morocco painted by a.s. forrest described by s.l. bensusan [illustration: stamp] london adam and charles black [illustration: in djedida] transcriber's note: the following apparent printer's errors were changed: from appearonce to appearance from everthing to everything from kindgom to kingdom from "tuesday market. to "tuesday market." other inconsistencies in spelling have been left as in the original. "as i have felt, so i have written." eothen. preface it has been a pleasant task to recall the little journey set out in the following pages, but the writer can hardly escape the thought that the title of the book promises more than he has been able to perform. while the real morocco remains a half-known land to-day, this book does not take the traveller from the highroad. the mere idler, the wayfarer to whom morocco is no more than one of many places of pilgrimage, must needs deal modestly with his task, even though modesty be an unfashionable virtue; and the painstaking folk who pass through this world pelting one another with hard facts will find here but little to add to their store of ammunition. this appeal is of set purpose a limited one, made to the few who are content to travel for the sake of the pleasures of the road, free from the comforts that beset them at home, and free also from the popular belief that their city, religion, morals, and social laws are the best in the world. the qualifications that fit a man to make money and acquire the means for modern travel are often fatal to proper appreciation of the unfamiliar world he proposes to visit. to restore the balance of things, travel agents and other far-seeing folks have contrived to inflict upon most countries within the tourist's reach all the modern conveniences by which he lives and thrives. so soon as civilising missions and missionaries have pegged out their claims, even the desert is deemed incomplete without a modern hotel or two, fitted with electric light, monstrous tariff, and served by a crowd of debased guides. in the wake of these improvements the tourist follows, finds all the essentials of the life he left at home, and, knowing nothing of the life he came to see, has no regrets. so from algiers, tunis, cairo--ay, even from jerusalem itself, all suggestion of great history has passed, and one hears among ruins, once venerable, the globe-trotter's cry of praise. "hail cook," he cries, as he seizes the coupons that unveil isis and read the riddle of the sphinx, "those about to tour salute thee." but of the great procession that steams past gibraltar, heavily armed with assurance and circular tickets, few favour morocco at all, and the most of these few go no farther than tangier. once there, they descend upon some modern hotel, often with no more than twenty-four hours in which to master the secrets of sunset land. after dinner a few of the bolder spirits among the men take counsel of a guide, who leads them to the moorish coffee-house by the great mosque. there they listen to the music of ghaitah and gimbri, pay a peseta for a cup of indifferent coffee, and buy an unmusical instrument or two for many times the proper price. thereafter they retire to their hotel to consider how fancy can best embellish the bare facts of the evening's amusement, while the true believers of the coffee-house (debased in the eyes of all other believers, and, somewhat, too, in fact, by reason of their contact with the infidel) gather up the pesetas, curse the unbeliever and his shameless relations, and praise allah the one who, even in these degenerate days, sends them a profit. on the following morning the tourists ride on mules or donkeys to the showplaces of tangier, followed by scores of beggar boys. the ladies are shown over some hareem that they would enter less eagerly did they but know the exact status of the odalisques hired to meet them. one and all troop to the bazaars, where crafty men sit in receipt of custom and relieve the nazarene of the money whose value he does not know. lunch follows, and then the ship's siren summons the travellers away from morocco, to speak and write with authority for all time of the country and its problems. with these facts well in mind, it seemed best for me to let the pictures suffice for tangier, and to choose for the text one road and one city. for if the truth be told there is little more than a single path to all the goals that the undisguised european may reach. morocco does not change save by compulsion, and there is no area of european influence below tangier. knowing one highway well you know something of all; consequently whether fez, mequinez, wazzan, or marrakesh be the objective, the travel story does not vary greatly. but to-day, marrakusha-al-hamra, red marrakesh, is the most african of all cities in morocco, and seemed therefore best suited to the purpose of this book. moreover, at the time when this journey was made, bu hamara was holding the approaches to fez, and neither mequinez nor wazzan was in a mood to receive strangers. so it falls out that the record of some two or three hundred miles of inland travel is all that awaits the reader here. in time to come, when morocco has been purged of its offences of simplicity and primitiveness, the tourist shall accomplish in forty-eight hours the journey that demanded more than a month of last year's spring. for sunset land has no railway lines, nor can it boast--beyond the narrow limits of tangier--telegraphs, telephones, electric light, modern hotels, or any of the other delights upon which the pampered traveller depends. it is as a primeval forest in the hour before the dawn. when the sun of france penetrates pacifically to all its hidden places, the forest will wake to a new life. strange birds of bright plumage, called in europe _gens d'armes_, will displace the storks upon the battlements of its ancient towns, the _commis voyageur_ will appear where wild boar and hyæna now travel in comparative peace, the wild cat (_felis throgmortonensis_) will arise from all mineralised districts. arab and berber will disappear slowly from the moroccan forest as the lions have done before them, and in the place of their _douars_ and _ksor_ there shall be a multitude of small towns laid out with mathematical precision, reached by rail, afflicted with modern improvements, and partly filled with frenchmen who strive to drown in the café their sorrow at being so far away from home. the real morocco is so lacking in all the conveniences that would commend it to wealthy travellers that the writer feels some apology is due for the appearance of his short story of an almost unknown country in so fine a setting. surely a simple tale of sunset land was never seen in such splendid guise before, and will not be seen again until, with past redeemed and forgotten, future assured, and civilisation modernised, morocco ceases to be what it is to-day. s.l. bensusan. _july ._ contents chapter i page by cape spartel chapter ii from tangier to djedida chapter iii on the moorish road chapter iv to the gates of marrakesh chapter v in red marrakesh chapter vi round about marrakesh chapter vii the slave market at marrakesh chapter viii green tea and politics chapter ix through a southern province chapter x "sons of lions" chapter xi in the argan forest chapter xii to the gate of the picture city list of illustrations . in djedida _frontispiece_ facing page . a shepherd, cape spartel . the courtyard of the lighthouse, cape spartel . a street, tangier . in tangier . a street in tangier . a guide, tangier . the road to the kasbah, tangier . head of a boy from mediunah . the goatherd from mediunah . old buildings, tangier . moorish house, cape spartel . a patriarch . pilgrims on a steamer . the hour of sale . evening, magazan . sunset off the coast . a veranda at magazan . a blacksmith's shop . a saint's tomb . near a well in the country . near a well in the town . moorish woman and child . evening on the plains . travellers by night . the r'kass . a traveller on the plains . the mid-day halt . on guard . a village at dukala . the approach to marrakesh . date palms near marrakesh . on the road to marrakesh . a minstrel . one of the city gates . a blind beggar . a wandering minstrel . the roofs of marrakesh . a gateway, marrakesh . a courtyard, marrakesh . a well in marrakesh . a bazaar, marrakesh . a brickfield, marrakesh . a mosque, marrakesh . a water seller, marrakesh . on the road to the sôk el abeed . the slave market . dilals in the slave market . on the house-top, marrakesh . a house interior, marrakesh . a glimpse of the atlas mountains . a marrakshi . street in marrakesh . an arab steed . a young marrakshi . fruit market, marrakesh . in the fandak . the jama'a effina . evening in camp . preparing supper . a goatherd . coming from the mosque, hanchen . evening at hanchen . on the road to argan forest . the snake charmer . in camp . a countryman . moonlight . a moorish girl . a narrow street in mogador . night scene, mogador . house tops, mogador . selling grain in mogador . selling oranges _the illustrations in this volume have been engraved in england by the hentschel colourtype process._ by cape spartel [illustration: a shepherd, cape spartel] chapter i by cape spartel over the meadows that blossom and wither rings but the note of a sea-bird's song, only the sun and the rain come hither all year long. _the deserted garden._ before us the atlantic rolls to the verge of the "tideless, dolorous inland sea." in the little bay lying between morocco's solitary lighthouse and the famous caves of spartel, the waters shine in colours that recall in turn the emerald, the sapphire, and the opal. there is just enough breeze to raise a fine spray as the baby waves reach the rocks, and to fill the sails of one or two tiny vessels speeding toward the coast of spain. there is just enough sun to warm the water in the pools to a point that makes bathing the most desirable mid-day pastime, and over land and sea a solemn sense of peace is brooding. from where the tents are set no other human habitation is in sight. a great spur of rock, with the green and scarlet of cactus sprawling over it at will, shuts off lighthouse and telegraph station, while the towering hills above hide the village of mediunah, whence our supplies are brought each day at dawn and sun-setting. two fishermen, clinging to the steep side of the rock, cast their lines into the water. they are from the hills, and as far removed from our twentieth century as their prototypes who were fishing in the sparkling blue not so very far away when, the world being young, theocritus passed and gave them immortality. in the valley to the right, the atmosphere of the sicilian idylls is preserved by two half-clad goatherds who have brought their flock to pasture from hillside mediunah, in whose pens they are kept safe from thieves at night. as though he were a reincarnation of daphnis or menalcas, one of the brown-skinned boys leans over a little promontory and plays a tuneless ghaitah, while his companion, a younger lad, gives his eyes to the flock and his ears to the music. the last rains of this favoured land's brief winter have passed; beyond the plateau the sun has called flowers to life in every nook and cranny. soon the light will grow too strong and blinding, the flowers will fade beneath it, the shepherds will seek the shade, but in these glad march days there is no suggestion of the intolerable heat to come. [illustration: the court-yard of the lighthouse, cape spartel] on the plot of level ground that nature herself has set in position for a camp, the tents are pitched. two hold the impedimenta of travel; in the third salam and his assistant work in leisurely fashion, as befits the time and place. tangier lies no more than twelve miles away, over a road that must be deemed uncommonly good for morocco, but i have chosen to live in camp for a week or two in this remote place, in preparation for a journey to the southern country. at first the tents were the cynosure of native eyes. mediunah came down from its fastness among the hilltops to investigate discreetly from secure corners, prepared for flight so soon as occasion demanded it, if not before. happily salam's keen glance pierced the cover of the advance-guard and reassured one and all. confidence established, the village agreed after much solemn debate to supply eggs, chickens, milk, and vegetables at prices doubtless in excess of those prevailing in the country markets, but quite low enough for europeans. this little corner of the world, close to the meeting of the atlantic and mediterranean waters, epitomises in its own quiet fashion the story of the land's decay. now it is a place of wild bees and wilder birds, of flowers and bushes that live fragrant untended lives, seen by few and appreciated by none. it is a spot so far removed from human care that i have seen, a few yards from the tents, fresh tracks made by the wild boar as he has rooted o' nights; and once, as i sat looking out over the water when the rest of the camp was asleep, a dark shadow passed, not fifty yards distant, going head to wind up the hill, and i knew it for "tusker" wending his way to the village gardens, where the maize was green. yet the district has not always been solitary. where now the tents are pitched, there was an orange grove in the days when mulai abd er rahman ruled at fez and marrakesh, and then mediunah boasted quite a thriving connection with the coasts of portugal and spain. the little bay wherein one is accustomed to swim or plash about at noonday, then sheltered furtive sailing-boats from the sleepy eyes of moorish authority, and a profitable smuggling connection was maintained with the spanish villages between algeciras and tarifa point. beyond the rocky caverns, where patient countrymen still quarry for millstones, a bare coast-line leads to the spot where legend places the gardens of the hesperides; indeed, the millstone quarries are said to be the original caves of hercules, and the golden fruit the hero won flourished, we are assured, not far away. small wonder then that the place has an indefinable quality of enchantment that even the twentieth century cannot quite efface. [illustration: a street, tangier] life in camp is exquisitely simple. we rise with the sun. if in the raw morning hours a donkey brays, the men are very much perturbed, for they know that the poor beast has seen a djin. they will remain ill-at-ease until, somewhere in the heights where mediunah is preparing for another day, a cock crows. this is a satisfactory omen, atoning for the donkey's performance. a cock only crows when he sees an angel, and, if there are angels abroad, the ill intentions of the djinoon will be upset. when i was travelling in the country some few years ago, it chanced one night that the heavens were full of shooting stars. my camp attendants ceased work at once. satan and all his host were assailing paradise, they said, and we were spectators of heaven's artillery making counter-attack upon the djinoon.[ ] the wandering meteors passed, the fixed stars shone out with such a splendour as we may not hope to see in these western islands, and the followers of the great camel driver gave thanks and praise to his master allah, who had conquered the powers of darkness once again. while i enjoy a morning stroll over the hills, or a plunge in the sea, salam, squatting at the edge of the cooking tent behind two small charcoal fires, prepares the breakfast. he has the true wayfarer's gift that enables a man to cook his food in defiance of wind or weather. some wisps of straw and charcoal are arranged in a little hole scooped out of the ground, a match is struck, the bellows are called into play, and the fire is an accomplished fact. the kettle sings as cheerfully as the cicadas in the tree tops, eggs are made into what salam calls a "marmalade," in spite of my oft-repeated assurance that he means omelette, porridge is cooked and served with new milk that has been carefully strained and boiled. for bread we have the flat brown loaves of mediunah, and they are better than they look--ill-made indeed, but vastly more nutritious than the pretty emasculated products of our modern bakeries. bargain and sale are concluded before the morning walk is over. the village folk send a deputation carrying baskets of eggs and charcoal, with earthen jars of milk or butter, fresh vegetables, and live chickens. i stayed one morning to watch the procedure. the eldest of the party, a woman who seems to be eighty and is probably still on the sunny side of fifty, comes slowly forward to where salam sits aloof, dignified and difficult to approach. he has been watching her out of one corner of an eye, but feigns to be quite unconscious of her presence. he and she know that we want supplies and must have them from the village, but the facts of the case have nothing to do with the conventions of trading in sunset land. "the peace of the prophet on all true believers. i have brought food from mediunah," says the elderly advance-guard, by way of opening the campaign. "allah is indeed merciful, o my aunt," responds salam with lofty irrelevance. then follows a prolonged pause, somewhat trying, i apprehend, to aunt, and struggling with a yawn salam says at length, "i will see what you would sell." she beckons the others, and they lay their goods at our steward's feet. salam turns his head away meanwhile, and looks out across the atlantic as though anxious to assure himself about the state of agriculture in spain. at last he wheels about, and with a rapid glance full of contempt surveys the village produce. he has a cheapening eye. "how much?" he asks sternly. [illustration: in tangier] item by item the old dame prices the goods. the little group of young married women, with babies tied in a bundle behind them, or half-naked children clinging to their loin-cloths, nods approval. but salam's face is a study. in place of contemptuous indifference there is now rising anger, terrible to behold. his brows are knitted, his eyes flame, his beard seems to bristle with rage. the tale of prices is hardly told before, with a series of rapid movements, he has tied every bundle up, and is thrusting the good things back into the hands of their owners. his vocabulary is strained to its fullest extent; he stands up, and with outspread hands denounces mediunah and all its ways. the men of the village are cowards; the women have no shame. their parents were outcasts. they have no fear of the prophet who bade true believers deal fairly with the stranger within their gates. in a year at most, perhaps sooner, "our master the sultan" will assuredly be among these people who shame al moghreb,[ ] he will eat them up, dogs will make merry among their graves, and their souls will go down to the pit. in short, everything is too dear. only the little children are frightened by this outburst, which is no more than a prelude to bargaining. the women extol and salam decries the goods on offer; both praise allah. salam assures them that the country of the "ingliz" would be ruined if its inhabitants had to pay the prices they ask for such goods as they have to sell. he will see his master starve by inches, he will urge him to return to tangier and eat there at a fair price, before he will agree to sacrifices hitherto unheard of in sunset land. this bargaining proceeds for a quarter of an hour without intermission, and by then the natives have brought their prices down and salam has brought his up. finally the money is paid in spanish pesetas or moorish quarters, and carefully examined by the simple folk, who retire to their ancestral hills, once more praising allah who sends custom. salam, his task accomplished, complains that the villagers have robbed us shamefully, but a faint twinkle in his eye suggests that he means less than he says. breakfast over, i seek a hillside cave where there is a double gift of shade and a wonderful view, content to watch the pageantry of the morning hours and dream of hard work. only the goatherds and their charges suggest that the district is inhabited, unless some vessel passing on its way to or from the southern coast can be seen communicating with the signal station round the bend of the rocks. there a kindly old scot lives, with his spanish wife and little children, in comparative isolation, from the beginning to the end of the year. "i've almost forgotten my own tongue," he said to me one evening when he came down to the camp to smoke the pipe of peace and tell of the fur and feather that pass in winter time. it was on a day when a great flight of wild geese had been seen winging its way to the unknown south, and the procession had fired the sporting instinct in one of us at least. [illustration: a street in tangier] mid-day, or a little later, finds salam in charge of a light meal, and, that discussed, one may idle in the shade until the sun is well on the way to the west. then books and papers are laid aside. we set out for a tramp, or saddle the horses and ride for an hour or so in the direction of the mountain, an unexplored riviera of bewildering and varied loveliness. the way lies through an avenue of cork trees, past which the great hills slope seaward, clothed with evergreen oak and heath, and a species of sundew, with here and there yellow broom, gum cistus, and an unfamiliar plant with blue flowers. trees and shrubs fight for light and air, the fittest survive and thrive, sheltering little birds from the keen-eyed, quivering hawks above them. the road makes me think of what the french mediterranean littoral must have been before it was dotted over with countless vulgar villas, covered with trees and shrubs that are not indigenous to the soil, and tortured into trim gardens that might have strayed from a prosperous suburb of london or paris. save a few charcoal burners, or stray women bent almost double beneath the load of wood they have gathered for some village on the hills, we see nobody. these evening rides are made into a country as deserted as the plateau that holds the camp, for the mountain houses of wealthy residents are half a dozen miles nearer tangier.[ ] on other evenings the road chosen lies in the direction of the caves of hercules, where the samphire grows neglected, and wild ferns thrive in unexpected places. i remember once scaring noisy seabirds from what seemed to be a corpse, and how angrily the gorged, reluctant creatures rose from what proved to be the body of a stranded porpoise, that tainted the air for fifty yards around. on another evening a storm broke suddenly. somewhere in the centre rose a sand column that seemed to tell, in its brief moment of existence, the secret of the origin of the djinoon that roam at will through eastern legendary lore. it is always necessary to keep a careful eye upon the sun during these excursions past the caves. the light fails with the rapidity associated with all the african countries, tropical and semi-tropical alike. a sudden sinking, as though the sun had fallen over the edge of the world, a brief after-glow, a change from gold to violet, and violet to grey, a chill in the air, and the night has fallen. then there is a hurried scamper across sand, over rocks and past boulders, before the path that stretches in a faint fading line becomes wholly obliterated. in such a place as this one might wander for hours within a quarter of a mile of camp, and then only find the road by lucky accident, particularly if the senses have been blunted by very long residence in the heart of european civilisation. [illustration: a guide, tangier] i think that dinner brings the most enjoyable hour of the day. work is over, the sights of sea and shore have been enjoyed, we have taken exercise in plenty. salam and his helpers having dined, the kitchen tent becomes the scene of an animated conversation that one hears without understanding. two or three old headmen, finding their way in the dark like cats, have come down from mediunah to chat with salam and the town moor. the social instinct pervades morocco. on the plains of r'hamna, where fandaks are unknown and even the n'zalas[ ] are few and far between; in the fertile lands of dukala, shiadma, and haha; in m'touga, on whose broad plains the finest arab horses are reared and thrive,--i have found this instinct predominant. as soon as the evening meal is over, the headmen of the nearest village come to the edge of the tent, remove their slippers, praise god, and ask for news of the world without. it may be that they are going to rob the strangers in the price of food for mules and horses, or even over the tent supplies. it may be that they would cut the throats of all foreign wayfarers quite cheerfully, if the job could be accomplished without fear of reprisals. it is certain that they despise them for unbelievers, _i.e._ christians or jews, condemned to the pit; but in spite of all considerations they must have news of the outer world. when the moon comes out and the great bear constellation is shining above our heads as though its sole duty in heaven were to light the camp, there is a strong temptation to ramble. i am always sure that i can find the track, or that salam will be within hail should it be lost. how quickly the tents pass out of sight. the path to the hills lies by way of little pools where the frogs have a croaking chorus that aristophanes might have envied. on the approach of strange footsteps they hurry off the flat rocks by the pool, and one hears a musical plash as they reach water. very soon the silence is resumed, and presently becomes so oppressive that it is a relief to turn again and see our modest lights twinkling as though in welcome. it is hopeless to wait for wild boar now. one or two pariah dogs, hailing from nowhere, have been attracted to the camp, salam has given them the waste food, and they have installed themselves as our protectors, whether out of a feeling of gratitude or in hope of favours to come i cannot tell, but probably from a mixture of wise motives. they are alert, savage beasts, of a hopelessly mixed breed, but no wild boar will come rooting near the camp now, nor will any thief, however light-footed, yield to the temptation our tents afford. [illustration: the road to the kasbah, tangier] we have but one visitor after the last curtain has been drawn, a strange bird with a harsh yet melancholy note, that reminds me of the night-jar of the fen lands in our own country. the hills make a semicircle round the camp, and the visitor seems to arrive at the corner nearest spartel about one o'clock in the morning. it cries persistently awhile, and then flies to the middle of the semicircle, just at the back of the tents, where the note is very weird and distinct. finally it goes to the other horn of the crescent and resumes the call--this time, happily, a much more subdued affair. what is it? why does it come to complain to the silence night after night? one of the men says it is a djin, and wants to go back to tangier, but salam, whose loyalty outweighs his fears, declares that even though it be indeed a devil and eager to devour us, it cannot come within the charmed range of my revolver. hence its regret, expressed so unpleasantly. i have had to confess to salam that i have no proof that he is wrong. now and again in the afternoon the tribesmen call to one another from the hill tops. they possess an extraordinary power of carrying their voices over a space that no european could span. i wonder whether the real secret of the powers ascribed to the half-civilised tribes of africa has its origin in this gift. certain it is that news passes from village to village across the hills, and that no courier can keep pace with it. in this way rumours of great events travel from one end of the dark continent to the other, and if the tales told me of the passage of news from south to north africa during the recent war were not so extravagant as they seem at first hearing, i would set them down here, well assured that they would startle if they could not convince. in the south of morocco, during the latter days of my journey, men spoke with quiet conviction of the doings of sultan and pretender in the north, just as though morocco possessed a train or telegraph service, or a native newspaper. it does not seem unreasonable that, while the deserts and great rolling plains have extended men's vision to a point quite outside the comprehension of europe, other senses may be at least equally stimulated by a life we europeans shall: never know intimately. perhaps the fear of believing too readily makes us unduly sceptical, and inclined to forget that our philosophy cannot compass one of the many mysteries that lie at our door. if any proof were required that morocco in all its internal disputes is strictly tribal, our safe residence here would supply one. on the other side of tangier, over in the direction of tetuan, the tribes are out and the roads are impassable. europeans are forbidden to ride by way of angera to tetuan. even a minister, the representative of a great european power, was warned by old hadj mohammed torres, the resident secretary for foreign affairs, that the moorish administration would not hold itself responsible for his safety if he persisted in his intention to go hunting among the hills. and here we remain unmolested day after day, while the headmen of the mediunah tribe discuss with perfect tranquillity the future of the pretender's rebellion, or allude cheerfully to the time when, the jehad (holy war) being proclaimed, the moslems will be permitted to cut the throats of all the unbelievers who trouble the moghreb. in the fatalism of our neighbours lies our safety. if allah so wills, never a nazarene will escape the more painful road to eternal fire; if it is written otherwise, nazarene torment will be posthumous. they do not know, nor, in times when the land is preparing for early harvest, do they greatly care, what or when the end may be. your wise moor waits to gather in his corn and see it safely hoarded in the clay-lined and covered pits called mat'moras. that work over, he is ready and willing, nay, he is even anxious, to fight, and if no cause of quarrel is to be found he will make one. [illustration: head of a boy from mediuna] every year or two a party of travellers settles on this plateau, says the headman of mediunah. from him i hear of a fellow writer from england who was camped here six years ago.[ ] travellers stay sometimes for three or four days, sometimes for as many weeks, and he has been told by men who have come many miles from distant markets, that the nazarenes are to be found here and there throughout the moroccan highlands towards the close of the season of the winter rains. clearly their own land is not a very desirable abiding place, or they have sinned against the law, or their sultan has confiscated their worldly goods, remarks the headman. my suggestion that other causes than these may have been at work, yields no more than an assertion that all things are possible, if allah wills them. it is his polite method of expressing reluctance to believe everything he is told. from time to time, when we are taking our meals in the open air, i see the shepherd boys staring at us from a respectful distance. to them we must seem no better than savages. in the first place, we sit on chairs and not on the ground. we cut our bread, which, as every true believer knows, is a wicked act and defies providence, since bread is from allah and may be broken with the hand but never touched with a knife. then we do not know how to eat with our fingers, but use knives and forks and spoons that, after mere washing, are common property. we do not have water poured out over our fingers before the meal begins,--the preliminary wash in the tent is invisible and does not count,--and we do not say "bismillah" before we start eating. we are just heathens, they must say to themselves. our daily bathing seems to puzzle them greatly. i do not notice that little larbi or his brother kasem ever tempt the sea to wash or drown them. yet they look healthy enough, and are full of dignity. you may offer them fruit or sweetmeats or anything tempting that may be on the table, and they will refuse it. i fancy they regard the invitation to partake of nazarene's food as a piece of impertinence, only excusable because nazarenes are mad. the days slip away from the plateau below mediunah. march has yielded place to april. to-morrow the pack-mules will be here at sunrise. in the afternoon, when the cool hours approach, camp will be struck, and we shall ride down the avenue of cork trees for the last time on the way to "tanjah of the nazarenes," whence, at the week end, the boat will carry us to some atlantic port, there to begin a longer journey. [illustration: the goatherd from mediuna] footnotes: [ ] "moreover, we have decked the lower heaven with lamps, and have made them for pelting the devils."