The Spanish Government seems to have been paralysed by an
explosion of national feeling. There was not the least neces- sity for treating the rising of the Riff tribes as more than a barbarian insurrection, and this was, it was believed, the decision alike of the Queen-Regent and of S. Saga.sta's Ad- ministration. They did not want dangerous external com- plications, or an expense which would completely empty their already overburdened Treasury. So vehement was the outcry, however, about the "honour of Spain," especially in the Army, that the Government has felt constrained to yield, that Marshal Martinez Campos has been appointed Com- mander-in-Chief in Morocco, and that the Army round Melilla has been raised to twenty-five thousand. The Sultan offered to do the work of subjugation himself ; but this was refused, the universal feeling being that Spain owes it to her- self to defeat those who have attacked her. The Marshal intends, it is said, to penetrate into the hills ; and the expedi- tion will cost in the end six millions sterling, to obtain which the Spanish financiers have pledged the tobacco-revenue. Spanish persistence generally wins ; but even an Indian General would think twice before he ventured his troops in the recesses of a mountain system like the Riff.
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