gation of Algeria, neither pains nor money length the confusion became so great, and were spared to insure the success of the the casualties so numerous, that if it had expedition. The minister of war, the Count been January instead of June, the consede Bourmont, with more heroism than he quences would have been very serious. It afterwards thought proper to display in the would, perhaps, have been happy for Hascourse of the campaign, placed himself at sein Pasha if he had persevered in this mode its head and on the 28th of May, 1830, of warfare. It was suited to his resources, the army effected an undisturbed disem- his talents, and his troops. But he had barkation at Sidi-El-Ferruch, a small prom- formed an inordinate estimate of his own ontory about five leagues to the west of military skill, and resolved to risk his forAlgiers. tunes in a battle. The plain of Staweli appeared to offer considerable advantages as a theatre for this combat. Somewhat elevated above Sidi-El-Ferruch, it afforded the Mussulmans the opportunity of charging down hill-a consideration of no slight moment in the onset of troops, each man of whom fought as his own fancy or fortune directed him, and who despised regular manœuvres as much as the Highlanders at PrestonPans. As the projects of the French embraced occupancy as well as conquest, and an attempt at colonization made easy,' by the aid of wealth and science, the ingredients of the immense host thus poured forth upon Africa were necessarily very miscellaneous, and even chaotic in their character. Engineers to map out the country; savans to philosophize on their discoveries; antiquarians to search after Roman relics; farmers, fond of experimentizing, to cultivate the land as it was conquered; emigrants with their title-deeds to farms yet in the future tense firmly secured in their knapsacks, mingled with the more regular elements of June, simultaneously attacked by the enean invading army: while crutches for the disabled, wooden legs for the mutilated, and air balloons for the adventurous, bore witness to the foresight and ingenuity of the Parisian war-office. The French army consisted of three divisions, each of which was, about four o'clock in the morning of the 17th of my; and on each wing the success of the Turks was at first decisive. Against the left the charge was led most gallantly by the Aga in person, at the head of his Janissaries. Urging their horses at full speed The first military operations on the down the declivity, and leaping the barriAfrican coast took place on the same day cade, behind which the French were enthat the army disembarked. A small fort trenched, in a style which Lord Gardiner on the promontory appeared to the French might envy, their first onset was irresistiengineers to present an obstacle which ble; and if it had not been for the oppormust be overcome. Approaches were made tune arrival of General D'Arcine, with the in form a storming party threw them- 29th, the fortune of the day might have selves, with promising bravery, on the been different, and Flodden had been breach as soon as practicable-but alas! parturiunt montes, and the young aspirants for fame received more raillery than praise when they emerged with the garrison-two hens and a litter of puppies! Bannockburn!' On the right, too, the Bey of Constantina, by creeping up some small ravines clothed with brushwood, approached unperceived within a hundred yards of the French line, and all but achieved the capture of a park of artillery which was there posted. But more formidable enemies were not wanting, and soon made themselves felt, though not seen. It was the policy of the But among undisciplined troops there is dey to allow the French to land, for the no surer prelude to ruin than a partial sucsake of plundering their baggage after he cess, and at this moment General Lahitte should have beaten them; but it formed no-for the Count de Bourmont had contentpart of his design to allow them to sleep in ed himself with surveying the action from peace when that landing was effected. As the beach with the aid of a telescope-took night drew on, the tired soldiers addressed on himself the responsibility of ordering themselves to repose-but in vain. Con- the whole of the right wing to advance in tinual alarms prevented their closing their echelon, so as to coop up the Arab army eyes. Sentries mistook their comrades for between the two French divisions. Bedouins; partial attacks were made from movement was completely successful, altime to time upon detached portions of the though the left forgot to act merely as a line; out-posts were surprised; and at pivot, and advanced simultaneously with This the right. This error, which, with more skilful antagonists might have been fatal, had in fact a happy