--al koran; sura, "the kingdom." [ ] "the far west", the native name for morocco. [ ] one of the most charming of these houses is "aidonia," belonging to mr. ion perdicaris. he was seized there by the brigand rais uli in may last. [ ] shelters provided by the government for travellers. [ ] a.j. dawson, whose novels dealing with morocco are full of rare charm and distinction. from tangier to djedida [illustration: old buildings, tangier] chapter ii from tangier to djedida whan that aprille with his shoures soote the droghte of march hath perced to the roote * * * * * thanne longen folk to goon on pilgrimages. _the canterbury tales._ we have rounded the north-west corner of africa, exchanged farewell signals with our friend on lloyd's station,--who must now return to his spanish and arabic or live a silent life,--and i have taken a last look through field-glasses at the plateau that held our little camp. since then we have raced the light for a glimpse of el araish, where the gardens of the hesperides were set by people of old time. the sun was too swift in its decline; one caught little more than an outline of the white city, with the minarets of its mosques that seemed to pierce the sky, and flags flying in the breeze on the flat roofs of its consuls' houses. the river lekkus showed up whitely on the eastern side, a rising wind having whipped its waters into foam, and driven the light coasting vessels out to sea. so much i saw from the good ship _zweena's_ upper deck, and then evening fell, as though to hide from me the secret of the gardens where the golden apples grew. alas, that modern knowledge should have destroyed all faith in old legend! the fabled fruits of the hesperides turn to oranges in the hands of our wise men, the death-dealing dragon becomes wad lekkus itself, so ready even to-day to snarl and roar at the bidding of the wind that comes up out of the south-west, and the dusky maidens of surpassing loveliness are no more than simple berber girls, who, whilst doubtless dusky, and possibly maidenly as ever, have not inherited much of the storied beauty of their forbears. in spite of this modern perversion of the old tale i find that the oranges of the dining-table have a quite rare charm for me to-night,--such an attraction as they have had hitherto only when i have picked them in the gardens of andalusia, or in the groves that perfume the ancient town of jaffa at the far eastern end of the mediterranean. now i have one more impression to cherish, and the scent of a blossoming orange tree will recall for me el araish as i saw it at the moment when the shroud of evening made the mosques and the kasbah of mulai al yazeed melt, with the great white spaces between them, into a blurred pearly mass without salient feature. [illustration: moorish house, cape spartel] you shall still enjoy the sense of being in touch with past times and forgotten people, if you will walk the deck of a ship late at night. your fellow-passengers are abed, the watch, if watch there be, is invisible, the steady throbbing movement of the screw resolves itself into a pleasing rhythmic melody. so far as the senses can tell, the world is your closet, a silent pleasaunce for your waking dreams. the coast-line has no lights, nor is any other vessel passing over the waters within range of eye or glass. the hosts of heaven beam down upon a silent universe in which you are the only waking soul. on a sudden eight bells rings out sharply from the forecastle head, and you spring back from your world of fancy as hurriedly as cinderella returned to her rags when long-shore midnight chimed. the officer of the middle watch and a hand for the wheel come aft to relieve their companions, the illusion has passed, and you go below to turn in, feeling uncomfortably sure that your pretty thoughts will appear foolish and commonplace enough when regarded in the matter-of-fact light of the coming day. dár el baida, most moorish of seaports, received us in the early morning. the wind had fallen, and the heavy surf-boats of the port could land us easily. we went on shore past the water-gate and the custom-house that stands on the site of the stores erected by the society of the gremios majores when charles v. ruled spain. dár el baida seemed to have straggled over as much ground as tangier, but the ground itself was flat and full of refuse. the streets were muddy and unpaved, cobble stones strove ineffectually to disguise drains, and one felt that the sea breezes alone stood between the city and some such virulent epidemic as that which smote tangier less than ten years ago. but withal there was a certain picturesque quality about dár el baida that atoned for more obvious faults, and the market-place afforded a picture as eastern in its main features as the tired western eye could seek. camel caravans had come in from the interior for the monday market. they had tramped from the villages of the zair and the beni hassan tribes, bringing ripe barley for sale, though the spring months had not yet passed. from places near at hand the husbandmen had brought all the vegetables that flourish after the march rains,--peas and beans and lettuces; pumpkins, carrots and turnips, and the tender leaves of the date-palm. the first fruits of the year and the dried roses of a forgotten season were sold by weight, and charcoal was set in tiny piles at prices within the reach of the poorest customers. wealthy merchants had brought their horses within the shadow of the sok's[ ] high walls and loosened the many-clothed saddles. slaves walked behind their masters or trafficked on their behalf. the snake-charmer, the story-teller, the beggar, the water-carrier, the incense seller, whose task in life is to fumigate true believers, all who go to make the typical moorish crowd, were to be seen indolently plying their trade. but inquiries for mules, horses, and servants for the inland journey met with no ready response. dár el baida, i was assured, had nothing to offer; djedida, lower down along the coast, might serve, or saffi, if allah should send weather of a sort that would permit the boat to land. [illustration: a patriarch] as it happened, djedida was the steamer's next port of call, so we made haste to return to her hospitable decks. i carried with me a vivid impression of dár el baida, of the market-place with its varied goods, and yet more varied people, the white arabs, the darker berbers, the black slaves from the soudan and the draa. noticeable in the market were the sweet stores, where every man sat behind his goods armed with a feather brush, and waged ceaseless war with the flies, while a corner of his eye was kept for small boys, who were well nigh as dangerous. i remember the gardens, one particularly well. it belongs to the french consul, and has bananas growing on the trees that face the road; from beyond the hedge one caught delightful glimpses of colour and faint breaths of exquisite perfume. i remember, too, the covered shed containing the mill that grinds the flour for the town, and the curious little bakehouse to which dár el baida takes its flat loaves, giving the master of the establishment one loaf in ten by way of payment. i recall the sale of horses, at which a fine raking mare with her foal at foot fetched fifty-four dollars in moorish silver, a sum less than nine english pounds. and i seem to see, even now as i write, the spanish woman with cruel painted face, sitting at the open casement of an old house near the spanish church, thrumming her guitar, and beneath her, by the roadside, a beggar clad, like the patriarch of old, in a garment of many colours, that made his black face seem blacker than any i have seen in africa. then dár el baida sinks behind the water-port gate, the strong moorish rowers bend to their oars, their boat laps through the dark-blue water, and we are back aboard the ship again, in another atmosphere, another world. passengers are talking as it might be they had just returned from their first visit to a zoological garden. most of them have seen no more than the dirt and ugliness--their vision noted no other aspect--of the old-world port. the life that has not altered for centuries, the things that make it worth living to all the folk we leave behind,--these are matters in which casual visitors to morocco have no concern. they resent suggestion that the affairs of "niggers" can call for serious consideration, far less for appreciation or interest of any sort. happily djedida is not far away. at daybreak we are securely anchored before the town whose possession by the portuguese is recorded to this hour by the fine fortifications and walls round the port. we slip over the smooth water in haste, that we may land before the sun is too high in the heavens. it is not without a thrill of pleasure that i hear the ship's shrill summons and see the rest of the passengers returning. [illustration: pilgrims on a steamer] by this time it is afternoon, but the intervening hours have not been wasted. i have found the maalem, master of a bakehouse, a short, olive-skinned, wild, and wiry little man, whose yellowed eyes and contracting pupils tell a tale of haschisch and kief that his twitching fingers confirm. but he knows the great track stretching some hundred and twenty miles into the interior up to red marrakesh; he is "the father and mother" of mules and horses, animals that brighten the face of man by reason of their superlative qualities, and he is prepared to undertake the charge of all matters pertaining to a journey over this roadless country. his beasts are fit to journey to tindouf in the country of the draa, so fine is their condition; their saddles and accoutrements would delight the sultan's own ministers. by allah, the inland journey will be a picnic! quite gravely, i have professed to believe all he says, and my reservations, though many, are all mental. in the days that precede departure--and in morocco they are always apt to be numerous--i seek to enter into the life of djedida. sometimes we stroll to the custom-house, where grave and dignified moors sit in the bare, barnlike office that opens upon the waste ground beyond the port. there they deliver my shot guns after long and dubious scrutiny of the order from the british consulate at tangier. they also pass certain boxes of stores upon production of a certificate testifying that they paid duty on arrival at the diplomatic capital. these matters, trivial enough to the western mind, are of weight and moment here, not to be settled lightly or without much consultation. rotting in the stores of this same custom-house are two grand pianos and an electric omnibus. the sultan ordered them, the country paid for them,--so much was achieved by the commercial energy of the infidel,--and native energy sufficed to land them; it was exhausted by the effort. if mulai abd-el-aziz wants his dearly purchased treasure, the ordering and existence of which he has probably forgotten, he must come to mazagan for it, i am afraid, and unless he makes haste it will not be worth much. but there are many more such shipments in other ports, not to mention the unopened and forgotten packing cases at court. [illustration: the hour of sale] the basha of djedida is a little old man, very rich indeed, and the terror of the entire dukala province. i like to watch him as he sits day by day under the wall of the kasbah by the side of his own palace, administering what he is pleased to call justice. soldiers and slaves stand by to enforce his decree if need be, plaintiff and defendant lie like tombstones or advertisements of patent medicines, or telegrams from the seat of war, but no sign of an emotion lights the old man's face. he tempers justice with--let us say, diplomacy. the other afternoon a french-protected subject was charged with sheep-stealing, and i went to the trial. salam acted as interpreter for me. the case was simple enough. the defendant had received some hundred sheep from plaintiff to feed and tend at an agreed price. from time to time he sent plaintiff the sad news of the death of certain rams, always among the finest in the flock. plaintiff, a farmer in good circumstances, testified to the unity of allah and was content to pray for better luck, until news was brought to him that most of the sheep reported dead were to be seen in the friday market fetching good prices. the news proved true, the report of their death was no more than the defendant's intelligent anticipation of events, and the action arose out of it. to be sure, the plaintiff had presented a fine sheep to the basha, but the defendant was a french subject by protection, and the vice-consul of his adopted nation was there to see fair play. under these circumstances the defendant lied with an assurance that must have helped to convince himself; his friends arrived in the full number required by the law, and testified with cheerful mendacity in their companion's favour. the basha listened with attention while the litigants swore strange oaths and abused each other very thoroughly. then he silenced both parties with a word, and gave judgment for the defendant. there was no appeal, though, had the defendant been an unprotected subject, the plaintiff's knife had assuredly entered into the final settlement of this little matter. but the plaintiff knew that an attack upon a french protégé would lead to his own indefinite imprisonment and occasional torture, to the confiscation of his goods, and to sundry other penalties that may be left unrecorded, as they would not look well in cold print. he knew, moreover, that everything is predestined, that no man may avoid allah's decree. these matters of faith are real, not pale abstractions, in morocco. so he was less discontented with the decision than one of his european brethren would have been in similar case--and far more philosophic regarding it. [illustration: evening, mazagan] quite slowly we completed our outfit for the inland journey. heaven aid the misguided nazarene who seeks to accomplish such matters swiftly in this land of eternal afternoon. i bought an extraordinary assortment of what our american friends call "dry-goods" in the jewish stores, from the very business-like gentlemen in charge of them. these all wore black gaberdines, black slippers, stockings that were once white, and black skull-caps over suspiciously shining love-locks. most of the jewish men seemed to have had smallpox; in their speech they relied upon a very base arabic, together with worse spanish or quite barbarous french. djedida having no mellah, as the moorish ghetto is called, they were free to trade all over the town, and for rather less than a pound sterling i bought quite an imposing collection of cutlery, plate, and dishes for use on the road. it is true, as i discovered subsequently, that the spoons and forks might be crushed out of shape with one hand, that the knives would cut nothing rougher than danish butter, and were imported from germany with a sheffield mark on them to deceive the natives, and that the plates and dishes were not too good to go with the cutlery. but nothing had been bought without bargaining of a more or less exciting and interesting sort, and for the bargaining no extra charge whatever was made. the little boxlike shops, with flaps that served as shutters, were ill-adapted for private purchase; there was no room for more than the owner inside, and before we had been at one for five minutes the roadway became impassable. all the idlers and beggars in that district gathered to watch the strangers, and the maalem was the only one who could keep them at bay. salam would merely threaten to cuff an importunate rogue who pestered us, but the maalem would curse him so fluently and comprehensively, and extend the anathema so far in either direction, from forgotten ancestors to unborn descendants, that no native could stand up for long against the flashing eye, the quivering forefinger, the foul and bitter tongue of him. there were times, then and later on, when the maalem seemed to be some moorish connection of captain kettle's family, and after reflecting upon my experience among hard-swearing men of many nations, seafarers, land-sharks, beach-combers and the rest, i award the maalem pride of place. you will find him to-day in djedida, baking his bread with the aid of the small apprentice who looks after the shop when he goes abroad, or enjoying the dreams of the haschisch eater when his work is done. he is no man's enemy, and the penalty of his shortcomings will probably fall upon no body or soul save his own. a picturesque figure, passionate yet a philosopher, patiently tolerant of blinding heat, bad roads, uncomfortable sleeping quarters and short commons, the maalem will remain alive and real in my memory long after the kaids and wazeers and other high dignitaries of his country are no more than dimly splendid shadows, lacking altogether in individuality. i learned to enjoy djedida by night. then the town was almost as silent as our camp below mediunah had been. the ramparts left by the portuguese and the white walls of the city itself became all of a piece, indistinct and mysterious as the darkness blended them. late camels coming into the town to seek the security of some fandak would pad noiselessly past me; weird creatures from the under-world they seemed, on whom the ghostlike arabs in their white djellabas were ordered to attend. children would flit to and fro like shadows, strangely quiet, as though held in thrall even in the season of their play by the solemn aspect of the surroundings. the market-place and road to the landing-stage would be deserted, the gates of the city barred, and there was never a light to be seen save where some wealthy moor attended by lantern-bearing slaves passed to and from his house. one night by the kasbah the voice of a watchman broke upon the city's silence, at a time when the mueddin was at rest, and it was not incumbent upon the faithful to pray. "be vigilant, o guardians," he cried,--"be vigilant and do not sleep." below, by my side, on the ground, the guardians, wrapped warm in their djellabas, dreamed on, all undisturbed. by night, too, the pariah dogs, scavengers of all mohammedan cities, roamed at their ease and leisure through djedida, so hungry and so free from daintiness that no garbage would be left on the morrow. moorish houses have no windows fronting the road--decency forbids, and though there might have been ample light within, the bare walls helped to darken the pathway, and it was wise to walk warily lest one should tumble over some beggar asleep on the ground. [illustration: sunset off the coast] on nights like these and through streets not greatly different, harun al raschid fared abroad in baghdad and lighted upon the wonderful folk who live for all time in the pages of the _arabian nights_. doubtless i passed some twentieth-century descendants of the fisher-folk, the calendars, the slaves, and the merchants who move in their wonderful pageantry along the glittering road of the "thousand nights and a night,"--the type is marvellously unchanging in al moghreb; but, alas, they spoke, if at all, to deaf ears, and salam was ever more anxious to see me safely home than to set out in search of adventure. by day i knew that djedida had little of the charm associated even in this year of grace with the famous city on the tigris, but, all over the world that proclaims the inspiration of mohammed, the old times come back by night, and then "a thousand years are but as yesterday." happily we were right below the area of rebellion. in the north, round fez and taza, there was severe fighting, spreading thence to the riff country. here, people did no more than curse the pretender in public or the sultan in private, according to the state of their personal feelings. communication with the south, said the maalem, was uninterrupted; only in the north were the sons of the illegitimate, the rebels against allah, troubling our lord the sultan. from djedida down to the atlas the tribes were peaceful, and would remain at rest unless our master should attempt to collect his taxes, in which case, without doubt, there would be trouble. [illustration: a verandah at mazagan] he was a busy man in these days, was the maalem. when he was not baking bread or smoking kief he was securing mules and bringing them for our inspection. to mr. t. spinney, son of the british vice-consul in mazagan, we owed our salvation. a master of moghrebbin arabic, on intimate terms with the moors, and thoroughly conversant with the road and its requirements, he stood between me and the fiery-tongued maalem. this mule was rejected, that saddle was returned, stirrups tied with string were disqualified, the little man's claim to have all "the money in the hand" was overruled, and the maalem, red-hot sputtering iron in my hands, was as wax in mr. spinney's. my good friend and host also found kaid m'barak,[ ] the soldier, a tall, scorched, imperturbable warrior, who rode a brave horse, and carried a gun done up in a very tattered, old, flannel case tied with half a dozen pieces of string. the kaid's business was to strike terror into the hearts of evil men in return for a moorish dollar a day, and to help with tent setting and striking, or anything else that might be required, in return for his food. he was a lean, gaunt, taciturn man, to whom twelve hours in the saddle brought no discomfort, and though he strove earnestly to rob me, it was only at the journey's end, when he had done his work faithfully and well. his gun seemed to be a constant source of danger to somebody, for he carried it at right angles to his horse across the saddle, and often on the road i would start to consciousness that the kaid was covering me with his be-frocked weapon. after a time one grew accustomed and indifferent to the danger, but when i went shooting in the argan forest i left the blessed one in camp. he was convinced that he carried his gun in proper fashion, and that his duty was well done. and really he may have been right, for upon a day, when a hint of possible danger threatened, i learned to my amusement and relief that the valiant man carried no ammunition of any sort, and that the barrel of his gun was stuffed full of red calico. our inland tramp over, he took one day's rest at mogador, then gathered the well-earned store of dollars into his belt and started off to follow the coast road back to djedida. perhaps by now the basha has had his dollars, or the sultan has summoned him to help fight bu hamara. in any case i like to think that his few weeks with us will rank among the pleasant times of his life, for he proved a patient, enduring man, and though silent, a not unedifying companion. among the strange stories i heard in djedida while preparing for the journey was one relating to the then war minister, kaid mahedi el menebhi, some-time envoy to the court of st. james's. in his early days menebhi, though a member of the great atlas kabyle of that name, had been a poor lad running about djedida's streets, ready and willing to earn a handful of _floos_[ ] by hard work of any description. then he set up in business as a mender of old shoes and became notorious, not because of his skill as a cobbler, but on account of his quick wit and clever ideas. in all mohammedan countries a believer may rise without any handicap on account of lowly origin, and so it fell out that the late grand wazeer, ba ahmad, during a visit to djedida heard of the young cobbler's gifts, and straightway gave him a place in his household. thereafter promotion was rapid and easy for menebhi, and the lad who had loafed about the streets with the outcasts of the city became, under the sultan, the first man in morocco. "to-day," concluded my informant, "he has palaces and slaves and a great hareem, he is a chief wazeer and head of the sultan's forces, but he still owes a merchant in djedida some few dollars on account of leather he had bought and forgot to pay for when ba ahmad took him to marrakesh."[ ] [illustration: a blacksmith's shop] in the r'hamna country, on the way to the southern capital, we pitched our tents one night in a government n'zala, or guarded camping-ground, one of many that are spread about the country for the safety of travellers. the price of corn, eggs, and chickens was amazingly high, and the maalem explained that the n'zala was kept by some of the immediate family of mahedi el menebhi, who had put them there, presumably to make what profit they could. i looked very carefully at our greedy hosts. they were a rough unprepossessing crowd, but their wealth in sheep and goats alone was remarkable, and their stock was safe from molestation, for they were known to be relatives of the sultan's chief minister, a man whose arm is long and hard-hitting. since last autumn menebhi has resigned his high office, reduced his household, manumitted many slaves, and gone on the great pilgrimage to mecca, so it may be presumed that his relatives in the forsaken r'hamna country have lowered their prices. yet, 'tis something to have a great wazeer for relative even though, for the time being, loss of favour has given him leisure for pious observances. at length the evening came, when the last mule was selected, the last package made up, and nothing lay between us and the open road. sleep was hard to woo. i woke before daylight, and was in the patio before the first animal arrived, or the sleepy porter had fumbled at the door of the warehouse where the luggage was stacked. morn in the white wake of the morning star came furrowing all the orient into gold, and gave to the tops of walls and battlements a momentary tinge of rose colour, a sight well worth the effort demanded by early rising. sparrow-hawks and pigeons were fluttering over their nests on the deserted battlements, a stork eyed me with solemn curiosity from the minaret of a near mosque, and only the earliest wayfarers were astir. how slowly the men seemed to do their work, and how rapidly the morning wore on. ropes and palmetto baskets refused to fit at the last moment, two mules were restive until their "father," the maalem, very wide awake and energetic, cursed their religion, and reminded them that they were the children of asses renowned throughout the moghreb for baseness and immorality. one animal was found at the last moment to be saddle-galled, and was rejected summarily, despite its "father's" frenzied assurances. though i had been astir shortly before three, and at work soon after four, it was nearly seven o'clock when the last crooked way had been made straight, the last shwarri[ ] balanced, and the luggage mules were moving to the dukala gate. the crowd of curious onlookers then gave way, some few wishing us well on the journey. i daresay there were many among them, tied by their daily toil to the town, who thought with longing of the pleasant road before us, through fertile lands where all the orchards were aflower and the peasants were gathering the ripe barley, though april had yet some days to revel in. small boys waved their hands to us, the water-carrier carrying his tight goat-skin from the wells set his cups a-tinkling, as though by way of a god-speed, and then m'barak touched his horse with the spur to induce the bravery of a caracole, and led us away from djedida. i drew a long breath of pleasure and relief; we were upon the road. footnotes: [ ] the sok is the market-place. [ ] kaid is a complimentary title--he was a common soldier. m'barak means "the blessed one," and is one of the names usually set apart for slaves. [ ] base copper coins, of which a penny will purchase a score. [ ] it is fair to say that this is no more than one of many stories relating to the great wazeer's early days. another says that he started life as a soldier. there is no doubt that he is a man of extraordinary talent. [ ] a pannier made of palmetto. on the moorish road [illustration: a saint's tomb] chapter iii on the moorish road with the brief gladness of the palms, that tower and sway o'er seething plain, fraught with the thoughts of rustling shade, and welling spring, and rushing rain; 'tis their's to pass with joy and hope, whose souls shall ever thrill and fill dreams of the birthplace and the tomb,-- visions of allah's holy hill. _the kasidah._ we travel slowly, for the maalem "father" of the pack-mules--guide, philosopher, and trusted companion--says that haste kills strong men, and often repeats a moorish proverb which tells us that walking is better than running, and that of all things sitting still is best. if salam and i, reaching a piece of level sward by the side of some orchard or arable land when the heat of the day has passed, venture to indulge in a brisk canter, the maalem's face grows black as his eyes. "have a care," he said to me one evening, "for this place is peopled by djinoon, and if they are disturbed they will at least kill the horses and mules, and leave us to every robber among the hills." doubtless the maalem prophesied worse things than this, but i have no arabic worth mention, and salam, who acts as interpreter, possesses a very fair amount of tact. i own to a vulgar curiosity that urges me to see a djin if i can, so, after this warning, salam and i go cantering every late afternoon when the enemy, as some moors call the sun, is moving down towards the west, and the air gets its first faint touch of evening cool. fortunately or unfortunately, the evil spirits never appear however, unless unnoticed by me in the harmless forms of storks, stock-doves, or sparrow-hawks. [illustration: near a well in the country] in this fertile province of the dukala, in the little-known kingdom of the victorious sultan, mulai abd-el-aziz, there are delightful stretches of level country, and the husbandman's simplest toil suffices to bring about an abundant harvest. unhappily a great part of the province is not in permanent cultivation at all. for miles and miles, often as far as the eye can see, the land lies fallow, never a farmhouse or village to be seen, nothing save some zowia or saint's tomb, with white dome rising within four white walls to stare undaunted at the fierce african sun, while the saint's descendants in the shelter of the house live by begging from pious visitors. away from the fertility that marks the neighbourhood of the douars, one finds a few spare bushes, suddra, retam, or colocynth, a few lizards darting here and there, and over all a supreme silence that may be felt, even as the darkness that troubled egypt in days of old. the main track, not to be dignified by the name of road, is always to be discerned clearly enough, at least the maalem is never in doubt when stray paths, leading from nowhere to the back of beyond, intersect it. at long intervals we pass a n'zala, a square empty space surrounded by a zariba of thorn and prickly pear. the village, a few wattled huts with conical roofs, stands by its side. every n'zala is a government shelter for travellers; you may pitch your tent within the four walls, and even if you remain outside and hire guards the owners of the huts are responsible for your safety, with their worldly goods, perhaps with their lives. i have tried the interior of the moorish n'zalas, where all too frequently you must lie on unimagined filth, often almost within reach of camel-drivers and muleteers, who are so godly that they have no time to be clean, and i have concluded that the drawbacks outweigh the advantages. now i pitch my tent on some cleaner spot, and pay guards from the village to stretch their blankets under its lee and go to sleep. if there are thieves abroad the zariba will not keep them out, and if there are no thieves a tired traveller may forget his fatigue. on the road we meet few wayfarers, and those we encounter are full of suspicion. now and again we pass some country kaid or khalifa out on business. as many as a dozen well-armed slaves and retainers may follow him, and, as a rule, he rides a well-fed barb with a fine crimson saddle and many saddle cloths. over his white djellaba is a blue selham that came probably from manchester; his stirrups are silver or plated. he travels unarmed and seldom uses spurs--a packing needle serves as an effective substitute. when he has spurs they are simply spear-heads--sharp prongs without rowels. the presence of unbelievers in the country of the true faith is clearly displeasing to him, but he is nearly always diplomat enough to return my laboured greeting, though doubtless he curses me heartily enough under his breath. his road lies from village to village, his duty to watch the progress of the harvest for his overlord. even the locusts are kinder than the country kaids. but so soon as the kaid has amassed sufficient wealth, the governor of his province, or one of the high wazeers in the sultan's capital, will despoil him and sell his place to the highest bidder, and in the fulness of time the sultan will send for that wazeer or governor, and treat him in similar fashion. "mektub," it is written, and who shall avoid destiny?