cities, towns, and plains through the kaids appointed
by him, while the mountain tribes were practically free.
As the Sultan's revenues depended upon the amount
of taxes raised in the districts under control, his repu-
tation as a ruler depended to a great degree upon
the success with which he protected these districts
already under his sovereignty and increased their
extent. An additional incentive for him to try and
keep the border tribes in order was the knowledge that
if he was unable to do it, the Powers were always ready
to assist him in his task.

The Powers that were most interested in preserving
the independence of the Shereefian Empire -- through
mutual jealousy rather than through any desire to
respect the authority of the Sultan -- were France,
Great Britain, Spain, and Germany. Of these, Spain
had the oldest and least dangerous claims. After four
centuries of struggle she held merely a few présidios
along the Mediterranean coast, the two principal ones
being Ceuta and Melilla. France could date her inter-
ests back to 1533, when the Sultan of Fez granted to
Francis I the right to navigate freely upon the shores
of his states, and during the seventeenth century the
influence of France in Morocco was supreme. Her su-
premacy in the Moorish Empire ended in 1713, when
the Treaty of Utrecht gave Gibraltar to the English.
Great Britain also could claim an ancient lineage in her
Moroccan interests, as Charles II by his marriage to
Catherine of Braganza, inherited Tangier from Portu-
gal in 1662. It was found to be a dower of doubtful
value and after twenty years' sojourn there, the Eng-
lish found that they would be better off without it.

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