The plants suffer at first from the strong winds,
but they acclimatize themselves by degrees.
Remembering what had been told me of the unsuccessful attempt of the
French to appropriate the water springs of Sidi Mansur, near Gafsa, I
asked Dufresnoy whether the Arabs had not contested the action of his
company at Seldja.
"I should think so!" he said. "They raised the devil. But we are not civil
servants here, who must humour the caprices of half a dozen savages: the
health of the settlement was dependent on our getting this water, and we
took it, _voila!_ The great ambition of the company is to fix its people
on the spot; to make life here so pleasant for them that they don't want
to leave."
"You must find it difficult. The Arabs, I suspect, run back to the desert
as soon as they have earned a few francs; and as for the European
tradesmen, no doubt they get rich quickly, and then return to their homes
again as soon as possible."
"That is exactly what the company manages to avoid. Let them prosper, we
say; but slowly. And we succeed."
"How so?"
"By manipulating the rates of merchandise transport.
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