[ ] [illustration: near a well in the town] when the way is long and the sun hot, pack and saddle animals come together, keeping a level pace of some five miles an hour, and salam or the maalem beguiles the tedium of the way with song or legend. the maalem has a song that was taught him by one of his grandfather's slaves, in the far-off days when mulai mohammed reigned in red marrakesh. in this chant, with its weird monotonous refrain, the slaves sing of their journey from the lands of the south, the terrors of the way, the lack of food and water. it is a dismal affair enough, but the maalem likes it, and salam, riding under a huge tetuan hat, carrying my shot gun, in case some fresh meat should come along, and keeping watchful eye on the mules, joins lustily in the refrain. salam has few songs of his own, and does not care to sing them, lest his importance should suffer in the native eyes, but he possesses a stock of arabian nights' legends, and quotes them as though they were part of al koran. now and again, in some of the waste and stony places beyond dukala's boundaries, we come across a well, literally a well in the desert, with husbandmen gathered about it and drawing water in their goat-skin buckets, that are tied to long palmetto ropes made by the men of the neighbouring villages. the water is poured into flat, puddled troughs, and the thirsty flocks and herds drink in turn, before they march away to hunt for such scanty herbage as the land affords. the scene round these wells is wonderfully reminiscent of earliest bible times, particularly so where the wandering bedouins bring their flocks to water from the inhospitable territory of the wad nun and deserts below the sus. i note with pleasure the surprising dignity of the herdsmen, who make far less comment upon the appearance of the stranger in these wild places than we should make upon the appearance of a moor or berber in a london street. the most unmistakable tribute to the value of the water is paid by the skeletons of camels, mules, sheep and goats that mark the road to the well. they tell the tale of animals beaten by the enemy in their last stride. it is not easy for a european to realise the suffering these strange lands must see when the summer drought is upon the face of the earth. perhaps they are lessened among the human sufferers by the very real fatalism that accepts evil as it accepts good, without grief and without gladness, but always with philosophic calm; at least we should call it philosophic in a european; superstitious fatalism, of course, in a moor. [illustration: moorish woman and child] the earliest and latest hours of our daily journey are, i think, the best. when afternoon turns toward evening in the fertile lands, and the great heat begins to pass, countless larks resume their song, while from every orchard one hears the subdued murmur of doves or the mellow notes of the nightingale. storks sweep in wide circles overhead or teach their awkward young the arts of flight, or wade solemnly in search of supper to some marsh where the bull-frogs betray their presence by croaking as loudly as they can. the decline of the sun is quite rapid--very often the afterglow lights us to our destination. it is part of the maalem's duty to decide upon the place of our nightly sojourn, and so to regulate the time of starting, the pace, and the mid-day rest, that he may bring us to the village or n'zala in time to get the tent up before darkness has fallen. the little man is master of every turn in the road, and has only failed once--when he brought us to a large village, where the bulk of the inhabitants of outlying douars had attacked the governor's house, with very little success, on the previous day, and were now about to be attacked in their turn by the governor and his bodyguard. there had been much firing and more shouting, but nobody was badly hurt. prudence demanded that the journey be resumed forthwith, and for three hours the maalem kept his eyes upon the stars and cursed the disturbers of the land's peace. then we reached the desired haven, and passed unscathed through the attacks of the native dogs that guarded its approaches. the procedure when we approach a n'zala in the evening is highly interesting. some aged headman, who has seen our little company approaching, stands by the edge of the road and declares we are welcome.[ ] salam or the maalem responds and presents me, a traveller from the far country of the ingliz, carrying letters to the great sheikhs of the south. the headman repeats his welcome and is closely questioned concerning the existing supplies of water, corn, milk, eggs, and poultry. these points being settled, salam asks abouts guards. the strangers would sleep outside the n'zala: can they have guards at a fair price? three are promised for a payment of about sevenpence apiece, and then the headman precedes us and we turn from the main track to the place of shelter. instantly the village is astir. the dogs are driven off. every wattled hut yields its quota of men, women, and children, spectral in their white djellabas and all eager to see the strangers and their equipment. the men collect in one group and talk seriously of the visit, well assured that it has some significance, probably unpleasant; the women, nervous by nature and training, do not venture far from their homes and remain veiled to the eyes. but the children--dark, picturesque, half-naked boys and girls--are nearly free from fear if not from doubt. the tattoo marks on their chins keep them safe from the evil eye; so they do not run much risk from chance encounter with a european. they approach in a constantly shifting group, no detail of the unpacking is lost to them, they are delighted with the tent and amazed at the number of articles required to furnish it, they refuse biscuits and sugar, though salam assures them that both are good to eat, and indeed sugar is one of the few luxuries of their simple lives. [illustration: evening on the plains] by the headman's direction our wants are supplied. the patriarch, with his long white beard and clear far-seeing eyes, receives the respect and obedience of all the village, settles all disputes, and is personally responsible to the kaid of the district for the order and safety of the n'zala. three men come from the well, each bearing a big clay amphora of water that must be boiled before we drink it. one brings an ample measure of barley, costing about four shillings or a little more in english money, another bends under a great load of straw. closely-veiled women carry small jars of milk and hand them to their lord, who brings them up to salam and states the price demanded. milk is dear throughout morocco in the late spring and summer, for, herbage being scanty, cows are small and poor. eggs, on the other hand, are cheap; we can buy a dozen for twopence or its equivalent in spanish or moorish money, and chickens cost about fivepence apiece. if salam, m'barak and the maalem were travelling alone they would pay less, but a european is rarely seen, and his visit must be made memorable. provisions purchased, the tent up, mules and horses tethered together in full view of the tent, a great peace falls upon our little party. i am permitted to lie at full length on a horse rug and stare up at the dark, star-spangled sky; salam has dug a little hole in the ground, made a charcoal fire, and begun to prepare soup and boil the water for coffee. the maalem smokes kief in furtive manner, as though orthodox enough to be ashamed of the practice, while m'barak prepares plates and dishes for the evening meal. around, in a semicircle, some ten yards away, the men and boys of the village sit observing us solemnly. they have little to say, but their surprise and interest are expressed quite adequately by their keen unfailing regard. the afterglow passes and charcoal fires are lighted at the edge of most of the native huts, in preparation for the evening meal, for the young shepherds have come from the fields and the flocks are safely penned. in the gathering dusk the native women, passing through the smoke or by the flame of their fire, present a most weird picture, as it might be they were participating in a witches' sabbath. darkness envelops all the surrounding country, hiding the road by which we came, sealing up the track we have to follow, striking a note of loneliness that is awesome without being unpleasant. with what we call civilisation hundreds of miles away, in a country where law and order are to be regarded more as names than facts, one has a great joy in mere living, intensified doubtless by long hours spent in the saddle, by occasional hard work and curtailed rest, and by the daily sight of the rising sun. the evening meal is a simple affair of soup, a chicken, and some coffee to follow, and when it is over i make my way to the kitchen tent, where the men have supped, and send m'barak with an invitation to the headman and his sons. the blessed one makes his way to the headman's hut, while salam clears up the debris of the meal, and the maalem, conscious that no more work will be expected of him, devotes his leisure to the combustion of hemp, openly and unashamed. with many compliments the headman arrives, and i stand up to greet and bid him welcome--an effort that makes heavy call upon my scanty store of arabic. the visitors remove their slippers and sit at ease, while salam makes a savoury mess of green tea, heavily sweetened and flavoured with mint. my visitors are too simply pious to smoke, and regard the maalem with displeasure and surprise, but he is quite beyond the reach of their reproaches now. his eyes are staring glassily, his lips have a curious ashen colour, his hands are twitching--the hemp god has him by the throat. the village men turn their backs upon this degraded believer, and return thanks to allah the one for sending an infidel who gives them tea. broadly speaking, it is only coast moors, who have suffered what is to them the contamination of european influences, that smoke in morocco. like the walrus and the carpenter, we talk of many things, salam acting as interpreter. the interests of my guests are simple: good harvests, abundant rain, and open roads are all they desire. they have never seen the sea or even a big moorish town, but they have heard of these things from travellers and traders who have passed their nights in the n'zala in times recent or remote, and sometimes they appeal to me to say if these tales are true. are there great waters of which no man may drink--waters that are never at rest? do houses with devils (? steam engines) in them go to and fro upon the face of these waters? are there great cities so big that a man cannot walk from end to end in half a day? i testify to the truth of these things, and the headman praises allah, who has done what seemed good to him in lands both near and far. it is, i fear, the headman's polite way of saying that saul is among the prophets. my revolver, carefully unloaded, is passed from hand to hand, its uses and capacities are known even to these wild people, and the weapon creates more interest than the tent and all its varied equipment. naturally enough, it turns the talk to war and slaughter, and i learn that the local kaid has an endless appetite for thieves and other children of shameless women, that guns are fired very often within his jurisdiction, and baskets full of heads have been collected after a purely local fight. all this is said with a quiet dignity, as though to remind me that i have fallen among people of some distinction, and the effect is only spoilt by the recollection that nearly every headman has the same tale to tell. sultans, pretenders, wazeers, and high court functionaries are passed in critical review, their faults and failings noted. i cannot avoid the conclusion that the popular respect is for the strong hand--that civilised government would take long to clear itself of the imputation of cowardice. the local kaid is always a tyrant, but he is above all things a man, keen-witted, adventurous, prompt to strike, and determined to bleed his subjects white. so the men of the village, while suffering so keenly from his arbitrary methods, look with fear and wonder at their master, respect him secretly, and hope the day will come when by allah's grace they too will be allowed to have mastery over their fellows and to punish others as they have been punished. strength is the first and greatest of all virtues, so far as they can see, and cunning and ferocity are necessary gifts in a land where every man's hand is against his neighbour. [illustration: travellers by night] the last cup of green tea has been taken, the charcoal, no longer refreshed by the bellows, has ceased to glow, around us the native fires are out. the hour of repose is upon the night, and the great athletic villagers rise, resume their slippers, and pass with civil salutation to their homes. beyond the tent our guards are sleeping soundly in their blankets; the surrounding silence is overwhelming. the grave itself could hardly be more still. even the hobbled animals are at rest, and we enter into the enveloping silence for five or six dreamless hours. * * * * * the horses stir and wake me; i open the tent and call the men. our guards rouse themselves and retire to their huts. the maalem, no worse, to outward seeming, for the night's debauch, lights the charcoal. it is about half-past three, the darkness has past but the sun has not risen, the land seems plunged in heavy sleep, the air is damp and chill. few pleasures attach to this early rising, but it is necessary to be on the road before six o'clock in order to make good progress before the vertical rays of the sun bid us pause and seek what shelter we can find. two hours is not a long time in which to strike tents, prepare breakfast,--a solid affair of porridge, omelette, coffee, marmalade and biscuits,--pack everything, and load the mules. we must work with a will, or the multi-coloured pageant in the eastern sky will have passed before we are on the road again. early as it is we are not astir much before the village. almost as soon as i am dressed the shepherd boys and girls are abroad, playing on their reed flutes as they drive the flocks to pasture from the pens to which they were brought at sundown. they go far afield for food if not for water, but evening must see their animals safely secured once more, for if left out overnight the nearest predatory tribesmen would carry them off. there is no security outside the village, and no village is safe from attack when there is unrest in the province. a cattle raid is a favourite form of amusement among the warlike tribes of the moorish country, being profitable, exciting, and calculated to provoke a small fight. a group of interested observers assembles once more, reinforced by the smallest children, who were too frightened to venture out of doors last night. nothing disturbs the little company before we leave the camp. the headman, grave and dignified as ever, receives payment for corn, straw, chickens, milk, eggs, water, and guards, a matter of about ten shillings in english money, and a very large sum indeed for such a tiny village to receive. the last burden is fastened on the patient mules, girths and straps and belts are examined, and we pass down the incline to the main road and turn the horses' heads to the atlas mountains. footnotes: [ ] "there happeneth no misfortune on the earth or to yourselves, but it is written in the book before we created it: verily that is easy to allah."--al koran; sura, "the tree." [ ] this courtesy is truly eastern, and has many variants. i remember meeting two aged rabbis who were seated on stones by the roadside half a mile from the city of tiberias on the sea of galilee. they rose as i approached, and said in hebrew, "blessed be he who cometh." to the gates of marrakesh [illustration: the r'kass] chapter iv to the gates of marrakesh in hawthorn-time the heart grows bright, the world is sweet in sound and sight, glad thoughts and birds take flower and flight, the heather kindles toward the light, the whin is frankincense and flame. _the tale of balen._ if you would savour the true sense of morocco, and enjoy glimpses of a life that belongs properly to the era of genesis, journey through dukala, shiadma, or haha in april. rise early, fare simply, and travel far enough to appreciate whatever offers for a camping-ground, though it be no more than the grudging shadow of a wall at mid-day, or a n'zala not overclean, when from north, south, east, and west the shepherd boys and girls are herding their flocks along the homeward way. you will find the natives kind and leisured enough to take interest in your progress, and, their confidence gained, you shall gather, if you will, some knowledge of the curious, alluring point of view that belongs to fatalists. i have been struck by the dignity, the patience, and the endurance of the moor, by whom i mean here the arab who lives in morocco, and not the aboriginal berber, or the man with black blood preponderating in his veins. to the moor all is for the best. he knows that allah has bound the fate of each man about his neck, so he moves fearlessly and with dignity to his appointed end, conscious that his god has allotted the palace or the prison for his portion, and that fellow-men can no more than fulfil the divine decree. here lies the secret of the bravery that, when disciplined, may yet shake the foundations of western civilisation. how many men pass me on the road bound on missions of life or death, yet serene and placid as the mediæval saints who stand in their niches in some cathedral at home. let me recall a few fellow-wayfarers and pass along the roadless way in their company once again. [illustration: a traveller on the plains] first and foremost stands out a khalifa, lieutenant of a great country kaid, met midmost dukala, in a place of level barley fields new cut with the _media luna_. brilliant poppies and irises stained the meadows on all sides, and orchards whose cactus hedges, planted for defence, were now aflame with blood-red flowers, became a girdle of beauty as well as strength. the khalifa rode a swiftly-ambling mule, a beast of price, his yellow slippers were ostentatiously new, and his ample girth proclaimed the wealthy man in a land where all the poor are thin. "peace," was his salutation to m'barak, who led the way, and when he reached us he again invoked the peace of allah upon our lord mohammed and the faithful of the prophet's house, thereby and with malice aforethought excluding the infidel. like others of his class who passed us he was but ill-pleased to see the stranger in the land; unlike the rest he did not conceal his convictions. behind him came three black slaves, sleek, armed, proud in the pride of their lord, and with this simple retinue the khalifa was on his way to tithe the newly-harvested produce of the farmers who lived in that district. dangerous work, i thought, to venture thus within the circle of the native douars and claim the lion's share of the hard-won produce of the husbandmen. he and his little company would be outnumbered in the proportion of thirty or forty to one, they had no military following, and yet went boldly forth to rob on the kaid's behalf. i remembered how, beyond tangier, the men of the hills round anjera had risen against an unpopular khalifa, had tortured him in atrocious fashion, and left him blind and hideously maimed, to be a warning to all tyrants. doubtless our prosperous fellow-traveller knew all about it, doubtless he realised that the sultan's authority was only nominal, but he knew that his immediate master, the basha, still held his people in an iron grip while, above and beyond all else, he knew by the living faith that directed his every step in life, that his own fate, whether good or evil, was already assigned to him. i heard the faint echo of the greeting offered by the dogs of the great douar into which he passed, and felt well assured that the protests of the village folk, if they ventured to protest, would move him no more than the barking of those pariahs. the hawks we saw poised in the blue above our heads when small birds sang at sunsetting, were not more cheerfully devoid of sentiment than our khalifa, though it may be they had more excuse than he. on another afternoon we sat at lunch in the grateful sombre shade of a fig-tree. beyond the little stone dyke that cut the meadow from the arable land a negro ploughed with an ox and an ass, in flat defiance of biblical injunction. the beasts were weary or lazy, or both, and the slave cursed them with an energy that was wonderful for the time of day. even the birds had ceased to sing, the cicadas were silent in the tree tops, and when one of the mules rolled on the ground and scattered its pack upon all sides, the maalem was too exhausted to do more than call it the "son of a christian and a jew." [illustration: the mid-day halt] down the track we had followed came a fair man, of slight build, riding a good mule. he dismounted by the tree to adjust his saddle, tighten a stirrup thong, and say a brief prayer. then, indifferent to the heat, he hurried on, and salam, who had held short converse with him, announced that he was an emissary of bu hamara the pretender, speeding southward to preach the rising to the atlas tribes. he carried his life in his hands through the indifferently loyal southern country, but the burden was not heavy enough to trouble him. bu hamara, the man no bullets could injure, the divinely directed one, who could call the dead from their pavilion in paradise to encourage the living, had bade him go rouse the sleeping southerners, and so he went, riding fearlessly into the strong glare that wrapt and hid him. his work was for faith or for love: it was not for gain. if he succeeded he would not be rewarded, if he failed he would be forgotten. very often, at morning, noon, and sunset, we would meet the r'kass or native letter-carrier, a wiry man from the sus country, more often than not, with naked legs and arms. in his hand he would carry the long pole that served as an aid to his tired limbs when he passed it behind his shoulders, and at other times helped him to ford rivers or defend himself against thieves. an eager, hurrying fellow was the r'kass, with rarely enough breath to respond to a salutation as he passed along, his letters tied in a parcel on his back, a lamp at his girdle to guide him through the night, and in his wallet a little bread or parched flour, a tiny pipe, and some kief. only if travelling in our direction would he talk, repaying himself for the expenditure of breath by holding the stirrup of mule or horse. resting for three to five hours in the twenty-four, sustaining himself more with kief than with bread, hardened to a point of endurance we cannot realise, the r'kass is to be met with on every moorish road that leads to a big city--a solitary, brave, industrious man, who runs many risks for little pay. his letters delivered, he goes to the nearest house of public service, there to sleep, to eat sparingly and smoke incessantly, until he is summoned to the road again. no matter if the tribes are out on the warpath, so that the caravans and merchants may not pass,--no matter if the powder "speaks" from every hill,--the r'kass slips through with his precious charge, passing lightly as a cloud over a summer meadow, often within a few yards of angry tribesmen who would shoot him at sight for the mere pleasure of killing. if the luck is against him he must pay the heaviest penalty, but this seldom occurs unless the whole country-side is aflame. at other times, when there is peace in the land, and the wet season has made the unbridged rivers impassable, whole companies of travellers camp on either side of some river--a silver thread in the dry season, a rushing torrent now. but the r'kass knows every ford, and, his long pole aiding him, manages to reach his destination. it is his business to defy nature if necessary, just as he defies man in the pursuit of his task. he is a living proof of the capacity and dogged endurance still surviving in a race europeans affect to despise. we met slaves-dealers too from time to time, carrying women and children on mules, while the men slaves walked along at a good pace. and the dealers by no means wore the villainous aspect that conventional observers look to see, but were plainly men bent upon business, travelling to make money. they regarded the slaves as merchandise, to be kept in tolerably fair condition for the sake of good sales, and unless ruskin was right when he said that all who are not actively kind are cruel, there seemed small ground on which to condemn them. to be sure, they were taking slaves from market to market, and not bringing soudanese captives from the extreme south, so we saw no trace of the trouble that comes of forced travel in the desert, but even that is equally shared by dealers and slave alike. the villages of morocco are no more than collections of conical huts built of mud and wattle and palmetto, or goat and camel skins. these huts are set in a circle all opening to the centre, where the live-stock and agricultural implements are kept at night. the furniture of a tent is simple enough. handloom and handmill, earthenware jars, clay lamps, a mattress, and perhaps a tea-kettle fulfil all requirements. a dazzling, white-domed saint's shrine within four square walls lights the landscape here and there, and gives to some douar such glory as a holy man can yield when he has been dead so long that none can tell the special direction his holiness took. the zowia serves several useful purposes. the storks love to build upon it, and perhaps the influence of its rightful owner has something to do with the good character of the interesting young birds that we see plashing about in the marshes, and trying to catch fish or frogs with something of their parents' skill. then, again, the zowia shelters the descendants of the holy man, who prey upon passers in the name of allah and of the departed. beyond one of the villages graced with the shrine of a forgotten saint, i chanced upon a poor moorish woman washing clothes at the edge of a pool. she used a native grass-seed in place of soap, and made the linen very white with it. on a great stone by the water's edge sat a very old and very black slave, and i tried with salam's aid to chat with him. but he had no more than one sentence. "i have seen many sultans," he cried feebly, and to every question he responded with these same words. two tiny village boys stood hand in hand before him and repeated his words, wondering. it was a curious picture and set in striking colour, for the fields all round us were full of rioting irises, poppies, and convolvuli; the sun that gilded them was blazing down upon the old fellow's unprotected head. gnats were assailing him in legions, singing their flattering song as they sought to draw his blood.[ ] before us on a hill two meadows away stood the douar, its conical huts thatched with black straw and striped palmetto, its zowia with minaret points at each corner of the protecting walls, and a stork on one leg in the foreground. it cost me some effort to tear myself away from the place, and as i remounted and prepared to ride off the veteran cried once more, "i have seen many sultans." then the stork left his perch on the zowia's walls, and settled by the marsh, clapping his mandibles as though to confirm the old man's statement, and the little boys took up the cry, not knowing what they said. he had seen many sultans. the praise to allah, so had not i. [illustration: on guard] by another douar, this time on the outskirts of the r'hamna country, we paused for a mid-day rest, and entered the village in search of milk and eggs. all the men save one were at work on the land, and he, the guardian of the village, an old fellow and feeble, stood on a sandy mound within the zariba. he carried a very antiquated flint-lock, that may have been own brother to kaid m'barak's trusted weapon. i am sure he could not have had the strength to fire, even had he enjoyed the knowledge and possessed the material to load it. it was his business to mount guard over the village treasure. the mound he stood upon was at once the mat'mora that hid the corn store, and the bank that sheltered the silver dollars for whose protection every man of the village would have risked his life cheerfully. the veteran took no notice of our arrival: had we been thieves he could have offered no resistance. he remained silent and stationary, unconscious that the years in which he might have fulfilled his trust had gone for ever. all along the way the boundaries of arable land were marked by little piles of stones and i looked anxiously for some sign of the curious festival that greets the coming of the new corn, a ceremony in which a figure is made for worship by day and sacrifice by night; we were just too late for it. for the origin of this sacrifice the inquirer must go back to the time of nature worship. it was an old practice, of course, in the heyday of grecian civilisation, and might have been seen in england, i believe, little more than twenty years ago. claims for protection are made very frequently upon the road. there are few of the dramatic moments in which a man rushes up, seizes your stirrup and puts himself "beneath the hem of your garment," but there are numerous claims for protection of another sort. in morocco all the powers that signed the treaty of madrid are empowered to grant the privilege. france has protected subjects by the thousand. they pay no taxes, they are not to be punished by the native authorities until their vice-consul has been cited to appear in their defence, and, in short, they are put above the law of their own country and enabled to amass considerable wealth. the fact that the foreigner who protects them is often a knave and a thief is a draw-back, but the popularity of protection is immense, for the protector may possibly not combine cunning with his greed, while the native basha or his khalifa quite invariably does. british subjects may not give protection,--happily the british ideals of justice and fair-play have forbidden the much-abused practice,--and the most the englishman can do is to enter into a trading partnership with a moor and secure for him a certificate of limited protection called "mukhalat," from the name of the person who holds it. great britain has never abused the protection system, and there are fewer protected moors in the service or partnership of britons throughout all morocco than france has in any single town of importance. if i had held the power and the will to give protection, i might have been in morocco to-day, master of a house and a household, drawing half the produce of many fields and half the price of flocks of sheep and herds of goats. few mornings passed without bringing some persecuted farmer to the camp, generally in the heat of the day, when we rested on his land. he would be a tall, vigorous man, burnt brown by the sun, and he would point to his fields and flocks, "i have so many sheep and goats, so many oxen for the plough, so many mules and horses, so much grain unharvested, so much in store. give me protection, that i may live without fear of my kaid, and half of all i own shall be yours." then i had to explain through salam that i had no power to help him, that my government would do no more than protect me. it was hard for the applicants to learn that they must go unaided. the harvest was newly gathered, it had survived rain and blight and locusts, and now they had to wait the arrival of their kaid or his khalifa, who would seize all they could not conceal,--hawk, locust, and blight in one. at the village called after its patron saint, sidi b'noor, a little deputation of tribesmen brought grievances for an airing. we sat in the scanty shade of the zowia wall. m'barak, wise man, remained by the side of a little pool born of the winter rains; he had tethered his horse and was sleeping patiently in the shadow cast by this long-suffering animal. the headman, who had seen my sporting guns, introduced himself by sending a polite message to beg that none of the birds that fluttered or brooded by the shrine might be shot, for that they were all sacred. needless perhaps to say that the idea of shooting at noonday in southern morocco was far enough from my thoughts, and i sent back an assurance that brought half a dozen of the village notables round us as soon as lunch was over. strangely enough, they wanted protection--but it was sought on account of the sultan's protected subjects. "the men who have protection between this place and djedida," declared their spokesman, sorrowfully, "have no fear of allah or his prophet. they brawl in our markets and rob us of our goods. they insult our houses,[ ] they are without shame, and because of their protection our lives have become very bitter." "have you been to your basha?" i asked the headman. "i went bearing a gift in my hand, o highly favoured," replied the headman, "and he answered me, 'foolish farmer, shall i bring the sultan to visit me by interfering with these rebels against allah who have taken the protection from nazarenes?' and then he cursed me and drove me forth from his presence. but if you will give protection to us also we will face these misbegotten ones, and there shall be none to come between us." [illustration: a village at dukala] i could do no more than deliver messages of consolation to the poor tribesmen, who sat in a semicircle, patient in the quivering heat. the old story of goodwill and inability had to be told again, and i never saw men more dejected. at the moment of leave-taking, however, i remembered that we had some empty mineral-water bottles and a large collection of gunmaker's circulars, that had been used as padding for a case of cartridges. so i distributed the circulars and empty bottles among the protection hunters, and they received them with wonder and delight. when i turned to take a last look round, the pages that had pictures of guns were being passed reverently from hand to hand; to outward seeming the farmers had forgotten their trouble. thus easily may kindnesses be wrought among the truly simple of this world. the market of sidi b'noor is famous for its sales of slaves and horses,[ ] but i remember it best by its swarm of blue rock-pigeons and sparrow-hawks, that seemed to live side by side in the walls surrounding the saint's white tomb. for reasons best known to themselves they lived without quarrelling, perhaps because the saint was a man of peace. surely a sparrow-hawk in our island would not build his nest and live in perfect amity with pigeons. but, as is well known, the influence of the saintly endures after the flesh of the saint has returned to the dust whence it came. the difference between dukala and r'hamna, two adjacent provinces, is very marked. all that the first enjoys the second lacks. we left the fertile lands for great stony plains, wind-swept, bare and dry. skeletons of camels, mules, and donkeys told their story of past sufferings, and the water supply was as scanty as the herbage upon which the r'hamna flocks fare so poorly. in place of prosperous douars, set in orchards amid rich arable land, there were government n'zalas at long intervals in the waste, with wattled huts, and lean, hungry tribesmen, whose poverty was as plain to see as their ribs. neither basha nor kaid could well grow fat now in such a place, and yet there was a time when r'hamna was a thriving province after its kind. but it had a warlike people and fierce, to whom the temptation of plundering the caravans that made their way to the southern capital was irresistible. so the court elevated by allah, taking advantage of a brief interval of peace, turned its forces loose against r'hamna early in the last decade of the nineteenth century. from end to end of its plains the powder "spoke," and the burning douars lighted the roads that their owners had plundered so often. neither old nor young were spared, and great basketsful of human heads were sent to red marrakesh, to be spiked upon the wall by the j'maa effina. when the desolation was complete from end to end of the province, the shareefian troops were withdrawn, the few remaining folk of r'hamna were sent north and south to other provinces, the n'zalas were established in place of the forgotten douars, and the elevated court knew that there would be no more complaints. that was mulai el hassan's method of ruling--may allah have pardoned him--and his grand wazeer's after him. it is perhaps the only method that is truly understood by the people in morocco. r'hamna reminded me of the wildest and bleakest parts of palestine, and when the maalem said solemnly it was tenanted by djinoon since the insurrection, i felt he must certainly be right. one evening we met an interesting procession. an old farmer was making his way from the jurisdiction of the local kaid. his "house" consisted of two wives and three children. a camel, whose sneering contempt for mankind was very noticeable, shuffled cumbrously beneath a very heavy load of mattresses, looms, rugs, copper kettles, sacks of corn, and other impedimenta. the wives, veiled to the eyes, rode on mules, each carrying a young child; the third child, a boy, walked by his father's side. the barley harvest had not been good in their part of the country, so after selling what he could, the old man had packed his goods on to the camel's back and was flying from the tax-gatherer. to be sure, he might meet robbers on the way to the province of m'touga, which was his destination, but they would do no more than the kaid of his own district; they might even do less. he had been many days upon the road, and was quaintly hopeful. i could not help thinking of prosperous men one meets at home, who declare, in the intervals of a costly dinner, that the income tax is an imposition that justifies the strongest protest, even to the point of repudiating the government that puts it up by twopence in the pound. had anybody been able to assure this old wanderer that his kaid or khalifa would be content with half the produce of his land, how cheerfully would he have returned to his native douar, how readily he would have--devised plans to avoid payment. a little later the track would be trodden by other families, moving, like the true bedouins, in search of fresh pasture. it is the habit of the country to leave land to lie fallow when it has yielded a few crops. there were days when the mirage did for the plain the work that man had neglected. it set great cities on the waste land as though for our sole benefit. i saw walls and battlements, stately mosques, cool gardens, and rivers where caravans of camels halted for rest and water. several times we were deceived and hurried on, only to find that the wonder city, like the _ignis fatuus_ of our own marshlands, receded as we approached and finally melted away altogether. then the maalem, after taking refuge with allah from satan the stoned, who set false cities before the eyes of tired travellers, would revile the mules and horses for needing a mirage to urge them on the way; he would insult the fair fame of their mothers and swear that their sires were such beasts as no believer would bestride. it is a fact that when the maalem lashed our animals with his tongue they made haste to improve their pace, if only for a few minutes, and salam, listening with an expression of some concern at the sad family history of the beasts--he had a stinging tongue for oaths himself--assured me that their sense of shame hurried them on. certainly no sense of shame, or duty, or even compassion, ever moved the maalem. by night he would repair to the kitchen tent and smoke kief or eat haschisch, but the troubles of preparing beds and supper did not worry him. [illustration: the approach to marrakesh] "until the feast is prepared, why summon the guest," he said on a night when the worthy m'barak, opening his lips for once, remonstrated with him. that evening the feast consisted of some soup made from meat tablets, and two chickens purchased for elevenpence the pair, of a market woman we met on the road. yet if it was not the feast the maalem's fancy painted it, our long hours in the open air had served to make it more pleasant than many a more elaborate meal. we rode one morning through the valley of the little hills, once a place of unrest notorious by reason of several murders committed there, and deserted now by everything save a few birds of prey. there were gloomy rocks on all sides, the dry bed of a forgotten river offered us an uncomfortable and often perilous path, and we passed several cairns of small stones. the maalem left his mule in order to pick up stones and add one to each cairn, and as he did so he cursed satan with great fluency.[ ] it was a great relief to leave the little hills and emerge on to the plains of hillreeli beyond. we had not far to go then before the view opened out, the haze in the far distance took faint shape of a city surrounded by a forest of palms on the western side, a great town with the minarets of many mosques rising from it. at this first view of red marrakesh, salam, the maalem, and m'barak extolled allah, who had renewed to them the sight of yusuf ibn tachfin's thousand-year-old city. then they praised sidi bel abbas, the city's patron saint, who by reason of his love for righteous deeds stood on one leg for forty years, praying diligently all the time. we each and all rendered praise and thanks after our separate fashions, and for me, i lit my last cigarette, careless of the future and well pleased. footnotes: [ ] as the gnat settles he cries, "habibi," _i.e._ "o my beloved." his, one fears, is but a carnal affection. [ ] _i.e._ wives and children, to whom no moor refers by name. [ ] it is said to be the largest market in the sultan's dominions. as many as two thousand camels have been counted at one of the weekly gatherings here. [ ] the cairns are met frequently in morocco. some mark the place from which the traveller may obtain his first view of a near city; others are raised to show where a murder was committed. the cairns in the little hills are of the former kind. in red marrakesh [illustration: date palms near marrakesh] chapter v in red marrakesh think, in this batter'd caravanserai, whose portals are alternate night and day, how sultán after sultán with his pomp abode his destined hour and went his way. _the rubáiyát of omar khayyám._ there are certain cities that cannot be approached for the first time by any sympathetic traveller without a sense of solemnity and reverence that is not far removed from awe. athens, rome, constantinople, damascus, and jerusalem may be cited as examples; each in its turn has filled me with great wonder and deep joy. but all of these are to be reached nowadays by the railway, that great modern purge of sensibility. even jerusalem is not exempt. a single line stretches from jaffa by the sea to the very gates of the holy city, playing hide-and-seek among the mountains of judæa by the way, because the turk was too poor to tunnel a direct path. in morocco, on the other hand, the railway is still unknown. he who seeks any of the country's inland cities must take horse or mule, camel or donkey, or, as a last resource, be content with a staff to aid him, and walk. whether he fare to fez, the city of mulai idrees, in which, an old writer assures us, "all the beauties of the earth are united"; or to mequinez, where great mulai ismail kept a stream of human blood flowing constantly from his palace that all might know he ruled; or to red marrakesh, which yusuf ibn tachfin built nine hundred years ago,--his own exertion must convoy him. there must be days and nights of scant fare and small comfort, with all those hundred and one happenings of the road that make for pleasant memories. so far as i have been able to gather in the nine years that have passed since i first visited morocco, one road is like another road, unless you have the moghrebbin arabic at your command and can go off the beaten track in moorish dress. walter harris, the resourceful traveller and _times_ correspondent, did this when he sought the oases of tafilalt, so also, in his fashion, did r.b. cunninghame graham when he tried in vain to reach tarudant, and set out the record of his failure in one of the most fascinating travel books published since _eothen_.[ ] for the rank and file of us the government roads and the harmless necessary soldier must suffice, until the gordian knot of morocco's future has been untied or cut. then perhaps, as a result of french pacific penetration, flying railway trains loaded with tourists, guide-book in hand and camera at the ready, will pierce the secret places of the land, and men will speak of "doing" morocco, as they "do" other countries in their rush across the world, seeing all the stereotyped sights and appreciating none. for the present, by allah's grace, matters are quite otherwise. marrakesh unfolded its beauties to us slowly and one by one as we pushed horses and mules into a canter over the level plains of hillreeli. forests of date-palm took definite shape; certain mosques, those of sidi ben yusuf and bab dukala, stood out clearly before us without the aid of glasses, but the library mosque dominated the landscape by reason of the kutubia tower by its side. the atlas mountains came out of the clouds and revealed the snows that would soon melt and set every southern river aflood, and then the town began to show limits to the east and west where, at first, there was nothing but haze. one or two caravans passed us, northward bound, their leaders hoping against hope that the pretender, the "dog-descended," as a susi trader called him, would not stand between them and the sultan's camp, where the profits of the journey lay. by this time we could see the old grey wall of marrakesh more plainly, with towers here and there, ruinous as the wall itself, and storks' nests on the battlements, their red-legged inhabitants fulfilling the duty of sentries. to the right, beyond the town, the great rock of djebel geelez suggested infinite possibilities in days to come, when some conqueror armed with modern weapons and a pacific mission should wish to bombard the walls in the sacred cause of civilisation. then the view was lost in the date-palm forest, through which tiny tributaries of the tensift run babbling over the red earth, while the kingfisher or dragon-fly, "a ray of living light," flashes over the shallow water, and young storks take their first lessons in the art of looking after themselves. when a moor has amassed wealth he praises god, builds a palace, and plants a garden; or, is suspected, accused--despotic authority is not particular--and cast into prison! in and round marrakesh many moors have gained riches and some have held them. the gardens stretch for miles. there are the far-spreading augdal plantations of the sultans of morocco, in part public and elsewhere so private that to intrude would be to court death. the name signifies "the maze," and they are said to justify it. in the outer or public grounds of this vast pleasaunce the fruit is sold by auction to the merchants of the city in late spring, when blossoming time is over, and, after the sale, buyers must watch and guard the trees until harvest brings them their reward. [illustration: on the road to marrakesh] we rode past the low-walled gardens, where pomegranate and apricot trees were flowering, and strange birds i did not know sang in the deep shade. doves flitted from branch to branch, bee-eaters darted about among mulberry and almond trees. there was an overpowering fragrance from the orange groves, where blossom and unplucked fruit showed side by side; the jessamine bushes were scarcely less fragrant. spreading fig-trees called every passer to enjoy their shade, and the little rivulets, born of the tensift's winter floods to sparkle through the spring and die in june, were fringed with willows. it was delightful to draw rein and listen to the plashing of water and the cooing of doves, while trying in vain to recognise the most exquisite among many sweet scents. under one of the fig-trees in a garden three moors sat at tea. a carpet was spread, and i caught a glimpse of the copper kettle, the squat charcoal brazier tended by a slave, the quaint little coffer filled no doubt with fine green tea, the porcelain dish of cakes. it was a quite pleasing picture, at which, had courtesy permitted, i would have enjoyed more than a brief glance. the claim of the moors upon our sympathy and admiration is made greater by reason of their love for gardens. as a matter of fact, their devotion may be due in part to the profit yielded by the fruit, but one could afford to forget that fact for the time being, when nature seemed to be giving praise to the master of all seasons for the goodly gifts of the spring. we crossed the tensift by the bridge, one of the very few to be found in southern morocco. it has nearly thirty arches, all dilapidated as the city walls themselves, yet possessing their curious gift of endurance. even the natives realise that their bridge is crumbling into uselessness, after nearly eight centuries of service, but they do no more than shrug their shoulders, as though to cast off the burden of responsibility and give it to destiny. on the outskirts of the town, where gardens end and open market-squares lead to the gates, a small group of children gathered to watch the strangers with an interest in which fear played its part. we waited now to see the baggage animals before us, and then m'barak led the way past the mosque at the side of the bab el khamees and through the brass-covered doors that were brought by the moors from spain. within the khamees gate, narrow streets with windowless walls frowning on either side shut out all view, save that which lay immediately before us. [illustration: a minstrel] no untrained eye can follow the winding maze of streets in marrakesh, and it is from the moors we learn that the town, like ancient gaul of cæsar's _commentaries_, has three well defined divisions. the kasbah is the official quarter, where the soldiers and governing officials have their home, and the prison called hib misbah receives all evil-doers, and men whose luck is ill. the madinah is the general moorish quarter, and embraces the kaisariyah or bazaar district, where the streets are parallel, well cleaned, thatched with palm and palmetto against the light, and barred with a chain at either end to keep the animals from entering. the mellah (literally "salted place") is the third great division of marrakesh, and is the jewish quarter. in this district, or just beyond it, are a few streets that seem reserved to the descendants of mulai ismail's black guards, from whom our word "blackguard" should have come to us, but did not. within these divisions streets, irregular and without a name, turn and twist in manner most bewildering, until none save old residents may hope to know their way about. pavements are unknown, drainage is in its most dangerous infancy, the rainy season piles mud in every direction, and, as though to test the principle embodied in the homoeopathic theory, the marrakshis heap rubbish and refuse in every street, where it decomposes until the enlightened authorities who dwell in the kasbah think to give orders for its removal. then certain men set out with donkeys and carry the sweepings of the gutters beyond the gates.[ ] this work is taken seriously in the madinah, but in the mellah it is shamefully neglected, and i have ridden through whole streets in the last-named quarter searching vainly for a place clean enough to permit of dismounting. happily, or unhappily, as you will, the inhabitants are inured from birth to a state of things that must cause the weaklings to pay heavy toll to death, the lord who rules even sultans. i had little thought to spare for such matters as we rode into marrakesh for the first time. the spell of the city was overmastering. it is certainly the most african city in morocco to-day, almost the last survivor of the changes that began in the latter half of the nineteenth century, and have brought the dark continent from end to end within the sphere of european influence. fez and mequinez are cities of fair men, while here on every side one recognised the influence of the soudan and the country beyond the great desert. not only have the wives and concubines brought from beyond the great sand sea darkened the skin of the present generation of the marrakshis, but they have given to most if not to all a suggestion of relationship to the negro races that is not to be seen in any other moorish city i have visited. it is not a suggestion of fanaticism or intolerance. by their action as well as their appearance one knew most of the passers for friends rather than enemies. they would gratify their curiosity at our expense as we gratified ours at theirs, convinced that all europeans are harmless, uncivilised folk from a far land, where people smoke tobacco, drink wine, suffer their women-folk to go unveiled, and live without the true faith. marrakesh, like all other inland cities of morocco, has neither hotel nor guest-house. it boasts some large fandaks, notably that of hadj larbi, where the caravans from the desert send their merchandise and chief merchants, but no sane european will choose to seek shelter in a fandak in morocco unless there is no better place available. there are clean fandaks in sunset land, but they are few and you must travel far to find them. i had letters to the chief civilian resident of marrakesh, sidi boubikir, british political agent, millionaire, land-owner, financier, builder of palaces, politician, statesman, and friend of all englishmen who are well recommended to his care. i had heard much of the clever old moor, who was born in very poor surroundings, started life as a camel driver, and is now the wealthiest and most powerful unofficial resident in southern morocco, if not in all the moghreb, so i bade m'barak find him without delay. the first person questioned directed us to one of boubikir's fandaks, and by its gate, in a narrow lane, where camels jostled the camp-mules until they nearly foundered in the underlying filth, we found the celebrated man sitting within the porch, on an old packing-case. he looked up for a brief moment when the kaid dismounted and handed him my letter, and i saw a long, closely-shaven face, lighted by a pair of grey eyes that seemed much younger than the head in which they were set, and perfectly inscrutable. he read the letter, which was in arabic, from end to end, and then gave me stately greeting. "you are very welcome," he said. "my house and all it holds are yours." i replied that we wanted nothing more than a modest shelter for the days of our sojourn in the city. he nodded. "had you advised me of your visit in time," he said, "my best house should have been prepared. now i will send with you my steward, who has the keys of all my houses. choose which you will have." i thanked him, the steward appeared, a stout, well-favoured man, whose djellaba was finer than his master's. sidi boubikir pointed to certain keys, and at a word several servants gathered about us. the old man said that he rejoiced to serve the friend of his friends, and would look forward to seeing me during our stay. then we followed into an ill-seeming lane, now growing dark with the fall of evening. we turned down an alley more muddy than the one just left behind, passed under an arch by a fruit stall with a covering of tattered palmetto, caught a brief glimpse of a mosque minaret, and heard the mueddin calling the faithful to evening prayer. in the shadow of the mosque, at the corner of the high-walled lane, there was a heavy metal-studded door. the steward thrust a key into its lock, turned it, and we passed down a passage into an open patio. it was a silent place, beyond the reach of the street echoes; there were four rooms built round the patio on the ground floor, and three or four above. one side of the tower of the minaret was visible from the courtyard, but apart from that the place was nowhere overlooked. to be sure, it was very dirty, but i had an idea that the steward had brought his men out for business, not for an evening stroll, so i bade salam assure him that this place, known to the marrakshis as dar al kasdir,[ ] would serve our purposes. a thundering knock at the gate announced a visitor, one of sidi boubikir's elder sons, a civil, kindly-looking moor, whose face inspired confidence. advised of our choice he suggested we should take a stroll while the men cleaned and prepared the patio and the rooms opening upon it. then the mules, resting for the time in his father's fandak, would bring their burdens home, and we could enjoy our well-earned rest. [illustration: one of the city gates] we took this good counsel, and on our return an hour later, a very complete transformation had been effected. palmetto brooms, and water brought from an adjacent well, had made the floor look clean and clear. the warmth of the air had dried everything, the pack-mules had been relieved of their load and sent back to the stable. two little earthen braziers full of charcoal were glowing merrily under the influence of the bellows that m'barak wielded skilfully, and two earthen jars of water with palm leaves for corks had been brought in by our host's servants. in another hour the camp beds were unpacked and made up, a rug was set on the bedroom floor, and the little table and chairs were put in the middle of the patio. from the alcove where salam squatted behind the twin fires came the pleasant scent of supper; m'barak, his well-beloved gun at his side, sat silent and thoughtful in another corner, and the tiny clay bowl of the maalem's long wooden kief pipe was comfortably aglow. there was a timid knock at the door, the soldier opened it and admitted the shareef. i do not know his name nor whence he came, but he walked up to salam, greeted him affectionately, and offered his services while we were in the city. twenty years old perhaps, at an outside estimate, very tall and thin and poorly clad, the shareef was not the least interesting figure i met in marrakesh. a shareef is a saint in morocco as in every other country of islam, and his title implies descent from mohammed. he may be very poor indeed, but he is more or less holy, devout men kiss the hem of his djellaba, no matter how dirty or ragged it may be, and none may curse a shareef's ancestors, for the prophet was one of them. his youthful holiness had known salam in fez, and had caught sight of him by boubikir's fandak in the early afternoon. salam, himself a chief in his own land, though fallen on evil days then and on worse ones since, welcomed the newcomer and brought his offer to me, adding the significant information that the young shareef, who was too proud to beg, had not tasted food in the past forty-eight hours. he had then owed a meal to some moor, who, following a well-known custom, had set a bowl of food outside his house to conciliate devils. i accepted the proffered service, and had no occasion to regret my action. the young moor was never in the way and never out of the way, he went cheerfully on errands to all parts of the city, fetched and carried without complaint, and yet never lost the splendid dignity that seemed to justify his claim to saintship. so we took our ease in the open patio, and the shareef's long fast was broken, and the stars came to the aid of our lanterns, and when supper was over i was well content to sit and smoke, while salam, m'barak, the maalem, and the shareef sat silent round the glowing charcoal, perhaps too tired to talk. it was very pleasant to feel at home after two or three weeks under canvas below mediunah and along the southern road. the maalem rose at last, somewhat unsteadily after his debauch of kief. he moved to where our provisions were stocked and took oil and bread from the store. then he sought the corner of the wall by the doorway and poured out a little oil and scattered crumbs, repeating the performance at the far end of the patio. this duty done, he bade salam tell me that it was a peace-offering to the souls of the departed who had inhabited this house before we came to it. i apprehend they might have resented the presence of the infidel had they not been soothed by the maalem's little attention. he was ever a firm believer in djinoon, and exorcised them with unfailing regularity. the abuse he heaped on satan must have added largely to the burden of sorrows under which we are assured the fallen angel carries out his appointed work. he had been profuse in his prayers and curses when we entered the barren pathway of the little hills behind the plains of hillreeli, and there were times when i had felt quite sorry for satan. oblation offered to the house spirits, the maalem asked for his money, the half due at the journey's end, sober enough, despite the kief, to count the dollars carefully, and make his farewell with courteous eloquence. i parted with him with no little regret, and look forward with keen pleasure to the day when i shall summon him once again from the bakehouse of djedida to bring his mules and guide me over the open road, perchance to some destination more remote. i think he will come willingly, and that the journey will be a happy one. the shareef drew the heavy bolt behind the maalem, and we sought our beds. it was a brief night's rest. the voice of the mueddin, chanting the call to prayer and the shehad,[ ] roused me again, refreshed. the night was passing; even as the sonorous voice of the unseen chanted his inspiring "allah akbar," it was yielding place to the moments when "the wolf-tail[ ] sweeps the paling east." i looked out of my little room that opened on to the patio. the arch of heaven was swept and garnished, and from "depths blown clear of cloud" great stars were shining whitely. the breeze of early morning stirred, penetrating our barred outer gates, and bringing a subtle fragrance from the beflowered groves that lie beyond the city. it had a freshness that demanded from one, in tones too seductive for denial, prompt action. moreover, we had been rising before daylight for some days past in order that we might cover a respectable distance before the enemy should begin to blaze intolerably above our heads, commanding us to seek the shade of some chance fig-tree or saint's tomb. so i roused salam, and together we drew the creaking bolts, bringing the kaid to his feet with a jump. there was plenty of time for explanation, because he always carried his gun, at best a harmless weapon, in the old flannel case secured by half a dozen pieces of string, with knots that defied haste. he warned us not to go out, since the djinoon were always abroad in the streets before daylight; but, seeing our minds set, he bolted the door upon us, as though to keep them from the dar al kasdir, and probably returned to his slumbers. [illustration: a blind beggar] beyond the house, in a faint glow that was already paling the stars, the african city, well-nigh a thousand years old, assumed its most mysterious aspect. the high walls on either side of the roads, innocent of casements as of glass, seemed, in the uncertain light, to be tinted with violet amid their dull grey. the silence was complete and weird. never a cry from man or beast removed the first impression that this was a city of the dead. the entrances of the bazaars in the kaisariyah, to which we turned, were barred and bolted, their guardians sat motionless, covered in white djellabas, that looked like shrouds. the city's seven gates were fast closed, though doubtless there were long files of camels and market men waiting patiently without. the great mansions of the wazeers and the green-tiled palace of mulai abd-el-aziz--our victorious master the sultan--seemed unsubstantial as one of those cities that the mirage had set before us in the heart of the r'hamna plains. salam, the untutored man from the far riff country, felt the spell of the silent morning hour. it was a primitive appeal, to which he responded instantly, moving quietly by my side without a word. "o my masters, give charity; allah helps helpers!" a blind beggar, sitting by the gate, like bartimæus of old, thrust his withered hand before me. lightly though we had walked, his keen ear had known the difference in sound between the native slipper and the european boot. it had roused him from his slumbers, and he had calculated the distance so nicely that the hand, suddenly shot out, was well within reach of mine. salam, my almoner, gave him a handful of the copper money, called _floos_, of which a score may be worth a penny, and he sank back in his uneasy seat with voluble thanks, not to us, but to allah the one, who had been pleased to move us to work his will. to me no thanks were due. i was no more than allah's unworthy medium, condemned to burn in fires seven times heated, for unbelief. from their home on the flat house-tops two storks rose suddenly, as though to herald the dawn; the sun became visible above the city's time-worn walls, and turned their colouring from violet to gold. we heard the guards drawing the bars of the gate that is called bab al khamees, and knew that the daily life of marrakesh had begun. the great birds might have given the signal that woke the town to activity. straightway men and beasts made their way through the narrow cobbled lanes. sneering camels, so bulked out by their burdens that a foot-passenger must shrink against the wall to avoid a bad bruising; well-fed horses, carrying some early-rising moor of rank on the top of seven saddle-cloths; half-starved donkeys, all sores and bruises; one encountered every variety of moorish traffic here, and the thoroughfare, that had been deserted a moment before, was soon thronged. in addition to the moors and susi traders, there were many slaves, black as coal, brought in times past from the soudan. from garden and orchard beyond the city the fruit and flowers and vegetables were being carried into their respective markets, and as they passed the air grew suddenly fragrant with a scent that was almost intoxicating. the garbage that lay strewn over the cobbles had no more power to offend, and the fresh scents added in some queer fashion of their own to the unreality of the whole scene. to avoid the crush we turned to another quarter of the city, noting that the gates of the bazaars were opened, and that only the chains were left across the entrance. but the tiny shops, mere overgrown packing-cases, were still locked up; the merchants, who are of higher rank than the dealers in food-stuffs, seldom appear before the day is aired, and their busiest hours are in the afternoon, when the auction is held. "custom is from allah," they say, and, strong in this belief, they hold that time is only valuable as leisure. and, god wot, they may well be wiser herein than we are. a demented countryman, respected as a saint by reason of his madness, a thing of rags and tatters and woefully unkempt hair, a quite wild creature, more than six feet high, and gaunt as a lightning-smitten pine, came down the deserted bazaar of the brass-workers. he carried a long staff in one hand, a bright tin bowl in the other. the sight of a european heightened his usual frenzy-- across his sea of mind a thought came streaming like a blazing ship upon a mighty wind. i saw the sinews stand out on the bare arm that gripped the staff, and his bright eyes were soon fixed upon me. "you do not say words to him, sir," whispered salam; "he do'n know what he do--he very holy man." the madman spat on my shadow, and cursed profoundly, while his passion was mastering him. i noted with interest in that uncomfortable moment the clear signs of his epileptic tendencies, the twitching of the thumb that grasped the stick, the rigidity of the body, the curious working of certain facial muscles. i stood perfectly still, though my right hand involuntarily sought the pocket of my coat where my revolver lay, the use of which save in direst necessity had been a mad and wicked act; and then two peace-loving moors, whose blue selhams of fine manchester cloth proclaimed their wealth and station, came forward and drew the frenzied creature away, very gently and persuasively. he, poor wretch, did not know what was taking place, but moved helplessly to the door of the bazaar and then fell, his fit upon him. i hurried on. moors are kindly, as well as respectful, to those afflicted of allah. we passed on our way to the bab dukala, the gate that opens out upon elhara, the leper quarter. there we caught our morning view of the forest of date-palm that girdles the town. moors say that in centuries long past marrakesh was besieged by the men of tafilalt, who brought dates for food, and cast the stones on the ground. the rain buried them, the tensift nourished them, and to-day they crowd round ibn tachfin's ruinous city, 'their feet in water and their heads in fire.' 