The zouave owes his fondness for adventure and his almost nomadic habits to the African war. In constantly pursuing the Arabs through deserts and over mountains, he has formed habits of living very like those of these wandering tribes. Like the philosopher Bias, the zouave carries all his possessions about with him, which proves, perhaps, that he is something of a philosopher. But you should see a zouave’s knapsack when he is starting on an expedition. It is monstrous; one wonders if he will not sink beneath his burden, and be compelled to cast it aside. He would rather die. Besides, it seems to be the universal belief that he does not feel the weight of it. Usually, on taking the field, the infantry lighten their load as much as possible; the officers not only permit this, but require it. It is not so with the zouave. This seems to be the very time that his burden must be heaviest He reduces his effects to the smallest possible compass, rolls them, squeezes them, and then crowds them, and crowds them, until the straps become too short and the distended knapsack threatens to burst. There is a little of everything in the zouave’s load. An enumeration of its contents would sound like the inventory of three distinct establishments;--a drug, a haberdashery, and a grocery store. He has thread, needles, buttons, soap, wax, tallow, a thimble, a fork, one or two spoons, and several knives, to say nothing of the condiments indispensable in the concoction of a savory _ragoût_. For the zouave is a gourmand. It is to satisfy his fastidious tastes in this direction that, having no servant at his command, he has made himself the best cook in Europe. His _ragoûts_ might not make his fortune in Paris; but in Africa, in the desert, how many generals have smacked their lips over them! Any one can make a savory dish of stewed rabbit _with_ a rabbit; but to make it _without_ a rabbit, that is a difficult task, quite worthy of a zouave. His fertile imagination never shines as brilliantly as when the larder is empty; then, he employs all his wits; he searches, he invents. On such days, he dines admirably; but how many strange animals are made to turn from their usual path to take the road to the saucepan. “I do not ask my zouaves for strawberries,” said Marshal, then Colonel Canrobert, one frightfully hot day, in the middle of the desert; “but if I really desired some, they are quite capable of discovering them in the sand.” To-day the zouave is the most popular of all our soldiers; his _chachia_ threatens to pass down to posterity with the towering bear-skin cap worn by the grenadiers of the First Empire. It is to the zouave that we owe the words of the celebrated march known as the “Casquette.” This is the origin of it: