As the telegram which we publish on another page inform us that the relations between France and the sniall State of Tanis are becoming critical, some particulars of the latter may be interesting to our readers. It is situated in the central part of the northern coast of of Africa, occupying the countries Byzaciam, and projects tower centre of the Mediter: in eighty miles of Sicily. Ite position therefore makes it the most important of all the countries in northern Africa. The dimensions of the State are about 300 miles from north to south and some 65 to 140 miles from east to west, the average width being about 100 miles, so that the area of Tunis may be estimated at 30,000 square miles, Its people have always been warlike and commercial, and were the terror and detestation of the Romans, if the height of their power. Tu the middle ages, its inhabitants and the Saracens invaded southern Europe, and after it fell into the hands of the Mahomedan pirates in the sixteenth century, it was a constant annoyance to the Christian States.
its coast are many excellent harbours, which were the resort of the Barbary corsairs and slavers; in them they fitted out the fleets and vessels with which they committed groat ravages on the commerce of all nations trading in the Mediterranean. In 1656, Admiral Blake, with a powerfal fleet, the first that had appeared in these seas since the time of the Crus having compelled the Dey of Algiers to make peace, appeared before Tunis, destroyed two castles, and forced the Bey to promise that his pirate subjects should not in fatare commit depredations on the English. France and Holland afterwards took the same course, but the agreements into which the Bey entered wore very imperfectly carried, out and indeed wore scarcely observed until 1816, when Lord Exmoutb, who, with a large naval force had inflicted condign punishment on Algeirs, threatened the same to Tunis, when the slavery of Christians was abolished for e1 The inbabitants of the State are of many races—Turks, Moors, and Jews; the capital is the city of Tunis, a large and flourish. ing port on the Gulf of the same name, a little to the south of ancient Carthage. The population is probably about 125,000 to 150,000, ana i more motley character than the inhabitants of the State generally, who, according to late statistics, number 2,100,000, of whom 45,000 are Jews, 25,000 Catholics, and the remainder, except a few hundred Protestants and Greeks, are Mahomedans.
The regular army of Tunis consists of seven regiments of infantry, four battalions of artillery, and a small body of cavalry, but in time of war the latter can be raised to 30,000. The equip-mout of the regular army is said to navy consists of two ships of war, viz., a despatch-boat, of 500 tons and 160 H.P., and carrying eight guns, and one transport of 400 tons, and the total number of seamen in the Bey's service' seems to be 250 men. Since 1871, the Porte has relingnished the tribute formerly paid by the Boy, who is inva with his rank at Constantinople. He cannot make war, conclude peace, or cede any of his territory without the permission of the Sultan, in whose name all the money of the State is coined. The army of the Bey is held at the disposal of the Porte in the case of war, The Eufida dispute is simple enough. A Pasha had mortgaged his estates to the Societe Marseillaise, and the interest fell into arrears, on which the Frouch Compsiny proceeded to foreclose. Levy, a British subject, held land adjoining, and claimed his right of pre-emption. Bat the Marseilles Company had endeavoured to evade this by making neutral belt round the lands, so as to destroy the contiguity of the estates, a device that might well inva originated in the brain of the typical low attorney of fiction, but which was adopted and supported by the representative of France, For some years past, the French hay been endeavouring to establish an protectorate over Tunis, and have always displayed much auessiness and irritation when any favour has been shown to the representatives or subjects of any other nation.,|Bey and his people like the Ttaliaus, with whom the chief part of their trade is carried on, better than the French, and some years ago conferred on the Rubattino Railway Company a cones. sion which their rivals wore very desirous to obtain. On that and subsequent occasions, the extreme sensitiveness of the French on all Tanisian matters and questions has been shown, while it seems to be evident that the Italian officials, merchants and engineers, have been growing in favour, England has very little interest in the affairs of the Tanis regency, or indeed of the kingdom. But in the Bufida dispute one of the parties is a British subject and has claimed protection for his rights from the Foreign Office. In this affair the French Charge d'Affaires would seem to have been in the wrong. The British subject was in possession of the land, which his labourers were tilling, and on which his cattle were grazing, when agents of the Marseilles Company hired a tribe of Algerian Arabs who attacked and dispossessed the agents of the Englishman, with the knowledge of the French representative at Tunis. According to Mahomedan law, Mr. Levy, the British subject, bad the right of pre-emption to the land, and it seems that his right can scarcely be contested, as France, England and other European Powers, had recognized and guaranteed Mahomedan law in all matters relating to Jand tenure. Bat it appears from the little that has been allowed to appear in the French newspapers on this matter, that neither the French Ministry nor the Marsvilles
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.