'tis an agreeable legend. [illustration: a wandering minstrel] market men, half naked and very lean, were coming in from tamsloht and amsmiz, guiding their heavy-laden donkeys past the crumbling walls and the steep valley that separates elhara from the town. some scores of lepers had left their quarters, a few hiding terrible disfigurement under great straw hats, others quite careless of their deplorable disease. beggars all, they were going on their daily journey to the shrine of sidi bel abbas, patron of the destitute, to sit there beneath the zowia's ample walls, hide their heads in their rags, and cry upon the passers to remember them for the sake of the saint who had their welfare so much at heart. and with the closing of the day they would be driven out of the city, and back into walled elhara, to such of the mud huts as they called home. long acquaintance with misery had made them careless of it. they shuffled along as though they were going to work, but from my shaded corner, where i could see without being seen, i noted no sign of converse between them, and every face that could be studied was stamped with the impress of unending misery. the scene around us was exquisite. far away one saw the snow-capped peaks of the atlas; hawks and swallows sailed to and from elhara's walls; doves were cooing in the orchards, bee-eaters flitted lightly amid the palms. i found myself wondering if the lepers ever thought to contrast their lives with their surroundings, and i trusted they did not. some few, probably, had not been lepers, but criminals, who preferred the horrid liberty of elhara to the chance of detection and the living death of the hib misbah. other beggars were not really lepers, but suffered from one or other of the kindred diseases that waste morocco. in marrakesh the native doctors are not on any terms with skilled diagnosis, and once a man ventures into elhara, he acquires a reputation for leprosy that serves his purpose. i remember inquiring of a moorish doctor the treatment of a certain native's case. "who shall arrest allah's decree?" he began modestly. and he went on to say that the best way to treat an open wound was to put powdered sulphur upon it, and apply a light.[ ] horrible as this remedy seems, the worthy doctor believed in it, and had sent many a true believer to--paradise, i hope--by treating him on these lines. meanwhile his profound confidence in himself, together with his knowledge and free use of the koran, kept hostile criticism at bay.[ ] we turned back into the city, to see it in another aspect. the rapid rise of the sun had called the poorer workers to their daily tasks; buyers were congregating round the market stalls of the dealers in meat, bread, vegetables, and fruit. with perpetual grace to allah for his gift of custom, the stall-keepers were parting with their wares at prices far below anything that rules even in the coast towns of the sultan's country. the absence of my lord abd-el-aziz and his court had tended to lower rates considerably. it was hard to realise that, while food cost so little, there were hundreds of men, women, and children within the city to whom one good meal a day was something almost unknown. yet this was certainly the case. towering above the other buyers were the trusted slaves of the wazeers in residence--tall negroes from the far south for the most part--hideous men, whose black faces were made the more black by contrast with their white robes. they moved with a certain sense of dignity and pride through the ranks of the hungry freemen round them; clearly they were well contented with their lot--a curious commentary upon the european notions of slavery--based, to be sure, upon european methods in regard to it. the whole formed a marvellous picture, and how the pink roses, the fresh, green mint and thyme, the orange flowers and other blossoms, sweetened the narrow ways, garbage-strewn under foot and roofed overhead with dried leaves of the palm! footnotes: [ ] "moghreb-al-acksa." [ ] street cleaners are paid out of the proceeds of a tax derived from the slaughter of cattle, and the tax is known to moorish butchers by a term signifying "_floos_ of the throat." [ ] _i.e._ the tin house. [ ] declaration of faith. [ ] the false dawn. [ ] the sultan mulaz-abd-el-aziz was once treated for persistent headache by a moorish practitioner. the wise man's medicine exploded suddenly, and his majesty had a narrow escape. i do not know whether the practitioner was equally fortunate. [ ] the doctors and magicians of morocco have always been famous throughout the east. nearly all the medicine men of the _thousand nights and a night_ including the uncle of aladdin, are from the moghreb. round about marrakesh [illustration: the roofs of marrakesh] chapter vi round about marrakesh "speaking of thee comforts me, and thinking of thee makes me glad." --_râod el kartas._ the charm of marrakesh comes slowly to the traveller, but it stays with him always, and colours his impressions of such other cities as may attract his wandering footsteps. so soon as he has left the plains behind on his way to the coast, the town's defects are relegated to the background of the picture his memory paints. he forgets the dirty lanes that serve for roads, the heaps of refuse at every corner, the pariah curs that howled or snapped at his horse's heels when he rode abroad, the roughness and discomfort of the accommodation, the poverty and disease that everywhere went hand in hand around him. but he remembers and always will remember the city in its picturesque aspects. how can he forget moorish hospitality, so lavishly exercised in patios where the hands of architect and gardener meet--those delightful gatherings of friends whose surroundings are recalled when he sees, even in the world of the west-- groups under the dreaming garden trees, and the full moon, and the white evening star. he will never forget the kutubia tower flanking the mosque of the library, with its three glittering balls that are solid gold, if you care to believe the moors (and who should know better!), though the european authorities declare they are but gilded copper. he will hear, across all intervening sea and lands, the sonorous voices of the three blind mueddins who call true believers to prayer from the adjacent minarets. by the side of the tower, that is a landmark almost from r'hamna's far corner to the atlas mountains, yusuf ibn tachfin, who built marrakesh, enjoys his long, last sleep in a grave unnoticed and unhonoured by the crowds of men from strange, far-off lands, who pass it every day. yet, if the conqueror of fez and troubler of spain could rise from nine centuries of rest, he would find but little change in the city he set on the red plain in the shadow of the mountains. the walls of his creation remain: even the broken bridge over the river dates, men say, from his time, and certainly the faith and works of the people have not altered greatly. caravans still fetch and carry from fez in the north to timbuctoo and the banks of the niger, or reach the bab-er-rubb with gold and ivory and slaves from the eastern oases, that france has almost sealed up. the saints' houses are there still, though the old have yielded to the new. storks are privileged, as from earliest times, to build on the flat roofs of the city houses, and, therefore, are still besought by amorous natives to carry love's greeting to the women who take their airing on the house-tops in the afternoon. berber from the highlands; black man from the draa; wiry, lean, enduring trader from tarudant and other cities of the sus; patient frugal saharowi from the sea of sand,--no one of them has altered greatly since the days of the renowned yusuf. and who but he among the men who built great cities in days before saxon and norman had met at senlac, could look to find his work so little scarred by time, or disguised by change? twelve miles of rampart surround the city still, if we include the walls that guard the sultan's maze garden, and seven of the many gates ibn tachfin knew are swung open to the dawn of each day now. after the library mosque, with its commanding tower and modest yet memorable tomb, the traveller remembers the sultan's palace, white-walled, green-tiled, vast, imposing; and the lesser mosque of sidi bel abbas, to whom the beggars pray, for it is said of him that he knew god. the city's hospital stands beside this good man's grave. and here one pays tribute also to great mulai abd el kader ijjilalli, yet another saint whose name is very piously invoked among the poor. the mosque by the dukala gate is worthy of note, and earns the salutation of all who come by way of r'hamna to marrakesh. the kaisariyah lingers in the memory, and on hot days in the plains, when shade is far to seek, one recalls a fine fountain with the legend "drink and admire," where the water-carriers fill their goat-skins and all beggars congregate during the hours of fire. the mellah, in which the town jews live, is reached by way of the olive garden. it is the dirtiest part of marrakesh, and, all things considered, the least interesting. the lanes that run between its high walls are full of indescribable filth; comparison with them makes the streets of madinah and kasbah almost clean. one result of the dirt is seen in the prevalence of a very virulent ophthalmia, from which three out of four of the mellah's inhabitants seem to suffer, slightly or seriously. few adults appear to take exercise, unless they are called abroad to trade, and when business is in a bad way the misery is very real indeed. a skilled workman is pleased to earn the native equivalent of fourteenpence for a day's labour, beginning at sunrise, and on this miserable pittance he can support a wife and family. low wages and poor living, added to centuries of oppression, have made the morocco jew of the towns a pitiable creature; but on the hills, particularly among the atlas villages, the people of the book are healthy, athletic, and resourceful, able to use hands as well as head, and the trusted intermediary between berber hillman and town moor. [illustration: a gateway, marrakesh] being of the ancient race myself, i was received in several of the show-houses of the mellah--places whose splendid interiors were not at all suggested by the squalid surroundings in which they were set. this is typical to some extent of all houses in morocco, even in the coast towns, and greatly misleads the globe-trotter. there was a fine carving and colouring in many rooms, but the european furniture was, for the most part, wrongly used, and at best grotesquely out of place. hygiene has not passed within the mellah's walls, but a certain amount of western tawdriness has. patriarchal jews of good stature and commanding presence had their dignity hopelessly spoilt by the big blue spotted handkerchief worn over the head and tied under the chin; jewesses in rich apparel seemed quite content with the fineness within their houses, and indifferent to the mire of the streets. i visited three synagogues, one in a private house. the approaches were in every case disgusting, but the synagogues themselves were well kept, very old, and decorated with rare and curious memorial lamps, kept alight for the dead through the year of mourning. the benches were of wood, with straw mats for cover; there was no place for women, and the seats themselves seemed to be set down without attempt at arrangement. the brasswork was old and fine, the scrolls of the law were very ancient, but there was no sign of wealth, and little decoration. in the courtyard of the chief synagogue i found school-work in progress. half a hundred intelligent youngsters were repeating the master's words, just as mohammedan boys were doing in the madinah, but even among these little ones ophthalmia was playing havoc, and doubtless the disease would pass from the unsound to the sound. cleanliness would stamp out this trouble in a very little time, and preserve healthy children from infection. unfortunately, the administration of this mellah is exceedingly bad, and there is no reason to believe that it will improve. when the elevated court is at marrakesh the demand for work helps the jewish quarter to thrive, but since the sultan went to fez the heads of the mellah seem to be reluctant to lay out even a few shillings daily to have the place kept clean. there are no statistics to tell the price that is paid in human life for this shocking neglect of the elementary decencies, but it must be a heavy one. business premises seem clean enough, though the approach to them could hardly be less inviting. you enter a big courtyard, and, if wise, remain on your horse until well clear of the street. the courtyard is wide and cared for, an enlarged edition of a patio, with big store-rooms on either side and stabling or a granary. here also is a bureau, in which the master sits in receipt of custom, and deals in green tea that has come from india via england, and white sugar in big loaves, and coffee and other merchandise. he is buyer and seller at once, now dealing with a native who wants tea, and now with an atlas jew who has an ouadad skin or a rug to sell; now talking shilha, the language of the berbers, now the moghrebbin arabic of the moors, and again debased spanish or hebrew with his own brethren. he has a watchful eye for all the developments that the day may bring, and while attending to buyer or seller can take note of all his servants are doing at the stores, and what is going out or coming in. your merchant of the better class has commercial relations with manchester or liverpool; he has visited england and france; perhaps some olive-skinned, black-eyed boy of his has been sent to an english school to get the wider views of life and faith, and return to the mellah to shock his father with both, and to be shocked in turn by much in the home life that passed uncriticised before. these things lead to domestic tragedies at times, and yet neither son nor father is quite to blame. the best class of jew in the mellah has ideas and ideals, but outside the conduct of his business he lacks initiative. he believes most firmly in the future of the jewish race, the ultimate return to palestine, the advent of the messiah. immersed in these beliefs, he does not see dirt collecting in the streets and killing little children with the diseases it engenders. gradually the grime settles on his faith too, and he loses sight of everything save commercial ends and the observances that orthodoxy demands. his, one fears, is a quite hopeless case. the attention of philanthropy might well turn to the little ones, however. for their sake some of the material benefits of modern knowledge should be brought to jewry in marrakesh. schools are excellent, but children cannot live by school learning alone. going from the mellah one morning i saw a strange sight. by the entrance to the salted place there is a piece of bare ground stretching to the wall. here sundry young jews in black djellabas sat at their ease, their long hair curled over their ears, and black caps on their heads in place of the handkerchiefs favoured by the elders of the community. one or two women were coming from the jewish market, their bright dresses and uncovered faces a pleasing contrast to the white robes and featureless aspect of the moorish women. a little moorish boy, seeing me regard them with interest, remarked solemnly, "there go those who will never look upon the face of god's prophet," and then a shareef, whose portion in paradise was of course reserved to him by reason of his high descent, rode into the open ground from the madinah. i regret to record the fact that the holy man was drunk, whether upon haschisch or the strong waters of the infidel, i know not, and to all outward seeming his holiness alone sufficed to keep him on the back of the spirited horse he bestrode. he went very near to upsetting a store of fresh vegetables belonging to a true believer, and then nearly crushed an old man against the wall. he raised his voice, but not to pray, and the people round him were in sore perplexity. he was too holy to remove by force and too drunk to persuade, so the crowd, realising that he was divinely directed, raised a sudden shout. this served. the hot-blooded barb made a rush for the arcade leading to the madinah and carried the drunken saint with him, cursing at the top of his voice, but sticking to his unwieldy saddle in manner that was admirable and truly moorish. if he had not been holy he would have been torn from his horse, and, in native speech, would have "eaten the stick," for drunkenness is a grave offence in orthodox morocco. [illustration: a courtyard, marrakesh] they have a short way with offenders in moorish cities. i remember seeing a man brought to the kasbah of a northern town on a charge of using false measures. the case was held proven by the khalifa; the culprit was stripped to the waist, mounted on a lame donkey, and driven through the streets, while two stalwart soldiers, armed with sticks, beat him until he dropped to the ground. he was picked up more dead than alive, and thrown into prison. there are two sorts of market in marrakesh--the open market outside the walls, and the auction market in the kaisariyah. the latter opens in the afternoon, by which time every little boxlike shop is tenanted by its proprietor. how he climbs into his place without upsetting his stores, and how, arrived there, he can sit for hours without cramp, are questions i have never been able to answer, though i have watched him scores of times. he comes late in the day to his shop, lets down one of the covering flaps, and takes his seat by the step inside it. the other flap has been raised and is kept up by a stick. seated comfortably, he looks with dispassionate eye upon the gathering stream of life before him, and waits contentedly until it shall please allah the one to send custom. sometimes he occupies his time by reading in the perspicuous book; on rare occasions he will leave his little nest and make dignified way to the shop of an adool or scribe, who reads pious writings to a select company of devotees. in this way the morning passes, and in the afternoon the mart becomes crowded, country moors riding right up to the entrance chains, and leaving their mules in the charge of slaves who have accompanied them on foot. town buyers and country buyers, with a miscellaneous gathering of tribesmen from far-off districts, fill the bazaar, and then the merchants hand certain goods to dilals, as the auctioneers are called. the crowd divides on either side of the bazaar, leaving a narrow lane down the centre, and the dilals rush up and down with their wares,--linen, cotton and silk goods, carpets, skins or brassware, native daggers and pistols, saddles and saddle-cloths. the goods vary in every bazaar. the dilal announces the last price offered; a man who wishes to buy must raise it, and, if none will go better, he secures the bargain. a commission on all goods sold is taken at the door of the market by the municipal authorities. i notice on these afternoons the different aspects of the three classes represented in the bazaar. shopkeepers and the officials by the gate display no interest at all in the proceedings: they might be miles from the scene, so far as their attitude is a clue. the dilals, on the other hand, are in furious earnest. they run up and down the narrow gangway proclaiming the last price at the top of their voices, thrusting the goods eagerly into the hands of possible purchasers, and always remembering the face and position of the man who made the last bid. they have a small commission on the price of everything sold, and assuredly they earn their wage. in contrast with the attitudes of both shopkeepers and auctioneers, the general public is inclined to regard the bazaar as a place of entertainment. beggar lads, whose scanty rags constitute their sole possession, chaff the excited dilals, keeping carefully out of harm's way the while. three-fourths of the people present are there to idle the afternoon hours, with no intention of making a purchase unless some unexpected bargain crosses their path. i notice that the dilals secure several of these doubtful purchasers by dint of fluent and eloquent appeals. when the last article has been sold and the crowd is dispersing, merchants arise, praise allah, who in his wisdom sends good days and bad, step out of their shop, let down one flap and raise the other, lock the two with a huge key and retire to their homes. i remember asking a moor to explain why the jews were so ill-treated and despised all over morocco. the worthy man explained that the koran declares that no true believer might take jew or christian to be his friend, that the veracious book also assures the faithful that jews will be turned to pigs or monkeys for their unbelief, and that the metamorphosis will be painful. "moreover," said the true believer, who did not know that i was of the despised race, "do you not know that one of these cursed people tried to seize the throne in the time of the great tafilatta?" i pleaded ignorance. "do you not know the feast of scribes, that is held in marrakesh and fez?" he asked. again i had to make confession that, though i had heard about the feast, i had never witnessed it. "only allah is omniscient," he said by way of consolation. "doubtless there are some small matters known to nazarenes and withheld from us--strange though that may seem to the thoughtful. "in the name of the most merciful--know that there was a ruler in taza before mulai ismail--prince of the faithful, he who overcame in the name of god--reigned in the land. now this ruler[ ] had a jew for wazeer. when it pleased allah to take the sultan and set him in the pavilion of mother of pearl appointed for him in paradise, in the shadow of the tuba tree, this jew hid his death from the people until he could seize the throne of taza for himself and ride out under the m'dhal.[ ] then mulai ismail protested to the people, and the tolba (scribes) arranged to remove the reproach from the land. so they collected forty of their bravest men and packed them in boxes--one man in a box. they put two boxes on a mule and drove the twenty mules to the courtyard of the palace that the jew had taken for himself. the man in charge of the mules declared he had a present for the sultan, and the unbeliever, whose grave was to be the meeting-place of all the dogs of taza, gave orders that the boxes should be brought in and set before him. this was done, and the cursed jew prepared to gloat over rich treasure. but as each box was opened a talib rose suddenly, a naked sword in his hand, and falling bravely upon the unbelieving one, cut his body to pieces, while shaitan hurried his soul to the furnace that is seven times heated and shall never cool. [illustration: well in marrakesh] "then the father of the faithful, the ever victorious," continued the true believer, "decreed that the tolba should have a festival. and every year they meet in marrakesh and fez, and choose a talib who is to rule over them. the post is put up to auction; he who bids highest is sultan for a week. he rides abroad on a fine horse or mule, under a m'dhal, as though he were indeed my lord abd-el-aziz himself. black slaves on either side brush away the flies with their white clothes, soldiers await to do his bidding, he is permitted to make a request to the true sultan, and our master has open ear and full hand for the tolba, who kept the moghreb from the unbelievers, the inheritors of the fire, against whom sidna mohammed has turned his face." i arrived in marrakesh just too late to witness the reign of the talib, but i heard that the successful candidate had paid thirty-two dollars for the post--a trifle less than five pounds in our money, at the rate of exchange then current. this money had been divided among the tolba. the governor of marrakesh had given the lucky king one hundred dollars in cash, thirty sheep, twenty-five cones of sugar, forty jars of butter, and several sacks of flour. this procedure is peculiar to the southern capital. in fez the tolba kings collect taxes in person from every householder. the talib's petition to the sultan had been framed on a very liberal scale. he asked for a home in saffi, exemption from taxes, and a place in the custom-house. the sultan had not responded to the petition when i left the city; he was closely beleaguered in fez, and bu hamara was occupying taza, the ancient city where the deed of the tolba had first instituted the quaint custom. my informant said there was little doubt but that his shareefian majesty would grant all the requests, so the talib's investment of thirty-two dollars must be deemed highly profitable. at the same time i cannot find the story i was told confirmed by moorish historians. no record to which i have had access tells of a jewish king of taza, though there was a hebrew in high favour there in the time of rasheed ii. the details of the story told me are, as the american scribe said, probably attributable to mr. benjamin trovato. when the attractions of kaisariyah palled, the markets beyond the walls never failed to revive interest in the city's life. the thursday market outside the bab al khamees brought together a very wonderful crowd of men and goods. all the city's trade in horses, camels, and cattle was done here. the caravan traders bought or hired their camels, and there were fine animals for sale with one fore and one hind leg hobbled, to keep them from straying. the camels were always the most interesting beasts on view. for the most part their attendants were saharowi, who could control them seemingly by voice or movement of the hand; but a camel needs no little care, particularly at feeding time, when he is apt to turn spiteful if precedence be given to an animal he does not like. they are marvellously touchy and fastidious creatures--quite childlike in many of their peculiarities. [illustration: a bazaar, marrakesh] the desert caravan trade is not what it was since the french occupied timbuctoo and closed the oases of tuat; but i saw some caravans arrive from the interior--one of them from the sandy region where mons. lebaudy has set up his kingdom. how happy men and beasts seemed to be. i never saw camels looking so contented: the customary sneer had passed from their faces--or accumulated dust had blotted it out. on the day when the market is held in the open place beyond the bab al khamees, there is another big gathering within the city walls by the jamáa effina. here acrobats and snake-charmers and story-tellers ply their trade, and never fail to find an audience. the acrobats come from tarudant and another large city of the sus that is not marked in the british war office map of morocco dated ! occasionally one of these clever tumblers finds his way to london, and is seen at the music halls there. i remember calling on one hadj abdullah when i was in the north, and to my surprise he told me he spoke english, french, german, spanish, turkish, moghrebbin arabic, and shilha. "i know london well," he said; "i have an engagement to bring my troupe of acrobats to the _canterbury_ and the _oxford_. i am a member of a masonic lodge in camberwell." commonplace enough all this, but when you have ridden out of town to a little moorish house on the hillside overlooking the mediterranean, and are drinking green tea flavoured with mint, on a diwan that must be used with crossed legs, you hardly expect the discussion to be turned to london music-halls. snake-charmers make a strong appeal to the untutored moorish crowd. black cobras and spotted leffa snakes from the sus are used for the performance. when the charmer allows the snakes to dart at him or even to bite, the onlookers put their hands to their foreheads and praise sidi ben aissa, a saint who lived in mequinez when mulai ismail ruled, a pious magician whose power stands even to-day between snake-charmers and sudden death. the musician who accompanies the chief performer, and collects the _floos_ offered by spectators, works his companion into a condition of frenzy until he does not seem to feel the teeth of the snakes; but as people who should be well informed declare that the poison bags are always removed before the snakes are used for exhibition, it is hard for the mere unbeliever to render to sidi ben aissa the exact amount of credit that may be due to him. [illustration: a brickfield, marrakesh] the story-teller, whose legends are to be found in the "thousand nights and a night," is generally a merry rogue with ready wit. his tales are told with a wealth of detail that would place them upon the index expurgatorius of the western world, but men, women, and children crowd round to hear them, and if his tale lacks the ingredients most desired they do not hesitate to tell him so, whereupon he will respond at once to his critics, and add love or war in accordance with their instructions. one has heard of something like this in the serial market at home. his reward is scanty, like that of his fellow-workers, the acrobat and the snake charmer, but he has quite a professional manner, and stops at the most exciting points in his narrative for his companion to make a tour of the circle to collect fees. the quality of the adventures he retails is settled always by the price paid for them. it is a strange sight, and unpleasant to the european, who believes that his morality, like his faith, is the only genuine article, to see young girls with antimony on their eyelids and henna on their nails, listening to stories that only the late sir richard burton dared to render literally into the english tongue. while these children are young and impressionable they are allowed to run wild, but from the day when they become self-conscious they are strictly secluded. throughout marrakesh one notes a spirit of industry. if a man has work, he seems to be happy and well content. most traders are very courteous and gentle in their dealings, and many have a sense of humour that cannot fail to please. while in the city i ordered one or two lamps from a workman who had a little shop in the madinah. he asked for three days, and on the evening of the third day i went to fetch them, in company with salam. the workman, who had made them himself, drew the lamps one by one from a dark corner, and salam, who has a hawk's eye, noticed that the glass of one was slightly cracked. "have a care, o father of lamps," he said; "the englishman will not take a cracked glass." "what is this," cried the lamps' father in great anger, "who sells cracked lamps? if there is a flaw in one of mine, ask me for two dollars." salam held the lamp with cracked glass up against the light. "two dollars," he said briefly. the tradesman's face fell. he put his tongue out and smote it with his open hand. "ah," he said mournfully, when he had admonished the unruly member, "who can set a curb upon the tongue?"