granted all the signatories to the Madrid Convention most-favoured-nation treatment, claimed that if France desired to make good her demand for special privileges, she ought to have the consent of the special signatories to the Madrid pact.  Germany had a right to be heard in any new settlement of Moroccan conditions; she could not allow herself to be treated as a quantite negligeable, nor be left out of account when a country lying on two of the world’s greatest commercial highways was being disposed of.  She had a commercial treaty with Morocco, conferring most-favoured-nation rights, and it did not accord with her honour to give way.

The Act of Algeciras, however, proved to have brought only temporary relief to European tension.  Disturbances continued in Morocco, French subjects were murdered at Marakesch in 1907, and France occupied the province of Udja with troops until satisfaction should be given.  Owing to riots at Casablanca in 1908, in which French as well as Spanish and Italian labourers were killed, she decided to occupy the place, and sent a strong military and naval force thither.  A French warship bombarded the town, and by June, 1908, the French army of occupation numbered 15,000 men.  Meanwhile internal commotions and intrigues had led to the deposition of Abdul Aziz and his replacement on the throne by his brother, Muley Hafid, with the support of Germany.  France and Spain refused to recognize the new ruler unless he gave guarantees that he would respect the Act of Algeciras.  Muley gave the required guarantees, and in March, 1909, France “declared herself wholly attached to the integrity and independence of the Shereefian Empire and decided to safeguard economic equality in Morocco.”  Germany on her side declared she was pursuing in Morocco only economic interests and, “recognizing that the special political interests of France in Morocco are closely bound up in that country with the consolidation of order and of internal peace,” was “resolved not to impede those interests.”

The German idea of not impeding French special political interests in Morocco was disclosed little more than two years later by the dispatch of the German gunboat Panther (of “Well done, Panther!” fame) on July 3, 1911, to the “closed” port of Agadir on the south Moroccan coast.

It was as dramatic a coup as the Emperor’s visit to Tangier and caused as much alarm.  The fact is that the march of French troops to Fez, which had taken place a few months before, convinced the Emperor and his Government that France, relying on the support of her Entente friend England, was bent on the Tunisification of Morocco.  The Emperor, Chancellor von Bethmann-Hollweg, and Foreign Secretary Kiderlen-Waechter met at the Foreign Office on May 21st, and it was decided to send a ship of war, as at once a hint and a demonstration, to Agadir or other Moroccan port.  Germany, of course, in accordance with diplomatic strategy, did