result; and the barbarians, broken and disheartened, retreated in the utmost disorder. The French army bivouacked for the night in the Algerine camp; and if their general had pushed on immediately to Algiers, there is little doubt he would have carried it by a coup-de-main. But the Count de Bourmont was not a prompt, nor, as we have already hinted, a very courageous soldier. The battle of Staweli was fought and won on the 17th of June, at the distance of only four leagues from Algiers, but it was not till the 28th that the French army was ordered to take Mount Bujareah, the summit of which commanded the capital. This important position was carried in a night skirmish, and rapid preparations were now made for investing Algiers itself. No nation in the world excels France in military engineering; and at daybreak on the 4th of July, the batteries of De Bourmont opened their fire at point-blank distance upon the devoted city, with splendid precision and effect. The dey and his janissaries fought like lions; but the fortifications of Algiers on the land side, erected merely with a view to the rude assaults of insurgent Arabs, were quite unfitted to withstand a scientific attack-and the issue of the combat was not for a moment doubtful. By nine o'clock, the fire from the emperor's fort, which overhung the town, was silenced; and the French engineers had already broken ground for new works against the remaining stronghold-the Kassaubahwhen a flag of truce from the dey announced that he had abandoned the hopeless conflict, and suspended further operations. Algiers being thus reduced, and the dey expelled, the French began to congratulate each other on their conquest; to survey its resources, and to deliberate as to its future fate. No great acumen, however, was requisite in the opinion of the politicians of Paris to mark out their future course. The end was obvious, and the means easy. Algeria must be colonized. The Arabs must be flattered or forced into submission; and European energy, with the aid of science, must supply the ravages or the lethargy of barbarism. True, they argued, we have hitherto been unfortunate in our colonies; they have been one by one wrested from us by the arms or jealous diplomacy of other states; but here we have nothing to fear. England, the only power able to molest us, feels secure in the possession of Gibraltar, Malta, and Corfu, and will view with indif ference our acquirements in the west. If Algeria is not, as Egypt, on the high road to India, or to any mighty emporium of wealth, still it enjoys redeeming advantages. Napoleon himself would not have disdained a country so rich in tropical productions, at the distance of only three days' sail from Marseilles. Once let us establish our Nouvelle France on the other side of the Mediterranean, and who shall limit our empire? Who can calculate the results that will flow from such a virgin field for wealth and enterprise? These were bright and not unnatural hopes-yet how signally have they failed! Since the capture of Algiers, in 1830, the north of Africa, instead of conferring riches and prosperity upon France, has been a constant object of anxiety and disappointment, and an incessant drain on her resources. The profound tranquillity which has reigned in Europe, has alone enabled her to maintain in Algeria 100,000 troops with any regard to prudence. We could almost venture to predict, that in the event of a continental war, she would be compelled, before six months elapsed, to abandon all her African interior possessions to the Arab tribes she is now endeavoring to crush. The terms which were granted the unfortunate old pirate, were more clement than he could reasonably have expected. His personal property was secured to him, and he was permitted to retire to Naples, which he chose for his future residence. One article of the convention concluded on this occasion is important; as it must influence our opinion of the subsequent It is the coast alone that is at present conduct of the French in Algeria. It is conquered. Oran, Algiers, Bona, Phillipto this effect-The exercise of the Mo-ville, Constantina are hers-but at the dishammedan religion shall remain free: the liberty of the inhabitants of all classes, their religion, property, commerce, and industry, shall receive no injury; their women shall be respected; the general takes this on his own responsibility.' tance of ten miles from any of these towns the farmer cannot visit his cattle; the husbandman cannot till his ground, without the protection of a patrol-and not even then without a very fair chance of being riddled by a bullet, or being dismembered by a yataghan.