[ ] footnotes: [ ] mulai rashed ii. [ ] the royal umbrella. [ ] cf. james iii. . but for a mere matter of dates, one would imagine that luther detected the taint of islam in james when he rejected his epistle. the slave market at marrakesh [illustration: a mosque, marrakesh] chapter vii the slave market at marrakesh as to your slaves, see that ye feed them with such food as ye eat yourselves, and clothe them with the stuff ye wear. and if they commit a fault which ye are not willing to forgive, then sell them, for they are the servants of allah, and are not to be tormented. --_mohammed's last address._ in the bazaars of the brass-workers and dealers in cotton goods, in the bazaars of the saddlers and of the leather-sellers,--in short, throughout the kaisariyah, where the most important trade of marrakesh is carried on,--the auctions of the afternoon are drawing to a close. the dilals have carried goods to and fro in a narrow path between two lines of true believers, obtaining the best prices possible on behalf of the dignified merchants, who sit gravely in their boxlike shops beyond the reach of toil. no merchant seeks custom: he leaves the auctioneers to sell for him on commission, while he sits at ease, a stranger to elation or disappointment, in the knowledge that the success or failure of the day's market is decreed. many articles have changed hands, but there is now a greater attraction for men with money outside the limited area of the kaisariyah, and i think the traffic here passes before its time. the hour of the sunset prayer is approaching. the wealthier members of the community leave many attractive bargains unpursued, and, heedless of the dilals' frenzied cries, set out for the sok el abeed. wool market in the morning and afternoon, it becomes the slave market on three days of the week, in the two hours that precede the setting of the sun and the closing of the city gates; this is the rule that holds in red marrakesh. i follow the business leaders through a very labyrinth of narrow, unpaved streets, roofed here and there with frayed and tattered palmetto-leaves that offer some protection, albeit a scanty one, against the blazing sun. at one of the corners where the beggars congregate and call for alms in the name of mulai abd el kader ijjilalli, i catch a glimpse of the great kutubia tower, with pigeons circling round its glittering dome, and then the maze of streets, shutting out the view, claims me again. the path is by way of shops containing every sort of merchandise known to moors, and of stalls of fruit and vegetables, grateful "as water-grass to herds in the june days." past a turning in the crowded thoroughfare, where many southern tribesmen are assembled, and heavily-laden camels compel pedestrians to go warily, the gate of the slave market looms portentous. a crowd of penniless idlers, to whom admittance is denied, clamours outside the heavy door, while the city urchins fight for the privilege of holding the mules of wealthy moors, who are arriving in large numbers in response to the report that the household of a great wazeer, recently disgraced, will be offered for sale. one sees portly men of the city wearing the blue cloth selhams that bespeak wealth, country moors who boast less costly garments, but ride mules of easy pace and heavy price, and one or two high officials of the dar el makhzan. all classes of the wealthy are arriving rapidly, for the sale will open in a quarter of an hour. the portals passed, unchallenged, the market stands revealed--an open space of bare, dry ground, hemmed round with tapia walls, dust-coloured, crumbling, ruinous. something like an arcade stretches across the centre of the ground from one side to the other of the market. roofless now and broken down, as is the outer wall itself, and the sheds, like cattle pens, that are built all round, it was doubtless an imposing structure in days of old. behind the outer walls the town rises on every side. i see mules and donkeys feeding, apparently on the ramparts, but really in a fandak overlooking the market. the minaret of a mosque rises nobly beside the mules' feeding-ground, and beyond there is the white tomb of a saint, with swaying palm trees round it. doubtless this zowia gives the sok el abeed a sanctity that no procedure within its walls can besmirch; and, to be sure, the laws of the saint's religion are not so much outraged here as in the daily life of many places more sanctified by popular opinion. on the ground, by the side of the human cattle pens, the wealthy patrons of the market seat themselves at their ease, arrange their djellabas and selhams in leisurely fashion, and begin to chat, as though the place were the smoking-room of a club. water-carriers--lean, half-naked men from the sus--sprinkle the thirsty ground, that the tramp of slaves and auctioneers may not raise too much dust. watching them as they go about their work, with the apathy born of custom and experience, i have a sudden reminder of the spanish bull-ring, to which the slave market bears some remote resemblance. the gathering of spectators, the watering of the ground, the sense of excitement, all strengthen the impression. there are no bulls in the _torils_, but there are slaves in the pens. it may be that the bulls have the better time. their sufferings in life are certainly brief, and their careless days are very long drawn out. but i would not give the impression that the spectators here are assembled for amusement, or that my view of some of their proceedings would be comprehensible to them. however i may feel, the other occupants of this place are here in the ordinary course of business, and are certainly animated by no such fierce passions as thrill through the air of a plaza de toros. i am in the east but of the west, and "never the twain shall meet." [illustration: a water-seller, marrakesh] within their sheds the slaves are huddled together. they will not face the light until the market opens. i catch a glimpse of bright colouring now and again, as some woman or child moves in the dim recesses of the retreats, but there is no suggestion of the number or quality of the penned. two storks sail leisurely from their nest on the saint's tomb, and a little company of white ospreys passes over the burning market-place with such a wild, free flight, that the contrast between the birds and the human beings forces itself upon me. now, however, there is no time for such thoughts; the crowd at the entrance parts to the right and left, to admit twelve grave men wearing white turbans and spotless djellabas. they are the dilals, in whose hands is the conduct of the sale. slowly and impressively these men advance in a line almost to the centre of the slave market, within two or three yards of the arcade, where the wealthy buyers sit expectant. then the head auctioneer lifts up his voice, and prays, with downcast eyes and outspread hands. he recites the glory of allah, the one, who made the heaven above and the earth beneath, the sea and all that is therein; his brethren and the buyers say amen. he thanks allah for his mercy to men in sending mohammed the prophet, who gave the world the true belief, and he curses shaitan, who wages war against allah and his children. then he calls upon sidi bel abbas, patron saint of marrakesh, friend of buyers and sellers, who praised allah so assiduously in days remote, and asks the saint to bless the market and all who buy and sell therein, granting them prosperity and length of days. and to these prayers, uttered with an intensity of devotion quite mohammedan, all the listeners say amen. only to unbelievers like myself,--to men who have never known, or knowing, have rejected islam,--is there aught repellent in the approaching business; and unbelievers may well pass unnoticed. in life the man who has the true faith despises them; in death they become children of the fire. is it not so set down? throughout this strange ceremony of prayer i seem to see the bull-ring again, and in place of the dilals the cuadrillas of the matadors coming out to salute, before the alguazils open the gates of the toril and the slaying begins. the dramatic intensity of either scene connects for me this slave market in marrakesh with the plaza de toros in the shadow of the giralda tower in sevilla. strange to remember now and here, that the man who built the kutubia tower for this thousand-year-old-city of yusuf ben tachfin, gave the giralda to andalusia. prayers are over--the last amen is said. the dilals separate, each one going to the pens he presides over, and calling upon their tenants to come forth. these selling men move with a dignity that is quite eastern, and speak in calm and impressive tones. they lack the frenzied energy of their brethren who traffic in the bazaars. [illustration: on the road to the sÔk el abeed] obedient to the summons, the slaves face the light, the sheds yield up their freight, and there are a few noisy moments, bewildering to the novice, in which the auctioneers place their goods in line, rearrange dresses, give children to the charge of adults, sort out men and women according to their age and value, and prepare for the promenade. the slaves will march round and round the circle of the buyers, led by the auctioneers, who will proclaim the latest bid and hand over any one of their charges to an intending purchaser, that he may make his examination before raising the price. in the procession now forming for the first parade, five, if not six, of the seven ages set out by the melancholy jaques are represented. there are men and women who can no longer walk upright, however the dilal may insist; there are others of middle age, with years of active service before them; there are young men full of vigour and youth, fit for the fields, and young women, moving for once unveiled yet unrebuked, who will pass at once to the hareem. and there are children of every age, from babies who will be sold with their mothers to girls and boys upon the threshold of manhood and womanhood. all are dressed in bright colours and displayed to the best advantage, that the hearts of bidders may be moved and their purses opened widely. "it will be a fine sale," says my neighbour, a handsome middle-aged moor from one of the atlas villages, who had chosen his place before i reached the market. "there must be well nigh forty slaves, and this is good, seeing that the elevated court is at fez. it is because our master--allah send him more victories!--has been pleased to 'visit' sidi abdeslam, and send him to the prison of mequinez. all the wealth he has extorted has been taken away from him by our master, and he will see no more light. twenty or more of these women are of his house." now each dilal has his people sorted out, and the procession begins. followed by their bargains the dilals march round and round the market, and i understand why the dust was laid before the procession commenced. most of the slaves are absolutely free from emotion of any sort: they move round as stolidly as the blind-folded horses that work the water-wheels in gardens beyond the town, or the corn mills within its gates. i think the sensitive ones--and there are a few--must come from the household of the unfortunate sidi abdeslam, who was reputed to be a good master. small wonder if the younger women shrink, and if the black visage seems to take on a tint of ashen grey, when a buyer, whose face is an open defiance of the ten commandments, calls upon the dilal to halt, and, picking one out as though she had been one of a flock of sheep, handles her as a butcher would, examining teeth and muscles, and questioning her and the dilal very closely about past history and present health. and yet the european observer must beware lest he read into incidents of this kind something that neither buyer nor seller would recognise. novelty may create an emotion that facts and custom cannot justify. [illustration: the slave market] "ah, tsamanni," says my gossip from the atlas to the big dilal who led the prayers, and is in special charge of the children for sale, "i will speak to this one," and tsamanni pushes a tiny little girl into his arms. the child kisses the speaker's hand. not at all unkindly the moor takes his critical survey, and tsamanni enlarges upon her merits. "she does not come from the town at all," he says glibly, "but from timbuctoo. it is more difficult than ever to get children from there. the accursed nazarenes have taken the town, and the slave market droops. but this one is desirable: she understands needlework, she will be a companion for your house, and thirty-five dollars is the last price bid." "one more dollar, tsamanni. she is not ill-favoured, but she is poor and thin. nevertheless say one dollar more," says the moor. "the praise to allah, who made the world," says the dilal piously, and hurries round the ring, saying that the price of the child is now thirty-six dollars, and calling upon the buyers to go higher. i learn that the dilal's commission is two and a half per cent on the purchase price, and there is a government tax of five per cent. slaves are sold under a warranty, and are returned if they are not properly described by the auctioneer. bids must not be advanced by less than a moorish dollar (about three shillings) at a time, and when a sale is concluded a deposit must be paid at once, and the balance on or shortly after the following day. thin slaves will not fetch as much money as fat ones, for corpulence is regarded as the outward and visible sign of health as well as wealth by the moor. "i have a son of my house," says the moor from the atlas, with a burst of confidence quite surprising. "he is my only one, and must have a playfellow, so i am here to buy. in these days it is not easy to get what one wants. everywhere the french. the caravans come no longer from tuat--because of the french. from timbuctoo it is the same thing. surely allah will burn these people in a fire of more than ordinary heat--a furnace that shall never cool. ah, listen to the prices," the little girl's market-value has gone to forty-four dollars--say seven pounds ten shillings in english money at the current rate of exchange. it has risen two dollars at a time, and tsamanni cannot quite cover his satisfaction. one girl, aged fourteen, has been sold for no less than ninety dollars after spirited bidding from two country kaids; another, two years older, has gone for seventy-six. "there is no moderation in all this," says the atlas moor, angrily. "but prices will rise until our lord the sultan ceases to listen to the nazarenes, and purges the land. because of their bashadors we can no longer have the markets at the towns on the coasts. if we do have one there, it must be held secretly, and a slave must be carried in the darkness from house to house. this is shameful for an unconquered people." i am only faintly conscious of my companion's talk and action, as he bids for child after child, never going beyond forty dollars. interest centres in the diminishing crowd of slaves who still follow the dilals round the market in monotonous procession. the attractive women and strong men have been sold, and have realised good prices. the old people are in little or no demand; but the auctioneers will persist until closing time. up and down tramp the people nobody wants, burdens to themselves and their owners, the useless, or nearly useless men and women whose lives have been slavery for so long as they can remember. even the water-carrier from the sus country, who has been jingling his bright bowls together since the market opened, is moved to compassion, for while two old women are standing behind their dilal, who is talking to a client about their reserve price, i see him give them a free draught from his goat-skin water-barrel, and this kind action seems to do something to freshen the place, just as the mint and the roses of the gardeners freshen the alleys near the kaisariyah in the heart of the city. to me, this journey round and round the market seems to be the saddest of the slaves' lives--worse than their pilgrimage across the deserts of the wad nun, or the draa, in the days when they were carried captive from their homes, packed in panniers upon mules, forced to travel by night, and half starved. for then at least they were valued and had their lives before them, now they are counted as little more than the broken-down mules and donkeys left to rot by the roadside. and yet this, of course, is a purely western opinion, and must be discounted accordingly. it is fair to say that auctioneers and buyers treat the slaves in a manner that is not unkind. they handle them just as though they were animals with a market value that ill-treatment will diminish, and a few of the women are brazen, shameless creatures--obviously, and perhaps not unwisely, determined to do the best they can for themselves in any surroundings. these women are the first to find purchasers. the unsold adults and little children seem painfully tired; some of the latter can hardly keep pace with the auctioneer, until he takes them by the hand and leads them along with him. moors, as a people, are wonderfully kind to children. the procedure never varies. as a client beckons and points out a slave, the one selected is pushed forward for inspection, the history is briefly told, and if the bidding is raised the auctioneer, thanking allah, who sends good prices, hurries on his way to find one who will bid a little more. on approaching an intending purchaser the slave seizes and kisses his hand, then releases it and stands still, generally indifferent to the rest of the proceedings. [illustration: dilals in the slave market] "it is well for the slaves," says the atlas moor, rather bitterly, for the fifth and last girl child has gone up beyond his limit. "in the mellah or the madinah you can get labour for nothing, now the sultan is in fez. there is hunger in many a house, and it is hard for a free man to find food. but slaves are well fed. in times of famine and war free men die; slaves are in comfort. why then do the nazarenes talk of freeing slaves, as though they were prisoners, and seek to put barriers against the market, until at last the prices become foolish? has not the prophet said, 'he who behaveth ill to his slave shall not enter into paradise'? does that not suffice believing people? clearly it was written, that my little mohammed, my first born, my only one, shall have no playmate this day. no, tsamanni: i will bid no more. have i such store of dollars that i can buy a child for its weight in silver?" the crowd is thinning now. less than ten slaves remain to be sold, and i do not like to think how many times they must have tramped round the market. men and women--bold, brazen, merry, indifferent--have passed to their several masters; all the children have gone; the remaining oldsters move round and round, their shuffling gait, downcast eyes, and melancholy looks in pitiful contrast to the bright clothes in which they are dressed for the sale, in order that their own rags may not prejudice purchasers. once again the storks from the saint's tomb pass over the market in large wide flight, as though to tell the story of the joy of freedom. it is the time of the evening promenade. the sun is setting rapidly and the sale is nearly at an end. "forty-one dollars--forty-one," cries the dilal at whose heels the one young and pretty woman who has not found a buyer limps painfully. she is from the western soudan, and her big eyes have a look that reminds me of the hare that was run down by the hounds a few yards from me on the marshes at home in the coursing season. "why is the price so low?" i ask. "she is sick," said the moor coolly: "she cannot work--perhaps she will not live. who will give more in such a case? she is of kaid abdeslam's household, though he bought her a few weeks before his fall, and she must be sold. but the dilal can give no warranty, for nobody knows her sickness. she is one of the slaves who are bought by the dealers for the rock salt of el djouf." happily the woman seems too dull or too ill to feel her own position. she moves as though in a dream--a dream undisturbed, for the buyers have almost ceased to regard her. finally she is sold for forty-three dollars to a very old and infirm man. "no slaves, no slaves," says the atlas moor impatiently: "and in the town they are slow to raise them." i want an explanation of this strange complaint. "what do you mean when you say they are slow to raise them," i ask. "in marrakesh now," he explains, "dealers buy the healthiest slaves they can find, and raise as many children by them as is possible. then, so soon as the children are old enough to sell, they are sold, and when the mothers grow old and have no more children, they too are sold, but they do not fetch much then." this statement takes all words from me, but my informant sees nothing startling in the case, and continues gravely: "from six years old they are sold to be companions, and from twelve they go to the hareems. prices are good--too high indeed; fifty-four dollars i must have paid this afternoon to purchase one, and when mulai mohammed reigned the price would have been twenty, or less, and for that one would have bought fat slaves. where there is one caravan now, there were ten of old times." only three slaves now, and they must go back to their masters to be sent to the market on another day, for the sun is below the horizon, the market almost empty, and the guards will be gathering at the city gates. two dilals make a last despairing promenade, while their companions are busy recording prices and other details in connection with the afternoon's business. the purchased slaves, the auctioneer's gaudy clothing changed for their own, are being taken to the houses of their masters. we who live within the city walls must hasten now, for the time of gate-closing is upon us, and one may not stay outside. it has been a great day. many rich men have attended personally, or by their agents, to compete for the best favoured women of the household of the fallen kaid, and prices in one or two special cases ran beyond forty pounds (english money), so brisk was the bidding. outside the market-place a country moor of the middle class is in charge of four young boy slaves, and is telling a friend what he paid for them. i learn that their price averaged eleven pounds apiece in english currency--two hundred and eighty dollars altogether in moorish money, that they were all bred in marrakesh by a dealer who keeps a large establishment of slaves, as one in england might keep a stud farm, and sells the children as they grow up. the purchaser of the quartette is going to take them to the north. he will pass the coming night in a fandak, and leave as soon after daybreak as the gates are opened. some ten days' travel on foot will bring him to a certain city, where his merchandise should fetch four hundred dollars. the lads do not seem to be disturbed by the sale, or by thoughts of their future, and the dealer himself seems to be as near an approach to a commercial traveller as i have seen in morocco. to him the whole transaction is on a par with selling eggs or fruit, and while he does not resent my interest, he does not pretend to understand it. from the minaret that overlooks the mosque the mueddin calls for the evening prayer; from the side of the kutubia tower and the minaret of sidi bel abbas, as from all the lesser mosques, the cry is taken up. lepers pass out of the city on their way to elhara; beggars shuffle off to their dens; storks standing on the flat house-tops survey the familiar scene gravely but with interest. doubtless the dilals and all who sent their slaves to the market to be sold this afternoon will respond to the mueddins' summons with grateful hearts, and sidi bel abbas, patron saint of red marrakesh, will hardly go unthanked. green tea and politics [illustration: on the house-top, marrakesh] chapter viii green tea and politics whither resorting from the vernal heat shall old acquaintance old acquaintance greet, under the branch that leans above the wall to shed his blossom over head and feet. _the rubáiyát of omar khayyám._ he was a grave personable moor of middle age, and full of the dignity that would seem to be the birthright of his race. his official position gave him a certain knowledge of political developments without affecting his serene outlook upon life. whether he sat outside the kasbah of his native town and administered the law according to his lights, or, summoned to the capital, rode attended so far as the dar el makhzan, there to take his part in a council of the sultan's advisers, or whether, removed for a time from cares of office, he rested at ease among his cushions as he was doing now, this moorish gentleman's placid and unruffled features would lead the western observer to suppose that he was a very simple person with no sort of interest in affairs. i had occasion to know him, however, for a statesman, after the moorish fashion--a keen if resigned observer of the tragic-comedy of his country's politics, and a pious man withal, who had visited mecca in the month that is called shawall, and had cast stones on the hill of arafat, as the custom is among true believers. some years had passed since our first meeting, when i was the bearer of a letter of introduction written by a high official in the intricate arabic character. it began: "praise be to god! the blessing of allah on our lord mohammed, and his peace upon friends and followers." irrelevant perhaps all this, but the letter had opened the portals of his house to me, and had let loose for my benefit thoughts not lightly to be expressed. now we sat side by side on cushions in his patio, partly shaded by a rose tree that climbed over trellis-work and rioted in bud and blossom. we drank green tea flavoured with mint from tiny glasses that were floridly embossed in gilt. beyond the patio there was a glimpse of garden ablaze with colour; we could hear slaves singing by the great persian water-wheel, and the cooing of doves from the shaded heart of trees that screened a granary. "since mulai el hasan died," said the hadj quietly, "since that prince of believers went to his pavilion in paradise, set among rivers in an orchard of never-failing fruit, as is explained in the most perspicuous book,[ ] troubles have swept over this land, even as el jerad, the locust, comes upon it before the west wind has risen to blow him out to sea." he mused awhile, as though the music of the garden pleased him. "even before the time of my lord el hasan," he went on, "there had been troubles enough. i can remember the war with spain, though i was but a boy. my father was among those who fell at wad ras on the way to tanjah of the nazarenes. but then your country would not permit these spanish dogs to steal our land, and even lent the money to satisfy and keep them away. this was a kindly deed, and mulai mohammed, our victorious master, opened his heart to your bashador[ ] and took him to his innermost councils. and i can remember that great bashador of yours when he came to this city and was received in the square by the augdal gardens. our master the sultan came before him on a white horse[ ] to speak gracious words under the m'dhal, that shades the ruling house. "a strong man was our master the sultan, and he listened carefully to all your bashador said, still knowing in his heart that this country is not as the land of the nazarenes, and could not be made like it in haste. his wazeers feared change, the ulema[ ] opposed it so far as they dared, and that you know is very far, and nothing could be done rapidly after the fashion of the west. my lord understood this well. "then that king of the age and prince of true believers fulfilled his destiny and died, and my lord el hasan, who was in the south, reigned in his stead.[ ] and the troubles that now cover the land began to grow and spread." he sipped his tea with grave pleasure. two female slaves were peering at the infidel through the branches of a lemon tree, just beyond the patio, but when their master dropped his voice the heads disappeared suddenly, as though his words had kept them in place. in the depths of the garden close, oom el hasan, the nightingale, awoke and trilled softly. we listened awhile to hear the notes "ring like a golden jewel down a golden stair." [illustration: a house interior, marrakesh] "my lord el hasan," continued the hadj, "was ever on horseback; with him the powder was always speaking. first fez rejected him, and he carried fire and sword to that rebellious city. then er-riff refused to pay tribute and he enforced it--allah make his kingdom eternal. then this ungrateful city rebelled against his rule and the army came south and fed the spikes of the city gate with the heads of the unfaithful. before he had rested, fez was insolent once again, and on the road north our master, the ever victorious, was (so to say, as the irreligious see it) defeated by the illegitimate men from ghaita, rebels against allah, all, and his house[ ] was carried away. there were more campaigns in the north and in the south, and the shareefian army ate up the land, so that there was a famine more fatal than war. after that came more fighting, and again more fighting. my lord sought soldiers from your people and from the french, and he went south to the sus and smote the rebellious kaids from tarudant to high. so it fell out that my lord was never at peace with his servants, but the country went on as before, with fighting in the north and the south and the east and the west. the devil ships of the nazarene nations came again and again to the bay of tanjah to see if the prince of the faithful were indeed dead, as rumour so often stated. but he was strong, my lord el hasan, and not easy to kill. in the time of a brief sickness that visited him the french took the oases of tuat, which belongs to the country just so surely as does this our marrakesh. they have been from times remote a place of resting for the camels, like tindouf in the sus. but our master recovered his lordship with his health, and the french went back from our land. after that my lord el hasan went to tafilalt over the atlas, never sparing himself. and when he returned to this city, weary and very sick, at the head of an army that lacked even food and clothing, the spaniards were at the gates of er-riff once more, and the tribes were out like a fire of thorns over the northern roads. but because the span allotted him by destiny was fulfilled, and also because he was worn out and would not rest, my lord hasan died near tadla; and ba ahmad, his chief wazeer, hid his death from the soldiers until his son abd-el-aziz was proclaimed." there was a pause here, as though my host were overwhelmed with reflections and was hard driven to give sequence to his narrative. "our present lord was young," he continued at last thoughtfully; "he was a very young man, and so ba ahmad spoke for him and acted for him, and threw into prison all who might have stood before his face. also, as was natural, he piled up great stores of gold, and took to his hareem the women he desired, and oppressed the poor and the rich, so that many men cursed him privately. but for all that ba ahmad was a wise man and very strong. he saw the might of the french in the east, and of the bashadors who pollute tanjah in the north; he remembered the ships that came to the waters in the west, and he knew that the men of these ships want to seize all the foreign lands, until at last they rule the earth even as they rule the sea. against all the wise men of the nazarenes who dwell in tanjah the wazeer fought in the name of the exalted of god,[ ] so that no one of them could settle on this land to take it for himself and break into the bowels of the earth. to be sure, in wazzan and far in the eastern country the accursed french grew in strength and in influence, for they gave protection, robbing the sultan of his subjects. but they took little land, they sent few to court, the country was ours until the wazeer had fulfilled his destiny and died. allah pardon him, for he was a man, and ruled this country, as his master before him, with a rod of very steel." "but," i objected, "you told me formerly that while he lived no man's life or treasure was safe, that he extorted money from all, that he ground the faces of the rich and the poor, that when he died in this city, the marrakshis said 'a dog is dead.' how now can you find words to praise him?" "the people cry out," explained the hadj calmly; "they complain, but they obey. in the moghreb it is for the people to be ruled as it is for the rulers to govern. shall the hammers cease to strike because the anvil cries out? truly the prisons of my lord abd-el-aziz were full while ba ahmad ruled, but all who remained outside obeyed the law. no man can avoid his fate, even my lord el hasan, a fighter all the days of his life, loved peace and hated war. but his destiny was appointed with his birth, and he, the peaceful one, drove men yoked neck and neck to fight for him, even a whole tribe of the rebellious, as these eyes have seen. while ba ahmad ruled from marrakesh all the moghreb trembled, but the roads were safe, as in the days of mulai ismail,--may god have pardoned him,--the land knew quiet seasons of sowing and reaping, the expeditions were but few, and it is better for a country like ours that many should suffer than that none should be at rest." i remained silent, conscious that i could not hope to see life through my host's medium. it was as though we looked at his garden through glasses of different colour. and perhaps neither of us saw the real truth of the problem underlying what we are pleased to call the moorish question. [illustration: a glimpse of the atlas mountains] "when the days of the grand wazeer were fulfilled," the hadj continued gravely, "his enemies came into power. his brother the war minister and his brother the chamberlain died suddenly, and he followed them within the week. no wise man sought too particularly to know the cause of their death. christians came to the court elevated by allah, and said to my lord abd-el-aziz, 'be as the sultans of the west.' and they brought him their abominations, the wheeled things that fall if left alone, but support a man who mounts them, as i suppose, in the name of shaitan; the picture boxes that multiply images of true believers and, being as the work of painters,[ ] are wisely forbidden by the far seeing book; carriages drawn by invisible djinoon, who scream and struggle in their fiery prison but must stay and work, small sprites that dance and sing.[ ] the christians knew that my lord was but a young man, and so they brought these things, and abd-el-aziz gave them of the country's riches, and conversed with them familiarly, as though they had been of the house of a grand shareef. but in the far east of the moghreb the french closed the oases of tuat and tidikelt without rebuke, and burnt ksor and destroyed the faithful with guns containing green devils,[ ] and said, 'we do all this that we may venture abroad without fear of robbers.' then my lord sent the war minister, the kaid maheddi el menebhi, to london, and he saw your sultan face to face. and your sultan's wazeers said to him, 'tell the lord of the moghreb to rule as we rule, to gather his taxes peaceably and without force, to open his ports, to feed his prisoners, to follow the wisdom of the west. if he will do this, assuredly his kingdom shall never be moved.' thereafter your sultan's great men welcomed the kaid yet more kindly, and showed him all that allah the one had given them in his mercy, their palaces, their workplaces, their devil ships that move without sails over the face of the waters, and their unveiled women who pass without shame before the faces of men. and though the kaid said nothing, he remembered all these things. "when he returned, and by the aid of your own bashador in tanjah prevailed over the enemies who had set snares in his path while he fared abroad, he stood up before my lord and told him all he had seen. thereupon my lord abd-el-aziz sought to change that which had gone before, to make a new land as quickly as the father of the red legs[ ] builds a new nest, or the boar of the atlas whom the hunter has disturbed finds a new lair. and the land grew confused. it was no more the moghreb, but it assuredly was not as the lands of the west. "in the beginning of the season of change the french were angry. 