It is in the essential difference between these two statements that we have to seek for the origin of the typhoid fever and dysentery which has deprived France of so many of her children. M. Saint-Hilaire deceived not only Lord Granville and Signor Cairoli,—he deceived France, he deceived the army, and he deceived himself. If he had said in April that he was going to “carry out the traditions of his predecessors” and send the French forces to practically conquer Tunis, a _corps d’armée_ would have been mobilised, a proper ambulance and hospital service organised, and care taken not to bring soldiers from infected stations. But he said nothing of the kind: all he spoke of then was “a military promenade of ten days—a fortnight at the most,” “a rapid march against the Khamírs and back into Algeria,” and “a week’s expedition for which no preparations were necessary.” The frontier was crossed with such ideas as these, and what were the consequences? To the entry into Khamír-land succeeded the capture of Kef; the fall of Kef was followed by the occupation of Bizerta; after Bizerta came the march to the Bardo; the sequel to the treaty of Kasr-es-Said was the bombardment of Sfax and the concentric movement on Kairwán. The “military promenade of ten days—a fortnight at the most,” became an expedition, and the expedition became an occupation, but no serious preparations were made either for one or the other—_hinc illæ lacrimæ_. This, however, is not all. M. Barthélémy Saint-Hilaire not only indulged in the utmost conceivable stretch of the elasticity of diplomatic language, but he adopted a baneful fiction and stuck to it. “Tunis,” said this Aristotelian politician, “is at peace with France; Muhamed es Sadek is our ally: there can be no war between us, and the soldiers of the Republic must act accordingly. The persons and property of Tunisians must under all circumstances be respected.” It was these considerations which prevented houses and other buildings from being taken for hospital purposes; it was the attempt to solve the riddle of “when is a war not a war?” which condemned hundreds of sick soldiers to lie and die under the scant shelter of portable tents that afforded no adequate protection against either sun or rain. In short, it was this unhappy conjunction of falsehood and fiction, which set the ball of epidemic sickness rolling; and when it once began to roll, no amount of subsequent care and attention could possibly stop it. Add to the primary causes, a large admixture of red-tapeism, a fair amount of jealousy of any interference from a Red Cross Society, and no fellow- feeling between the medical officers and the _Intendance_, and we have the secret of the mortality amongst the French troops in Tunis, which even the _Havas_ failed to explain, and official denials were powerless to conceal.