* coyness. And this is the state of ern coast of Africa, was not without its inthings after an occupation of fifteen years-fluence in strengthening this commendable after the expenditure of money France can ill afford to spare from her internal economy -and after the perpetration, on both sides, of outrages which humanity shudders to remember! France, however, had the advantage of being entirely unfettered by the trammels of propriety. She had no character to lose; and theretore did not hesitate to seize the That, as far as the Algerines were con- opportunity of enriching herself, by spoiling cerned, the French were justified in expel- the Philistines. And, under the circumling the dey, and in taking possession of stances, she decided rightly. Her colonizathose territories to which he had a rightful tion, as well as reduction, of Algiers and its claim, we are prepared to admit. A pirati- circumjacent territory, cannot, we think, be cal state has a caput lupinum, and may be censured by even a severe moralist. But exterminated by the first who is sufficiently we can go no further. Qui non habet ille powerful; nay, he who accomplishes the non dat. The dey of Algiers had neither feat is entitled to the gratitude of the rest right nor title (not even that of seignorial of the civilized world.t England might possession) to the country south of the plain with equal fairness have annexed Algiers to of the Metidja; and we must confess our her colonial possessions in 1816; and, that sympathy with the efforts which the Kabyles we did not, resulted, perhaps, more from a of the highlands, and the Bedouins of the cautious regard to the national reputation, plains, are making to preserve that indethan from a consideration of the best inter-pendence which they have enjoyed so long; ests of Europe. England felt at that peri- and which would seem intended by Proviod all the conscious pride of the popular school-boy. We had tamed the pride' of the overgrown bully of Europe, and we felt unwilling to hazard our well-earned character by any achievements, the motives of which might be questioned. Perhaps, too, the reflection, that while we retained our possessions in the Mediterranean, we might securely abandon the north-west dence to be a kind of birth-right to the inhabitants of such regions, as a partial compensation for the rugged and nomadic life they are destined to lead. But their opposition would have long ago succumbed under the immense resources brought to bear against them, if they had not possessed a leader who had influence. among them sufficient to organize that partial degree of combination which alone is suited to their genius. Unfortunately for "Nul ne peut se hazarder à une certaine distance sans être armé jusqu'aux dents. On va cher-France, such a man appeared at the precise cher de l'eau à la fontaine voisine, le fusil sur moment when his presence became indisl'épaule; on se visite l'arme au bris d'une pro-pensable, if the Arabs were to offer any priété à l'autre. Cette impossibilitié de se trans-effectual resistance. His name is familiar porter à la moindre distance, sans étre accompag to all the world. There are few, indeed, né d'une escorte, est un supplice indefinissable et qui ne permet pas de se croire un seul instant dans who have not heard of Abd-el-Kader. un pays civilizé." Rapport, &c., par M. Blanqui,' p. 17. The father of this extraordinary man was a marabout of great celebrity, and lineally The arrogance of the Algerines, and the amount of contribution they levied from different descended from Muley Abd-el-Kader, who states as a species of blackmail, is most surpris- is reverenced among the Arabs as the Elisha ing. And it is curious to observe the effect of of Mahomet. His mother too, who is still mutual jealousy among the continental powers alive, is remarkable for her grace and inin elevating to such factitious importance a mere telligence, and the young Abd-el-Kader enden of robbers. France, indeed, since the time of Henry IV., paid no tribute except under color joyed the advantage of an extremely culti of rent for the coral banks of Bona; and the vated Eastern education. While yet a mere Roman states enjoyed an equal freedom. Tur-youth he thoroughly understood the charkey, too, prohibited any depredations on Austrian or Russian vessels. But Sweden, Denmark, Por: tugal, Tuscany, the Two Sicilies, Sardinia, and Hanover, paid very heavily for the nominal friendship of the dey; and it is a disgraceful fact that England, even so lately as 1806, made him a present of 600l. whenever she changed her consul, an event which of course the Algerine government contrived to render tolerably frequent. -Vide L'Algérie,' par Baron Baude, vol. i. p. 264. acter of his countrymen, and used every effort to obtain that reputation for sanctity, without which he knew no permanent influence among the Arab tribes could be hoped for; and to which his