'all men shall pay an equal tax throughout my land,' said the king of the age, and the bashador of the french said, 'our protected subjects shall not yield even a handful of green corn to the gatherer.' now when the people saw that the tax-gatherers did not travel as they were wont to travel, armed and ready to kill, they hardened their hearts and said, 'we will pay no taxes at all, for these men cannot overcome us.' so the tribute was not yielded, and the french bashador said to the sultan, 'thou seest that these people will not pay, but we out of our abundant wealth will give all the money that is needed. only sign these writings that set forth our right to the money that is brought by nazarenes to the seaports, and everything will be well.' "so the sultan set his seal upon all that was brought before him, and the french sent gold to his treasury and more french traders came to his court, and my lord gave them the money that had come to him from their country, for more of the foolish and wicked things they brought. then he left marrakesh and went to fez; and the rogui, bu hamara,[ ] rose up and waged war against him." the hadj sighed deeply, and paused while fresh tea was brought by a coal-black woman slave, whose colour was accentuated by the scarlet _rida_ upon her head, and the broad silver anklets about her feet. when she had retired and we were left alone once more, my host continued:-- "you know what happened after. my lord abd-el-aziz made no headway against the rogui, who is surely assisted by devils of the air and by the devils of france. north and south, east and west, the moors flocked to him, for they said, 'the sultan has become a christian.' and to-day my lord has no more money, and no strength to fight the infidel, and the french come forward, and the land is troubled everywhere. but this is clearly the decree of allah the all wise, and if it is written that the days of the filali shareefs are numbered, even my lord will not avoid his fate." i said nothing, for i had seen the latter part of morocco's history working itself out, and knew that the improved relations between great britain and france had their foundation in the change of front that kept our foreign office from doing for morocco what it has done for other states divided against themselves, and what it had promised morocco, without words, very clearly. then, again, it was obvious to me, though i could not hope to explain it to my host, that the moor, having served his time, had to go under before the wave of western civilisation. morocco has held out longer than any other kingdom of africa, not by reason of its own strength, but because the rulers of europe could not afford to see the mediterranean balance of power seriously disturbed. just as mulai ismail praised allah publicly two centuries ago for giving him strength to drive out the infidel, when the british voluntarily relinquished their hold upon tangier, so successive moorish sultans have thought that they have held morocco for the moors by their own power. and yet, in very sober truth, morocco has been no more than one of the pawns in the diplomatic game these many years past. we who know and love the country, finding in its patriarchal simplicity so much that contrasts favourably with the hopeless vulgarity of our own civilisation, must recognise in justice the great gulf lying between a country's aspect in the eyes of the traveller and in the mind of the politician. [illustration: a marrakshi] before we parted, the hadj, prefacing his remark with renewed assurance of his personal esteem, told me that the country's error had been its admission of strangers. poor man, his large simple mind could not realise that no power his master held could have kept them out. he told me on another occasion that the great wazeers who had opposed the sultan's reforms were influenced by fear, lest western ideas should alter the status of their womenkind. they had heard from all their envoys to europe how great a measure of liberty is accorded to women, and were prepared to rebel against any reform that might lead to compulsory alteration of the system under which women live--too often as slaves and playthings--in morocco. my friend's summary of his country's recent history is by no means complete, and, if he could revise it here would doubtless have far more interest. but it seemed advisable to get the moorish point of view, and, having secured the curious elusive thing, to record it as nearly as might be. sidi boubikir seldom discussed politics. "i am in the south and the trouble is in the north," said he. "alhamdolillah,[ ] i am all for my lord abd-el-aziz. in the reign of his grandfather i made money, when my lord his father ruled--upon him the peace--i made money, and now to-day i make money. shall i listen then to pretenders and other evil men? the sultan may have half my fortune." i did not suggest what i knew to be true, that the sultan would have been more than delighted to take him at his word, for i remembered the incident of the lampmaker's wager. a considerable knowledge of moghrebbin arabic, in combination with hypnotic skill of a high order, would have been required to draw from boubikir his real opinions of the outlook. not for nothing was he appointed british political agent in south morocco. the sphinx is not more inscrutable. one night his son came to the dar al kasdir and brought me an invitation from sidi boubikir to dine with him on the following afternoon. arrived before the gate of his palace at the time appointed, two o'clock, we found the old diplomat waiting to welcome us. he wore a fine linen djellaba of dazzling whiteness, and carried a scarlet geranium in his hand. "you are welcome," he said gravely, and led the way through a long corridor, crying aloud as he went, "make way, make way," for we were entering the house itself, and it is not seemly that a moorish woman, whether she be wife or concubine, should look upon a stranger's face. yet some few lights of the hareem were not disposed to be extinguished altogether by considerations of etiquette, and passed hurriedly along, as though bent upon avoiding us and uncertain of our exact direction. the women-servants satisfied their curiosity openly until my host suddenly commented upon the questionable moral status of their mothers, and then they made haste to disappear, only to return a moment later and peep round corners and doorways, and giggle and scream--as if they had been europeans of the same class. sidi boubikir passed from room to room of his great establishment and showed some of its treasures. there were great piles of carpets and vast quantities of furniture that must have looked out at one time in their history upon the crowds that throng the tottenham court road; i saw chairs, sofas, bedsteads, clocks, and sideboards, all of english make. brought on camels through dukala and r'hamna to marrakesh, they were left to fill up the countless rooms without care or arrangement, though their owner's house must hold more than fifty women, without counting servants. probably when they were not quarrelling or dying their finger nails, or painting their faces after a fashion that is far from pleasing to european eyes, the ladies of the hareem passed their days lying on cushions, playing the gimbri[ ] or eating sweetmeats. in one room on the ground-floor there was a great collection of mechanical toys. sidi boubikir explained that the french commercial attaché had brought a large number to the sultan's palace, and that my lord abd-el-aziz had rejected the ones before us. with the curious childish simplicity that is found so often among the moors of high position, boubikir insisted upon winding up the clock-work apparatus of nearly all the toys. then one doll danced, another played a drum, a third went through gymnastic exercises, and the toy orchestra played the marseillaise, while from every adjacent room veiled figures stole out cautiously, as though this room in a moorish house were a stage and the shrouded visitors were the chorus entering mysteriously from unexpected places. the old man's merriment was very real and hearty, so genuine, in fact, that he did not notice how his women-folk were intruding until the last note sounded. then he turned round and the swathed figures disappeared suddenly as ghosts at cockcrow. though it was clear that sidi boubikir seldom saw half the rooms through which we hurried, the passion for building, that seizes all rich moors, held him fast. he was adding wing after wing to his vast premises, and would doubtless order more furniture from london to fill the new rooms. no moor knows when it is time to call a halt and deem his house complete, and so the country is full of palaces begun by men who fell from power or died leaving the work unfinished. the grand wazeer ba ahmad left a palace nearly as big as the dar el makhzan itself, and since he died the storks that build upon the flat roofs have been its only occupants. so it is with the gardens, whose many beauties he did not live to enjoy. i rode past them one morning, noted all manner of fruit trees blossoming, heard birds singing in their branches, and saw young storks fishing in the little pools that the rains of winter had left. but there was not one gardener there to tend the ground once so highly cultivated, and i was assured that the terror of the wazeer's name kept even the hungry beggars from the fruit in harvest time. [illustration: street in marrakesh] the home and its appointments duly exhibited, sidi boubikir led the way to a diwan in a well-cushioned room that opened on to the garden. he clapped his hands and a small regiment of women-servants, black and for the most part uncomely, arrived to prepare dinner. one brought a ewer, another a basin, a third a towel, and water was poured out over our hands. then a large earthenware bowl encased in strong basketwork was brought by a fourth servant, and a tray of flat loaves of fine wheat by a fifth, and we broke bread and said the "bismillah,"[ ] which stands for grace. the bowl was uncovered and revealed a savoury stew of chicken with sweet lemon and olives, a very pleasing sight to all who appreciate eastern cooking. the use of knives being a crime against the faith, and the use of forks and spoons unknown, we plunged the fingers of the right hand into the bowl and sought what pleased us best, using the bread from time to time to deal with the sauce of the stew. it was really a delicious dish, and when later in the afternoon i asked my host for the recipe he said he would give it to me if i would fill the bowl with bank of england notes. i had to explain that, in my ignorance of the full resources of moorish cooking, i had not come out with sufficient money. so soon as the charm of the first bowl palled, it was taken away and others followed in quick succession, various meats and eggs being served with olives and spices and the delicate vegetables that come to southern morocco in early spring. it was a relief to come to the end of our duties and, our hands washed once more, to digest the meal with the aid of green tea flavoured with mint. strong drink being forbidden to the true believer, water only was served with the dinner, and as it was brought direct from the tensift river, and was of rich red colour, there was no temptation to touch it. sidi boubikir was in excellent spirits, and told many stories of his earlier days, of his dealings with bashadors, his quarrel with the great kaid ben daoud, the siege of the city by certain illegitimate men--enemies of allah and the sultan--his journey to gibraltar, and how he met one of the rothschilds there and tried to do business with him. he spoke of his investments in consols and the poor return they brought him, and many other matters of equal moment. it was not easy to realise that the man who spoke so brightly and lightly about trivial affairs had one of the keenest intellects in the country, that he had the secret history of its political intrigues at his fingers' ends, that he was the trusted agent of the british government, and lived and throve surrounded by enemies. as far as was consistent with courtesy i tried to direct his reminiscences towards politics, but he kept to purely personal matters, and included in them a story of his attempt to bribe a british minister,[ ] to whom, upon the occasion of the arrival of a british mission in marrakesh, he went leading two mules laden with silver. "and when i came to him," said the old man, "i said, 'by allah's grace i am rich, so i have brought you some share of my wealth.' but he would not even count the bags. he called with a loud voice for his wife, and cried to her, 'see now what this son of shame would do to me. he would give me his miserable money.' and then in very great anger he drove me from his presence and bade me never come near him again bearing a gift. what shall be said of a man like that, to whom allah had given the wisdom to become a bashador and the foolishness to reject a present? two mules, remember, and each one with as many bags of spanish dollars as it could carry. truly the ways of your bashadors are past belief." i agreed heartily with sidi boubikir; a day's discourse had not made clear any other aspect of the case. footnotes: [ ] "in paradise are rivers of incorruptible water; and rivers of milk, the taste whereof changes not; and rivers of wine, pleasant unto those who drink; and rivers of clarified honey; and in paradise the faithful shall have all kinds of fruits, and pardon from their god."--al koran; sura , "mohammed." [ ] the late sir john drummond hay, whose name is honourably remembered to this day throughout the moghreb. [ ] when a sultan appears in public on a white horse, it is for sign that he is pleased; a black horse, on the other hand, is ominous to them that understand. [ ] literally "learned ones," a theological cabinet, the number of whose members is known to no man, the weight of whose decisions is felt throughout morocco. [ ] - . [ ] hareem. [ ] one of the titles of a sultan. the "lofty portal" ("sublime porte") and the "sublime presence" are among the others. [ ] mohammed said: "every painter is in hell fire, and allah will appoint a person at the day of resurrection to punish him for every picture he shall have drawn, and he shall be punished in hell. so, if ye must make pictures, make them of trees and things without souls." [ ] the reader will recognise the hadj's reference to bicycles, cameras, motor-cars, and other mechanical toys. [ ] melinite shells. [ ] the stork. [ ] literally, "father of the she-ass," the pretender who conducted a successful campaign against the sultan in and , and is still an active enemy of the filali dynasty. [ ] "the praise to allah." [ ] a moorish lute. [ ] literally, "in the name of god." [ ] the late sir william kirby green. through a southern province [illustration: an arab steed] chapter ix through a southern province the full streams feed on flower of rushes, ripe grasses trammel a travelling foot; the faint fresh flame of the young year flushes from leaf to flower, and flower to fruit. _atalanta in calydon._ even in these fugitive records of my last journey into the "extreme west," i find it hard to turn from marrakesh. just as the city held me within its gates until further sojourn was impossible, so its memories crowd upon me now, and i recall with an interest i may scarcely hope to communicate the varied and compelling appeals it made to me at every hour of the day. yet i believe, at least i hope, that most of the men and women who strive to gather for themselves some picture of the world's unfamiliar aspects will understand the fascination to which i refer, despite my failure to give it fitting expression. sevilla in andalusia held me in the same way when i went from cadiz to spend a week-end there, and the three days became as many weeks, and would have become as many months or years had i been my own master--which to be sure we none of us are. the hand of the moor is clearly to be seen in sevilla to-day, notably in the alcazar and the giralda tower, fashioned by the builder of the kutubia that stands like a stately lighthouse in the blad al hamra. so, with the fascination of the city for excuse, i lingered in marrakesh and went daily to the bazaars to make small purchases. the dealers were patient, friendly folk, and found no trouble too much, so that there was prospect of a sale at the end of it. most of them had a collapsible set of values for their wares, but the dealer who had the best share of my moorish or spanish dollars was an old man in the bazaar of the brass-workers, who used to say proudly, "behold in me thy servant, abd el kerim,[ ] the man of one price." the brass and copper workers had most of their metal brought to them from the sus country, and sold their goods by weight. woe to the dealer discovered with false scales. the gunsmiths, who seemed to do quite a big trade in flint-lock guns, worked with their feet as well as their hands, their dexterity being almost japanese. nearly every master had an apprentice or two, and if there are idle apprentices in the southern capital of my lord abd-el-aziz, i was not fated to see one. no phase of the city's life lacked fascination, nor was the interest abated when life and death moved side by side. a moorish funeral wound slowly along the road in the path of a morning's ride. first came a crowd of ragged fellows on foot singing the praises of allah, who gives one life to his servants here and an eternity of bliss in paradise at the end of their day's work. the body of the deceased followed, wrapped in a knotted shroud and partially covered with what looked like a coloured shawl, but was, i think, the flag from a saint's shrine. four bearers carried the open bier, and following came men of high class on mules. the contrast between the living and the dead was accentuated by the freshness of the day, the life that thronged the streets, the absence of a coffin, the weird, sonorous chaunting of the mourners. the deceased must have been a man of mark, for the crowd preceding the bier was composed largely of beggars, on their way to the cemetery, where a gift of food would be distributed. following their master's remains came two slaves, newly manumitted, their certificates of freedom borne aloft in cleft sticks to testify before all men to the generosity of the loudly lamented. doubtless the shroud of the dead had been sprinkled with water brought from the well zem zem, which is by the mosque of mecca, and is said to have been miraculously provided for hagar, when ishmael, then a little boy, was like to die of thirst in the wilderness. i watched the procession wind its way out of sight to the burial-ground by the mosque, whose mueddin would greet its arrival with the cry, "may allah have mercy upon him." then the dead man would be carried to the cemetery, laid on his right side looking towards mecca, and the shroud would be untied, that there may be no awkwardness or delay upon the day of the resurrection. and the kadi or f'k'hay[ ] would say, "o allah, if he did good, over-estimate his goodness; and if he did evil, forget his evil deeds; and of thy mercy grant that he may experience thine acceptance; and spare him the trials and troubles of the grave.... of thy mercy grant him freedom from torment until thou send him to paradise, o thou most pitiful of the pitying.... pardon us, and him, and all moslems, o lord of creation." [illustration: a young marrakshi] on the three following mornings the men of the deceased's house would attend by the newly-made grave, in company with the tolba, and would distribute bread and fruit to the poor, and when their task was over and the way clear, the veiled women would bring flowers, with myrtle, willows, and young leaves of the palm, and lay them on the grave, and over these the water-carrier would empty his goat-skin. i knew that the dead man would have gone without flinching to his appointed end, not as one who fears, but rather as he who sets out joyfully to a feast prepared in his honour. his faith had kept all doubts at bay, and even if he had been an ill liver the charitable deeds wrought in his name by surviving relatives would enable him to face the two angels who descend to the grave on the night following a man's burial and sit in judgment upon his soul. this one who passed me on his last journey would tell the angels of the men who were slaves but yesterday and were now free, he would speak of the hungry who had been fed, and of the intercession of the righteous and learned. these facts and his faith, the greatest fact of all, would assuredly satisfy munkir and nakir.[ ] small wonder if no manner of life, however vile, stamps ill-livers in morocco with the seal we learn to recognise in the western world. for the moslem death has no sting, and hell no victory. faith, whether it be in one god, in a trinity, in christ, mohammed, or buddha, is surely the most precious of all possessions, so it be as virile and living a thing as it is in sunset land. writing of religion, i needs must set down a word in this place of the men and women who work for the southern morocco mission in marrakesh. the beauty of the city has long ceased to hold any fresh surprises for them, their labour is among the people who "walk in noonday as in the night." it is not necessary to be of their faith to admire the steadfast devotion to high ideals that keeps mr. nairn and his companions in marrakesh. i do not think that they make converts in the sense that they desire, the faith of islam suits morocco and the moors, and it will not suffer successful invasion, but the work of the mission has been effective in many ways. if the few europeans who visit the city are free to wander unchallenged, unmolested through its every street, let them thank the missionaries; if the news that men from the west are straight-dealing, honourable, and slaves to truth, has gone from the villages on the hither side of atlas down to the far cities of the sus, let the missionaries be praised. and if a european woman can go unveiled yet uninsulted through marrakesh, the credit is due to the ladies of the mission. it may be said without mental reservation that the southern morocco mission accomplishes a great work, and is most successful in its apparent failure. it does not make professing christians out of moors, but it teaches the moors to live finer lives within the limits of their own faith, and if they are kinder and cleaner and more honourable by reason of their intercourse with the "tabibs" and "tabibas," the world gains and morocco is well served. when the sultan was in difficulties towards the end of , and the star of bu hamara was in the ascendant, sir arthur nicolson, our minister in tangier, ordered all british subjects to leave the inland towns for the coast. as soon as the news reached the marrakshis, the houses of the missionaries were besieged by eager crowds of moors and berbers, offering to defend the well-beloved tabibs against all comers, and begging them not to go away. very reluctantly mr. nairn and his companions obeyed the orders sent from tangier, but, having seen their wives and children safely housed in djedida, they returned to their work. [illustration: fruit market, marrakesh] the elhara or leper quarter is just outside one of the city gates, and after some effort of will, i conquered my repugnance and rode within its gate. the place proved to be a collection of poverty-stricken hovels built in a circle, of the native tapia, which was crumbling to pieces through age and neglect. most of the inhabitants were begging in the city, where they are at liberty to remain until the gates are closed, but there were a few left at home, and i had some difficulty in restraining the keeper of elhara, who wished to parade the unfortunate creatures before me that i might not miss any detail of their sufferings. leper women peeped out from corners, as boubikir's "house" had done; little leper children played merrily enough on the dry sandy ground, a few donkeys, covered with scars and half starved, stood in the scanty shade. in a deep cleft below the outer wall women and girls, very scantily clad, were washing clothes in a pool that is reserved apparently for the use of the stricken village. i was glad to leave the place behind me, after giving the unctuous keeper a gift for the sufferers that doubtless never reached them. they tell me that no sustained attempt is made to deal medically with the disease, though many nasty concoctions are taken by a few true believers, whose faith, i fear, has not made them whole.[ ] when it became necessary for us to leave marrakesh the young shareef went to the city's fandaks and inquired if they held muleteers bound for mogador. the maalem had taken his team home along the northern road, our path lay to the south, through the province of the son of lions (oulad bou sba), and thence through shiadma and haha to the coast. we were fortunate in finding the men we sought without any delay. a certain kaid of the sus country, none other than el arbi bel hadj ben haida, who rules over tiensiert, had sent six muleteers to marrakesh to sell his oil, in what is the best southern market, and he had worked out their expenses on a scale that could hardly be expected to satisfy anybody but himself. [illustration: in the fandak] "from tiensiert to marrakesh is three days journey," he had said, and, though it is five, no man contradicted him, perhaps because five is regarded as an unfortunate number, not to be mentioned in polite or religious society. "three days will serve to sell the oil and rest the mules," he had continued, "and three days more will bring you home." then he gave each man three dollars for travelling money, about nine shillings english, and out of it the mules were to be fed, the charges of n'zala and fandak to be met, and if there was anything over the men might buy food for themselves. they dared not protest, for el arbi bel hadj ben haida had every man's house in his keeping, and if the muleteers had failed him he would have had compensation in a manner no father of a family would care to think about. the oil was sold, and the muleteers were preparing to return to their master, when salam offered them a price considerably in excess of what they had received for the whole journey to take us to mogador. needless to say they were not disposed to let the chance go by, for it would not take them two days out of their way, so i went to the fandak to see mules and men, and complete the bargain. there had been a heavy shower some days before, and the streets were more than usually miry, but in the fandak, whose owner had no marked taste for cleanliness, the accumulated dirt of all the rainy season had been stirred, with results i have no wish to record. a few donkeys in the last stages of starvation had been sent in to gather strength by resting, one at least was too far gone to eat. even the mules of the susi tribesmen were not in a very promising condition. it was an easy task to count their ribs, and they were badly in need of rest and a few square meals. tied in the covered cloisters of the fandak there was some respite for them from the attack of mosquitoes, but the donkeys, being cheap and of no importance, were left to all the torments that were bound to be associated with the place. only one human being faced the glare of the light and trod fearlessly through the mire that lay eight or ten inches deep on the ground, and he was a madman, well-nigh as tattered and torn as the one i had angered in the kaisariyah on the morning after my arrival in the city. this man's madness took a milder turn. he went from one donkey to another, whispering in its ear, a message of consolation i hope and believe, though i had no means of finding out. when i entered the fandak he came running up to me in a style suggestive of the gambols of a playful dog, and i was exceedingly annoyed by a thought that he might not know any difference between me and his other friends. there was no need to be uneasy, for he drew himself up to his full height, made a hissing noise in his throat, and spat fiercely at my shadow. then he returned to the stricken donkeys, and the keeper of the fandak, coming out to welcome me, saw his more worthy visitor. turning from me with "marhababik" ("you are welcome") just off his lips, he ran forward and kissed the hem of the madman's djellaba. a madman is very often an object of veneration in morocco, for his brain is in divine keeping, while his body is on the earth. and yet the moor is not altogether logical in his attitude to the "afflicted of allah." while so much liberty is granted to the majority of the insane that feigned madness is quite common among criminals in the country, less fortunate men who have really become mentally afflicted, but are not recognised as insane, are kept chained to the walls of the marstan--half hospital, half prison--that is attached to the most great mosques. i have been assured that they suffer considerably at the hands of most gaoler-doctors, whose medicine is almost invariably the stick, but i have not been able to verify the story, which is quite opposed to moorish tradition. the mad visitor to the fandak did not disturb the conversation with the keeper and the susi muleteers, but he turned the head of a donkey in our direction and talked eagerly to the poor animal, pointing at me with outstretched finger the while. the keeper of the fandak, kind man, made uneasy by this demonstration, signed to me quietly to stretch out my hand, with palm open, and directed to the spot where the madman stood, for only in that way could i hope to avert the evil eye. the chief muleteer was a thin and wiry little fellow, a total stranger to the soap and water beloved of unbelievers. he could not have been more than five feet high, and he was burnt brown. his dark outer garment of coarse native wool had the curious yellow patch on the back that all berbers seem to favour, though none can explain its origin or purpose, and he carried his slippers in his hand, probably deeming them less capable of withstanding hard wear than his naked feet. he had no arabic, but spoke only "shilha," the language of the berbers, so it took some time to make all arrangements, including the stipulation that a proper meal for all the mules was to be given under the superintendence of m'barak. that worthy representative of shareefian authority was having a regal time, drawing a dollar a day, together with three meals and a ration for his horse, in return for sitting at ease in the courtyard of the tin house. arrangements concluded, it was time to say good-bye to sidi boubikir. i asked delicately to be allowed to pay rent for the use of the house, but the hospitable old man would not hear of it. "allah forbid that i should take any money," he remarked piously. "had you told me you were going i would have asked you to dine with me again before you started." we sat in the well-remembered room, where green tea and mint were served in a beautiful set of china-and-gold filagree cups, presented to him by the british government nearly ten years ago. he spoke at length of the places that should be visited, including the house of his near relative, mulai el hadj of tamsloht, to whom he offered to send me with letters and an escort. moreover, he offered an escort to see us out of the city and on the road to the coast, but i judged it better to decline both offers, and, with many high-flown compliments, left him by the entrance to his great house, and groped back through the mud to put the finishing touches to packing. the young shareef accepted a parting gift with grave dignity, and assured me of his esteem for all time and his willing service when and where i should need it. i had said good-bye to the "tabibs" and "tabibas," so nothing remained but to rearrange our goods, that nearly everything should be ready for the mules when they arrived before daybreak. knowing that the first day's ride was a long one, some forty miles over an indifferent road and with second-rate animals, i was anxious to leave the city as soon as the gates were opened. [illustration: the jama'a effina] right above my head the mueddin in the minaret overlooking the tin house called the sleeping city to its earliest prayer.