The ill-fated engineer who was legally
responsible for the mishap was in Paris at the time; he returned in all
haste. After seeing the mischief, he tried to throw himself into an Arab
well, and, baulked of this, lay down at night under a passing train and
was decapitated.
They showed me a map of this subterranean world, variously tinted
according to the regions already exploited and those yet virgin. It
reminded me, with its regular streets and blocks, of some model city in
the Far West.
The underground workings here are about thirty kilometres in length.
Beside these Metlaoui deposits, the company has begun to attack those of
Redeyeff, and will shortly open an assault upon the others at Ain
Moulares, which lie near Henchir Souatir, the present terminus of the
Feriana line. It employs six thousand men; some of the mineral goes as far
as Japan; the output of last year amounted to over a million tons.
One may well be interested in the discoverer of these phosphates, in the
man who has revolutionized the trade of Tunisia. He is a veterinary
surgeon in the French Army--Monsieur Philippe Thomas.
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