position as a marabout and a pilgrim to Mecca entitled him to aspire. On the death of his father, in 1836, the happy effects of this foresight, and youth ful austerity were immediately perceptible. merates thirty-four different tribes who had He was unanimously elected emir of his pledged their faith to his brother, who is, own tribe; and when he unfurled the ban- in fact, (though this has been denied,) one ner of Mahomet, proclaimed a holy war, of Abd-el-Kader's numerous emissaries; and undertook to drive the unbelievers from and on being asked what had his countryAfrica, immense masses of tribes crowded men to complain of on the part of the to his standard from every quarter; and the French, made this reply: The Arabs deyoung sultan was enabled to commence that test you because you are of a different redetermined opposition to the French arms, ligion; because you are strangers; because the issue of which is even yet doubtful, and you now take possession of their country, which has fixed on him the attention of the and to-morrow will demand their virgins whole world. His career since that epoch and their children. They said to my brohas been chequered with disasters, but has ther, lead us, and let us recommence the been on the whole successful. It is evi- war. Every day which passes consolidates dently not his policy to risk his undisci- the Christians. Let us have done with plined troops in pitched battles against the them at once.' Whatever you may say,' French, and accordingly he has seldom at- rejoined the mortified official, there are tempted it; and in the few instances in many Arabs who appreciate and are devotwhich he has, even when supported, as at ed to us?' There is but one God,' was Isly, by the neighboring empire of Moroc- the answer of the obstinate catechumen, co, a signal defeat has been his fate. But my life is in His hands, and not in yours. in vain have general after general attempted I shall, therefore, speak candidly. Every his destruction. A victory however decisive has failed to crush him-has been barren of the usual consequences. In some quarter where he is least expected, the ubiquitous emir is certain to reappear after the apparent demolition of his forces; to revenge himself for his previous discomfiture by some coup de main at once rash and successful, and to vanish as suddenly when his exploit is achieved: while the editor of the Moniteur Algerien' endeavors, with the legerdemain of a French annalist, to turn defeat into victory, and a rapid retreat into a daring razzia! The butcheries of Clauzel, Barthezene, and Savary-the courteous urbanity and judicious measures of Lamoricière-and the pompous manifestoes of Bugeaud have proved equally inefficacious. Not only in the more distant provinces, such as Oran and Constantina, but even in the immediate vicinity of Algiers itself, ebullitions and outbreaks of the most dangerous character are continually occurring, and every thing evidences the determination of the Mussulman to shake off the hated yoke of the French on the earliest opportunity. The Journal des Debats' of the 12th of December, 1845, contains an instructive exposition of this hostility, from the mouth of Mohammed Abdallah, when a prisoner under sentence of death. He had been convicted of instigating revolt among the Beni-Zoug-Zougs, and was at one time supposed to be the famous Bou-maza, though afterwards ascertained to be only that chieftain's brother. The prisoner enu day you find Mussalmen come to tell you that they are attached to you, and that they are your faithful servants. Do not believe them; they lie through fear or through selfinterest. If you were to give every Arab a slice of roast meat every day, which they love so well, cut from your own flesh, they would not the less detest you; and every time that a chief arises whom they believe capable of vanquishing you, they will all follow him were it proposed to attack you in Algiers itself.' 'Do you not believe,' persisted his interrogators, that the Arabs will tire of dying for an enterprise which can never have any chance of success?' But the question remained unanswered: refusing to be baited any longer, the prisoner wrapped himself up in his haick, and relapsed into that obstinate silence from which it is hopeless to attempt to arouse a child of the desert. To this account of the state of the French prospects in Algeria, we give implicit credit; for the course of events during the period of their occupation, bears with it concurrent testimony. The speculative dreams to which the African expedition in 1830 gave birth have faded away. Alge ria is yet an unsubdued, an uncolonized, and an unproductive country. It would have been vexatious if the gallant Arabian, who has directed this opposi tion, had been either ugly