General Forgemol’s march from Tebessa was a very different feat from General Saussier’s march from Manouba. While at Kairwán I had access to the journal of the _goumiers_ and other papers, and was able to write the following fairly correct account of an advance which awakens memories of Xenophon:— One of the most notable features of the concentric movement of the French troops on Kairwán is undoubtedly General Forgemol’s thirteen days’ march from Beccaria, nine miles east of Tebessa. The Division Forgemol consists of 7000 combatants, escorting a convoy of 8800 camels and 1500 mules, which carried thirty days’ provisions. Its composition is as follows:—Ten battalions of infantry, including three battalions of the 3d and two of the 1st Zouaves, three battalions of the 23d and one of the 1st Turcos, two battalions from the 100th and 34th of the Line, six squadrons of cavalry, the 3d Chasseurs d’Afrique, and two squadrons of the 3d Hussars, one troop of Spahis, together with 800 Goumiers, or Arab irregular cavalry, one battery of mountain guns, and another of horse artillery. The brigadiers under General Forgemol were Generals De la Sougéolle and De Jislain. The cavalry brigade was commanded by General Bonie. The order of march was adapted to the requirements of the enormous convoy, which even in close square covered a large extent of ground. The advance guard consisted of four squadrons of cavalry and two battalions of infantry. The main body of troops followed, headed by two battalions of infantry and one battery of artillery, flanked by a battalion of infantry on each side. The baggage train in close column of route was formed by an intervening battalion into two divisions, the first containing the baggage and the second the provisions. On either flank marched a troop of cavalry. The rear of the column was brought up by the mountain guns, three battalions of infantry, and one squadron of cavalry, while the whole force was covered by a cloud of irregular cavalry on every side. General Forgemol struck his camp at Beccaria early in the morning of the 16th of October, and in the afternoon of that day arrived at Ras-el-Aioun, on the Tunisian frontier. The next day a cavalry reconnaissance made a rapid movement to Hydra, some miles to the north-east of the boundary. Near the Roman ruins it was attacked by the warriors of the Ouled Maggers and the Frechich tribes, who had a few days before perpetrated a successful _razzia_ on Algerian territory between Ras-el-Aioun and Tebessa. The Goums suffered a loss of five killed and twenty-four wounded, and in the _mêlée_ considerable confusion ensued owing to the similarity existing between their costume and that of their assailants. Two _goumiers_ are even said to have been shot by mistake, and an order was subsequently issued that the Algerian irregulars should wear red, green, and yellow ribands on alternate days round their turbans, in order to distinguish them from their Tunisian co-religionists.