KAID MACLEAN

Te Aroha News, Volume XXVII, Issue 43113, 13 July 1907, Page 4

KAID MACLEAN

Kaid Sir Harry Maclean, who i& .at present in the hands of the bandit Raisuli, is 59 years of age. He was formerly in the 69th Foot. He is Colonel of the Sultan of Morocco’s bodyguard, and has been decorated for services to the British Government'. For some time past Raisuli and his followers have' been a source of anxiety to the Powers, and it has been more than once stated that the Suitan of Morocco was not in earnest' in his efforts to capture this famous bandit. “Nothing” (says Broad Arrow) “could be mere ominous than the open defiance of the Powers by Raisuli, who has made it known that he is prepared, with 15,000 men at his back, to sweep the infidels into the sea. . Raisuli is not a braggart'. Hitherto the connection between bis words and his deeds has been close. Therefore, allowing for a little Oriental exaggeration as to the number of hiis' followers, his threat! is no empty one. He is to Morocco what the Boxers were to China in 1900—a blind instrument of the national awakening. What people do not choose to remember is that the Moors were for generations a terror to all Christendom, and held Christian slaves in hideous captivity at their own sweet will. They are to-day Very match what they were then. . . . j

Should! Raisuli or any other Moorish leader give rent to the pent-up fury of his people against the Christians, the Powers will find it no easy task to retrieve the disaster and the blow to their own prestige. The relief of the legations in the Bast, will have to he repeated in the West in far more difficult circumstances.”