or ferocious and we are happy to be able to acquaint our readers, on the authority of M. de France (to whom we owe an apology for this tardy notice), that he is by no means either the one or the other. That gentle-tails; but it does not appear that their man has detailed his adventures among the enormities are authorized, or even known Arab tribes, after having been taken priso- by their sultan,* though doubtless his pow ner while absent from his ship on a shoot- er rests on too precarious a tenure to enable ing party, in a simple and unaffected style him to hold the reigns of discipline with which adds to the interest of his story. too unyielding a hand. The following is his portrait of Abd-el-Keder, which, considering it is from the pen of a Frenchman and a captive, is sufficiently attractive. But, though Sidi-el-Hadj-Abd-el-KaderMahidin (which is his name in full) has been a very powerful obstacle to the progress of the French in Africa, he is by no means the only one with which they have had to contend; and we are inclined to doubt whether if he had never existed they would have had better fortune; or whether, if he were to be slain to-morrow, their success would be materially accelerated. "Abd-el-Kader is little, being not more than five feet high; his face long, and of excessive paleness; his large black eyes are mild and caressing; his mouth small and graceful; his nose aquiline. His beard is thin, but | very black. He wears a small moustache, which gives his features, naturally fine and Among the primary causes of the failure benevolent, a martial air, which becomes him of the projected colonization of the north exceedingly. The ensemble of his physiogno- of Africa, may be classed the profound ignomy is sweet and agreeable. M. Bravais has rance which prevailed among the French, told me that an Arab chief, whose name I on their first arrival, of the nature of the have forgotten, being one day on board the 'Loiret,' in the captain's state-room, on seeing country in which they found themselves. the portrait of a woman, Isabeau de Baviere, Intoxicated with the reports of the fertility whom the engraver had taken to personify of Algeria, they forgot the unhealthiness Europe, exclaimed, 'There is Abd-el-Kader.' which is usually its concomitant, and Abd-el-Kader nas beautiful small hands and which, in fact, prevails in very many parts feet, and displays some coquetry in keeping of the Regency to a fearful extent. Immethem in order. He is always washing them. diately south of Algiers lies the Sahel, While conversing, squatted upon his cushions, which is an immense elevated tract of he holds his toes in his fingers, or, if this pos ture fatigues him, he begins to pare the bot-country, lying between the Mediterranean tom of the nails with the knife and scissors of and the plain of the Metidja. Its surface which the mother-of-pearl handle is delicately is crowded with little valleys and interworked, and which he constantly has in his hands. "He affects an extreme simplicity in his dress. There is never any gold or embroidery upon his bernous.* He wears a shirt of very fine linen, the seams of which are covered with a silken stripe. Next to his shirt comes the haick. He throws over the haick two bernous of white wool, and upon the two white bernous a black one. A few silken tassals are the only ornaments which relieve the simplicity of his costume. He never carries any arms at his girdle. His feet are naked in his slippers. He has his head shaved, and his head-dress is composed of two or three Greek caps, the one upon the other, over which he throws the hood of his bernous."-p. 28. The testimony paid by M. de France to the courtesy, kindness and humanity of the emir, is equally strong. The cruelties indeed practised by the Arabs upon such unfortunate Christians as fall within their clutches, are most revolting in their de *The bernous is a woollen mantle without sleeves, but with a hood. The haick is a covering of very thin wool, worn as a wrapper over the head and shoulders. sected by deep ravines. Its general apHere we find health indeed, though no pearance is rugged, sterile, and broken. greater susceptibility of culture than is afforded by similar mountainous regions. But, behind this stretches the vast plain of Metidja, which science and combination might render available, but, which in its present state, confided to the isolated enterprise of individuals, is more fatal to life than even the Arab bullets.t An English vessel had been wrecked off the African coast; the crew were on the point of being sacrificed by the natives, when a detachment opportunely arrived from Abd-el-Kader, the officer in command of which thus addressed the Arabs:-" Unhappy people! What are you "Malheur au voyageur imprudent qui s'est |