[ ] i rose and waked the others, and we dressed by a candle-light that soon became superfluous. when the mueddin began the chant that sounded so impressive and so mournful as it was echoed from every minaret in the city, the first approach of light would have been visible in the east, and in these latitudes day comes and goes upon winged feet. before the beds were taken to pieces and salam had the porridge and his "marmalade" ready, with steaming coffee, for early breakfast, we heard the mules clattering down the stony street. within half an hour the packing comedy had commenced. the susi muleteer, who was accompanied by a boy and four men, one a slave, and all quite as frowzy, unwashed, and picturesque as himself, swore that we did not need four pack-mules but eight. salam, his eyes flaming, and each separate hair of his beard standing on end, cursed the shameless women who gave such men as the susi muleteer and his fellows to the kingdom of my lord abd-el-aziz, threw the _shwarris_ on the ground, rejected the ropes, and declared that with proper fittings the mules, if these were mules at all, and he had his very serious doubts about the matter, could run to mogador in three days. clearly salam intended to be master from the start, and when i came to know something more about our company, the wisdom of the procedure was plain. happily for one and all mr. nairn came along at this moment. it was not five o'clock, but the hope of serving us had brought him into the cold morning air, and his thorough knowledge of the shilha tongue worked wonders. he was able to send for proper ropes at an hour when we could have found no trader to supply them, and if we reached the city gate that looks out towards the south almost as soon as the camel caravan that had waited without all night, the accomplishment was due to my kind friend who, with mr. alan lennox, had done so much to make the stay in marrakesh happily memorable. it was just half-past six when the last pack-mule passed the gate, whose keeper said graciously, "allah prosper the journey," and, though the sun was up, the morning was cool, with a delightfully fresh breeze from the west, where the atlas mountains stretched beyond range of sight in all their unexplored grandeur. they seemed very close to us in that clear atmosphere, but their foot hills lay a day's ride away, and the natives would be prompt to resent the visit of a stranger who did not come to them with the authority of a kaid or governor whose power and will to punish promptly were indisputable. with no little regret i turned, when we had been half an hour on the road, for a last look at ibn tachfin's city. distance had already given it the indefinite attraction that comes when the traveller sees some city of old time in a light that suggests every charm and defines none. i realised that i had never entered an eastern city with greater pleasure, or left one with more sincere regret, and that if time and circumstance had been my servants i would not have been so soon upon the road. the road from marrakesh to mogador is as pleasant as traveller could wish, lying for a great part of the way through fertile land, but it is seldom followed, because of the two unbridged rivers n'fiss and sheshoua. if either is in flood (and both are fed by the melting snows from the atlas mountains), you must camp on the banks for days together, until it shall please allah to abate the waters. our lucky star was in the ascendant; we reached wad n'fiss at eleven o'clock to find its waters low and clear. on the far side of the banks we stayed to lunch by the border of a thick belt of sedge and bulrushes, a marshy place stretching over two or three acres, and glowing with the rich colour that comes to southern lands in april and in may. it recalled to me the passage in one of the stately choruses of mr. swinburne's _atalanta in calydon_, that tells how "blossom by blossom the spring begins." the intoxication that lies in colour and sound has ever had more fascination for me than the finest wine could bring: the colour of the vintage is more pleasing than the taste of the grape. in this forgotten corner the eye and ear were assailed and must needs surrender. many tiny birds of the warbler family sang among the reeds, where i set up what i took to be a numidian crane, and, just beyond the river growths, some splendid oleanders gave an effective splash of scarlet to the surrounding greens and greys. in the waters of the marsh the bullfrogs kept up a loud sustained croak, as though they were true believers disturbed by the presence of the infidels. the n'fiss is a fascinating river from every point of view. though comparatively small, few europeans have reached the source, and it passes through parts of the country where a white man's presence would be resented effectively. the spurs of the atlas were still clearly visible on our left hand, and needless to say we had the place to ourselves. there was not so much as a tent in sight. at last m'barak, who had resumed his place at the head of our little company, and now realised that we had prolonged our stay beyond proper limits, mounted his horse rather ostentatiously, and the journey was resumed over level land that was very scantily covered with grass or clumps of irises. the mountains seemed to recede and the plain to spread out; neither eye nor glass revealed a village; we were apparently riding towards the edge of the plains. the muleteer and his companions strode along at a round pace, supporting themselves with sticks and singing melancholy shilha love-songs. their mules, recollection of their good meal of the previous evening being forgotten, dropped to a pace of something less than four miles an hour, and as the gait of our company had to be regulated by the speed of its slowest member, it is not surprising that night caught us up on the open and shut out a view of the billowy plain that seemingly held no resting-place. how i missed the little maalem, whose tongue would have been a spur to the stumbling beasts! but as wishing would bring nothing, we dismounted and walked by the side of our animals, the kaid alone remaining in the saddle. six o'clock became seven, and seven became eight, and then i found it sweet to hear the watch-dog's honest bark. of course it was not a "deep-mouthed welcome:" it was no more than a cry of warning and defiance raised by the colony of pariah dogs that guarded ain el baidah, our destination. in the darkness, that had a pleasing touch of purple colouring lent it by the stars, ain el baidah's headman loomed very large and imposing. "praise to allah that you have come and in health," he remarked, as though we were old friends. he assured me of my welcome, and said his village had a guest-house that would serve instead of the tent. methought he protested too much, but knowing that men and mules were dead beat, and that we had a long way to go, i told salam that the guest-house would serve, and the headman lead the way to a tapia building that would be called a very small barn, or a large fowl-house, in england. a tiny clay lamp, in which a cotton wick consumed some mutton fat, revealed a corner of the darkness and the dirt, and when our own lamps banished the one, they left the other very clearly to be seen. but we were too tired to utter a complaint. i saw the mules brought within the zariba, helped to set up my camp bed, took the cartridges out of my shot gun, and, telling salam to say when supper was ready, fell asleep at once. eighteen busy hours had passed since the mueddin called to "feyer" from the minaret above the tin house, but my long-sought rest was destined to be brief. footnotes: [ ] literally, "slave of the merciful." [ ] priest attached to the mosque. [ ] the angels of judgment. [ ] so many lepers come from the argan forest provinces of haha and shiadma that leprosy is believed by many moors to result from the free use of argan oil. there is no proper foundation for this belief. [ ] this is the most important of the five supplications. the sura of al koran called "the night journey" says, "to the prayer of daybreak the angels themselves bear witness." "sons of lions" and other true believers [illustration: evening in camp] chapter x "sons of lions" and other true believers falstaff--"four rogues in buckram let drive at me." _king henry iv._, act ii. scene . by the time salam had roused me from a dream in which i was being torn limb from limb in a roman amphitheatre, whose terraced seats held countless moors all hugely enjoying my dismemberment, i realised that a night in that guest-house would be impossible. the place was already over-populated. a brief meal was taken in the open, and we sat with our feet thrust to the edge of the nearest charcoal fire, for the night was cold. our animals, tethered and watered, stood anxiously waiting for the barley the chief muleteer had gone to buy. supper over, i sat on a chair in the open, and disposed myself for sleep as well as the conditions permitted. round me, on the bare ground, the men and the boy from the sus lay wrapped in their haiks--the dead could not have slept more soundly than they. the two fires were glimmering very faintly now, m'barak was stretching a blanket for himself, while salam collected the tin plates and dishes, his last task before retiring. somewhere in the far outer darkness i heard the wail of a hyæna, and a light cold breeze sighed over the plain. half asleep and half awake i saw the village headman approaching from out the darkness; a big bag of barley was on his shoulder, and he was followed closely by the muleteer. they came into the little circle of the fast falling light; i was nodding drowsily toward unconsciousness, and wondering, with a vague resentment that exhausted all my remaining capacity to think, why the headman should be speaking so loudly. suddenly, i saw the muleteer go to earth as if he had been pole-axed, and in that instant i was wide awake and on my feet. so was salam. the headman delivered himself of a few incisive rasping sentences. the muleteer rose slowly and wiped a little blood from his face. salam explained: his capacity for fathoming a crisis was ever remarkable. "headman he charge three dollars for barley and he don't worth more than one. muleteer he speaks for that, and headman 'e knock him down." "ask him how he dares interfere with our people," i said. "tell him his kaid shall hear of it." the headman replied haughtily to salam's questions and strode away. "he say," said salam, beginning to get angry, "pay first and talk afterwards--to allah, if you will. he say he wait long time for man like muleteer an' cut 'im throat. what he's bin done that be nothing. what he's goin' to do, that all moors is goin' to see. he come back soon, sir." then salam slipped noiselessly into the guest-house and fetched my repeating shot gun, from which i had previously drawn all cartridges. he sat down outside with the weapon across his knees, and the bruised muleteer safely behind him. i coaxed the charcoal to a further effort and returned to my chair, wondering whether trouble that had been so long in coming had arrived at last. some five minutes later we heard a sound of approaching footsteps, and i could not help noting how salam brightened. he was spoiling for a fight. i watched dim figures coming into the area of light, they took shape and showed ain al baidah's chief and two of his men--tall, sturdy fellows, armed with thick sticks. seeing salam sitting with gun levelled full on them they came to a sudden halt, and listened while he told them, in a voice that shook and sometimes broke with rage, their character, their characteristics, the moral standing of their parents and grandparents, the probable fate of their sons, and the certain and shameful destiny of their daughters. he invited them, with finger on trigger, to advance one step and meet the death that should enable him to give their ill-favoured bodies one by one to the pariahs and the hawks, before he proceeded to sack ain al baidah and overcome single-handed the whole of its fighting men. and, absurd though his rodomontade may sound to europeans, who read it in cold print, it was a vastly different matter there in the dark of the plain, when salam stood, believing he held a loaded gun in his hand, and allowed his fierce temper rein. the headman and his two attendants slunk off like whipped curs, and we proceeded to feed our animals, replenish both fires, and sleep with one eye open. [illustration: preparing supper] morning came over the hills to ain al baidah in cold and cheerless guise. the villagers crowded round to stare at us in the familiar fashion. but there were grim looks and dark scowls among them, and, failing the truculent and determined bearing of salam and the presence of the kaid we should have had a lively quarter of an hour. as it was, we were not ready to leave before eight o'clock, and then salam went, money in hand, to where the thieving headman stood. the broken night's rest had not made my companion more pleased with ain al baidah's chief. he threw the dollars that had been demanded on to the ground before the rogue's feet, and then his left hand flew up and outward. with one swift, irresistible movement he had caught his foe by the beard, drawn down the shrinking, vicious face to within a few inches of his own, and so holding him, spoke earnestly for half a minute, of what the prophet has said about hospitality to travellers, and the shocking fate that awaits headmen who rob those who come seeking shelter, and beat them when they complain. ain al baidah's chief could not but listen, and listening, he could not but shudder. so it fell out that, when salam's harangue was finished, we left a speechless, irresolute, disgraced headman, and rode away slowly, that none might say we knew fear. if the village had any inclination to assist its chief, the sight of the blessed one's weapon, in its fierce red cloth covering, must have awed them. some days later, in mogador, i was told that the ain al baidah man is a terror to travellers and a notorious robber, but i made no complaint to our consul. if the headman's overlord had been told to punish him, the method chosen would assuredly have been to rob every man in the douar, and if they resisted, burn their huts over their heads. it seemed better to trust that the memory of salam will lead ain al baidah's chief to lessen his proud looks. we made slow progress to sheshoua, where the river that might have barred our road to the coast was as friendly as the n'fiss had been on the previous day. the track to its banks had been flat and uninteresting enough; what good work the winter rains had done by way of weaving a flower carpet on the plains, the summer sun had destroyed. there was a considerable depression in the plain, though we could not notice it at the slow pace forced upon us, and this accounted for the absence of water between the rivers, and for the great extent of the calcareous gravel, in which few plants could thrive. only the _zizyphus lotus_, from whose branches little white snails hung like flowers, seemed to find real nourishment in the dry ground, though colocynth and wild lavender were to be seen now and again. but by the sheshoua river the change was very sudden and grateful to the eye. a considerable olive grove, whose grey-green leaves shone like silver in the light breeze, offered shade and shelter to a large colony of doves. there was a thriving village, with a saint's tomb for chief attraction, and solid walls to suggest that the place does not enjoy perennial tranquillity. but even though there are strangers who trouble these good folk, their home could not have looked more charmingly a haunt of peace than it did. all round the village one saw orchards of figs, apricots, and pomegranate trees; the first with the leaves untouched by the summer heat, the apricots just at the end of their blossoming, and the pomegranates still in flower. in place of the dry, hard soil that was so trying to the feet of man and beast, there were here meadows in plenty, from which the irises had only lately died. i saw the common english dandelion growing within stone's throw of a clump of feathery palms. tired after the vigil of the previous night and the long hours that had led up to it, we reclined at our ease under the olives, determined to spend the night at sidi el muktar, some fifteen or twenty miles away. from there one can hunt the great bustard, and i had hoped to do so until i saw the animals that were to take us to the coast. neither the bustard nor the gazelle, that sometimes roams sidi el muktar's plains, had anything to fear from those noble creatures. the kaid alone might have pursued bird or beast, but as his gun was innocent of powder and shot there would have been nothing but exercise to seek. after a two-hours' rest, given in one case more to sleep than lunch, we moved on towards the village of sidi el muktar, passing some curious flat-topped hills called by the natives haunk ijjimmal.[ ] the oasis had ceased as suddenly as it had begun, and the road became as uninteresting as was our own crawling gait. i noticed that the susi muleteers were travelling very sadly, that they had not among them an echo of the songs that had sounded so strangely on the previous day, and i bade salam find the cause of the depression, and ask whether the young lad whose features had become pinched and drawn felt ill. within a few moments the truth was out. the six men had eaten nothing save a little of the mules' barley since they left marrakesh, and as they had been on short rations between tiensiert and the southern capital, their strength was beginning to give out. it was no part of my business to feed them; they had received "something in the hand" before they left the city, and could well have bought supplies for the road, but they had preferred to trust providence, and hoped to live on a small part of the mules' barley and the daily gift of tea that had been promised. under the circumstances, and though i had found reason to believe that they were lazy, feckless rogues enough, who really needed an iron-handed kaid to rule over them, i told salam to pass word round that their wants would be supplied at the day's end. then they picked up their old stride, and one by one resumed the love-songs of yesterday as we moved slowly over the plains to where, in the far distance, sidi el muktar stood between us and the fast setting sun, placed near to the junction of three provinces--oulad bou sba, through which we travelled, m'touga, famous for fleet horses, and shiadma, where our road lay. but we were to find no rest in the shade of sidi el muktar's stately zowia. the "sons of lions" had raided the place on the previous day, hoping to terminate alike the rule and the existence of a kaid whose hand had rested too heavily upon them. some friend of the kaid having given him due notice of the raiders' intentions--treachery is a painfully common feature of these forays--he had been well prepared to meet these godless men. powder had spoken, and was to speak again, for the kaid, having driven off the raiders, was going to carry war into the enemy's country, and was busy preparing to start on the morrow at daybreak. at such a time as this it had not been wise to pitch tent within sound or sight of men with the killing lust upon them. very reluctantly we rode on for another two hours and then ain umast, a douar that is famous for its possession of a well of pure water, received us with nightfall. there our troubles were over, for though the place was more than commonly dirty, the inhabitants were peaceable and disposed to be friendly. a few crops were raised on the surrounding fields, and small herds of sheep and goats managed to pick up some sort of a living on the surrounding lands, but poverty reigned there, and ain umast is of small account by the side of sidi el muktar, which is the burial-place of a saint, whose miracles are still acknowledged by all the faithful who happen to have met with good luck of any sort. [illustration: a goatherd] bread, butter, and eggs were brought for the muleteers, and i was greatly surprised by the cleanliness of the men. before they broke an egg for the omelette they washed it with greatest care. they themselves stood far more in need of a washing than the eggs did, but perhaps they could not be expected to think of everything. barley was bought, at half the price charged at ain el baidah, and i noticed that the cunning susi hid some of it in the long bag they kept at the bottom of one of the _shwarris_. clearly they intended to make the supply we paid for serve to take them all the way to tiensiert. this was annoying, since one of the objects of ordering a good supply each night was to enable the long-suffering beasts to compass a better speed on the following day. that evening there was great excitement in the douar. the elders came round our fire after supper and sought to know if it were true that the "sons of lions" had blotted out sidi el muktar, and put all its inhabitants to the sword. when we declared that the little town was still where it had stood since they were born, they appeared distinctly surprised, and gave the praise and credit to the patron saint. they said the kaid's hand was a very heavy one, that his men went to the wednesday market and were the terror of the country folks who came to buy and sell. the absence of the court elevated by allah was to be deplored, for had my lord abd-el-aziz been in residence at marrakesh some other kaid would have made him a bid for the place of the ruler of sidi el muktar, basing his offer upon the fact that the present governor could not keep order. a change might have been for the better--it could hardly have been for the worse. one or two of the men of ain umast spoke shilha, and the susi men, hearing the cruelties of sidi el muktar's ruler discussed, claimed to have a far better specimen of the genus kaid in tiensiert. he was a man indeed, ready with fire and sword at the shortest notice; his subjects called him father of locusts, so thoroughly did he deal with all things that could be eaten up. it was a curious but instructive attitude. these miserable men were quite proud to think that the tyranny of their kaid, the great el arbi bel hadj ben haida, was not to be rivalled by anything shiadma could show. they instanced his treatment of them and pointed to the young boy who was of their company. his father had been kaid in years past, but the late grand wazeer ba ahmad sold his office to el arbi, who threw the man into prison and kept him there until he died. to show his might, el arbi had sent the boy with them, that all men might know how the social scales of tiensiert held the kaid on one side and the rest of the people on the other. the black slave who accompanied them had been brought up by the late kaid's father, and was devoted to the boy. in his mercy el arbi allowed him to live with the lad and work a small farm, the harvest of which was strictly tithed by tiensiert's chief--who took a full nine-tenths. before the evening was over the elders of ain umast had acknowledged, rather regretfully i thought, that the tyrant of sidi el muktar must hide a diminished head before his brother of the sus. the triumph of the grimy men from tiensiert was then complete. they were a sorry set of fellows enough, to outward seeming, but how shall a european judge them fairly? stevenson says in one of his essays, "justice is not done to the versatility and the unplumbed childishness of man's imagination. his life from without may seem but a rude mound of mud; there will be some golden chamber at the heart of it, in which he dwells delighted; and for as dark as his pathway seems to the observer, he will have some kind of bull's-eye at his belt." so, doubtless, had i had the eyes that see below the surface, these hardy traders, the best of whose hopes and actions were hidden from me, would have been no less interesting than the maalem or the young shareef. in view of the disturbed state of the country i thought of having a few extra guards, but finding the two already engaged sleeping peacefully before our tent was closed, it seemed likely that a couple of sleeping men would be as useful as four. i fear they had a troubled night, for though the "sons of lions" did not trouble us, a short, sharp shower came with the small hours and woke the poor fellows, who asked for extra money in the morning by way of consolation for their broken rest. by five o'clock we were astir, and soon after we were on the road again, bound for the village of hanchen, where a small sok thalata[ ] is held. after a brief mid-day rest we reached the outskirts of the argan forest. this great forest is quite the distinctive feature of southern morocco. the argan tree, that gives a name to it, is the indigenous olive of the country, and is found only in the zone between the tensift river and the river sus. argan wood is exceedingly hard and slow growing, thus differing materially from the olive, to which it seems so nearly related. the trunk divides low down, sometimes within six feet of the roots, and the branches grow horizontally. if the moors are right, the age of the elders of the forest is to be counted in centuries, and the wood can defy the attacks of insects that make short-work of other trees. the leaves of the argan recall those of the olive, but have even a lighter silvery aspect on the underside; the fruit is like the olive, but considerably larger, and is sought after by many animals. goats climb among the branches in search of the best nuts. camels and cows will not pass an argan tree if given the slightest chance to linger. the animals that eat the nuts reject their kernels, and the moors collect these in order to extract the oil, which is used in cooking, for lighting purposes, and as medicine. after extraction the pulp is eagerly accepted by cattle, so no part of the valued fruit is wasted. one of the giants of the forest, said to be four hundred years old, has before now given shade to a regiment of soldiers; i saw for myself that the circumference of its branches was more than two hundred feet. [illustration: coming from the mosque, hanchen] but it must not be thought that the argan forest is composed entirely of these trees. the argan dominates the forest but does not account for its beauty. the r'tam is almost as plentiful, and lends far more to the wood's colour scheme, for its light branches are stirred by every breeze. dwarf-palm is to be found on all sides, together with the arar or citrus, and the double-thorned lotus. the juniper, wild pear, and cork trees are to be met with now and again, and the ground is for the most part a sea of flowers almost unknown to me, though i could recognise wild thyme, asphodel, and lavender amid the tamarisk and myrtle undergrowth. at intervals the forest opens, showing some large douar that was built probably on the site of a well, and there industrious village folks have reclaimed the land, raised crops, and planted orchards. olive, fig, and pomegranate seem to be the most popular trees, and corn is grown in the orchards too, possibly in order that it may have the benefit of the trees' shade. the soil that can raise corn and fruit trees together must have exceptional vitality and richness, particularly in view of the fact that it is in no way fed, and is rather scraped or scratched than truly ploughed. the village of hanchen, known for miles round as "sok thalata" by reason of its weekly gathering, might well serve to justify a halt. it straggles over a hill surrounded on all sides by the forest, it has a saint's shrine of fair size and imposing aspect, a good supply of water, and very peaceful inhabitants. at the base of the slope, some fifty yards from the broad track leading to the coast, there was an orchard of more than common beauty, even for southern morocco. the pomegranates, aflower above the ripening corn, had finer blossoms than any i had seen before, the fig-trees were biblical in their glossy splendour. mules were footsore, the susi men were tired, the weather was perfect, time was our own for a day or two, and i was aching to take my gun down the long glades that seemed to stretch to the horizon. so we off-saddled, and pitched our tent in the shadow of a patriarchal fig-tree. then the mules were eased of their burdens and fed liberally, salam standing between the poor beasts and the muleteers, who would have impounded a portion of their hard-earned meal. the heat of the afternoon was passing; i loaded my gun and started out. at first sight of the weapon some score of lads from the village--athletic, vigorous boys, ready to go anywhere and do anything--made signs that they would come and beat for me. with salam's help i gave them proper instructions; my idea was to shoot enough of fur and feather to give the muleteers a good supper. at the outset a sorry accident befell. a fat pigeon came sailing overhead, so well fed that it was hard to believe he was a pigeon at all. this being the sort of bird that suits hungry men, i fired and was well pleased to note the swift direct fall, and to hear the thud that tells of a clean kill. to my surprise the beaters remained where they were, none offering to pick up the bird. there were glum and serious looks on every side. i motioned one lad to go forward, and, to my amazement, he made the sign that is intended to avert the evil eye, and declared that he took refuge from me with allah. i sent for salam, and, as he approached, a chorus of explanations came to him from all sides. the pigeon came from the zowia of el hanchen. it was sacred--that is why it was so fat. this was a bad beginning, and a matter that demanded careful handling. so i sent m'barak, representing official morocco, to express to el hanchen's headman my extreme sorrow and sincere regret. the blessed one was instructed to assure the village that i had no suspicion of the bird's holiness, and that it was my rule in life to respect everything that other men respected. it seemed courteous to await the kaid's return before resuming operations, and he came back in half an hour with word that the headman, while deeply regretting the incident, recognised the absence of bad intention. he asked that the sacred slain might not be eaten. i sent back word thanking him for his courteous acceptance of my explanations, and promising that the fat pigeon should receive decent burial. a small hole was dug on the sunny side of the fig-tree, and there the sacred bird was interred. i hope that the worms proved as particular as we had been. duty done, we went off to the woods, the beaters, now quite reassured, driving stock-doves over in quantities that left no reason to fear about the muleteers' supper. while birds were the quarry the lads worked well, but now and again a hare would start from her form, and every boy would join in the headlong, hopeless chase that ensued. it was impossible to check them, and equally impossible to shoot at the hare. while she was within gunshot the lads were close on her heels, and by the time she had distanced them or dashed into the long grasses and scrub she was out of range or out of sight. in vain i waved them back and complained when they returned panting; as soon as another hare got up they went after her in the same way, until at last, taking advantage of a wild chase that had carried them rather a longer distance than usual, i took a sharp turn and strolled away quite by myself. i heard the excited cries die away in the distance, and then for some few moments the forest silence was broken only by the rustle of the breeze through the grass, and the sudden scream of a startled jay. doves went happily from tree to tree and i never put my gun up. i had heard a very familiar sound, and wanted to be assured that my ears were not deceived. no, i was right; i could hear the cuckoo, calling through the depth of the forest, as though it were my favourite essex copse at home. it was pleasant, indeed, to hear the homely notes so far from any other object, even remotely, connected with england. i strolled for an hour or more, listening to the "wandering voice," heedless of what passed me by, at peace with all the world, and resolved to shoot no more. alas, for good intentions! coming suddenly into a great clearing girdled by argan trees, i flushed two large birds some forty yards away. the first was missed, the second came down and proved to be a lesser bustard or _boozerat_--quite a prize. well content, i emptied the gun to avoid temptation and walked back to the camp, where there was quite a fair bag. "tell the muleteers, salam," i said, "that they may have these birds for their supper, and that i hope they will enjoy themselves." salam wore a rather troubled expression, i thought, as he went to the head muleteer and pointed to the spoils. then he came back and explained to me that their dietary laws did not allow the susi to eat anything that had not been killed by bleeding in the orthodox fashion. had they been with me, to turn wounded birds to the east and cut their throats in the name of allah, all would have been well, but birds shot dead were an abomination to the righteous susi. they scorned to avail themselves of the excuse afforded by their needs.[ ] so my labour had been in vain, and i did not know what to do with the spoil. but i left the slain in a little heap out of the way of insects and flies, and when we rose in the morning the unorthodox among hanchen's inhabitants had apparently solved the problem. footnotes: [ ] the camel's jaw. [ ] "tuesday market." [ ] "i find not in that which hath been revealed to me anything forbidden unto the eater ... except it be that which dieth of itself ... or that which is profane, having been slain in the name of some other than god. but whoso shall be compelled of necessity to eat these things, not lusting nor wilfully transgressing, verily thy lord will be gracious unto him and merciful."--al koran, sura, "cattle." in the argan forest [illustration: evening at hanchen] chapter xi in the argan forest life, even at its greatest and best, may be compared to a froward child, who must be humoured and played with till he falls asleep, and then the care is over. --_goldsmith._ early morning found the tuesday market in full swing, and the town of hanchen already astir in honour of the occasion. to realise the importance of the weekly gathering, it is well to remember that a market in the country here is the only substitute for the bazaar of the towns. every douar within a ten-mile radius of hanchen sends men and women to the tuesday market to buy and sell. so it befell that the hillside slope, which was bare on the previous afternoon, hummed now like a hive, and was well nigh as crowded. rough tents of goats' or camels'-hair cloth sheltered everything likely to appeal to the native mind and resources,--tea, sugar, woollen and cotton goods, pottery, sieves, padlocks, and nails being to all appearance the goods most sought after by the country moor. quite a brisk demand for candles prevailed; they were highly-coloured things, thick at the base and tapering to the wick. there was a good sale too for native butter, that needed careful straining before it could be eaten with comfort, and there were eggs in plenty, fetching from twopence to threepence the dozen, a high price for morocco, and brought about by the export trade that has developed so rapidly in the last few years. for the most part the traders seemed to be berbers or of evident berber extraction, being darker and smaller than the arabs, and in some cases wearing the dark woollen outer garment, with its distinctive orange-coloured mark on the back. women and little children took no small part in the market, but were perhaps most concerned with the sale of the chickens that they brought from their homes, tied by the legs in bundles without regard to the suffering entailed. the women did rather more than a fair share of porters' work too. very few camels were to be seen, but i noticed one group of half a dozen being carefully fed on a cloth, because, like all their supercilious breed, they were too dainty to eat from the ground. they gurgled quite angrily over the question of precedence. a little way from the tents in which hardware was exposed for sale, bread was being baked in covered pans over a charcoal fire fanned by bellows, while at the bottom of the hill a butcher had put up the rough tripod of wooden poles, from which meat is suspended. the slaughter of sheep was proceeding briskly. a very old moor was the official slaughter-man, and he sat in the shade of a wall, a bloody knife in hand, and conversed gravely with villagers of his own age. when the butcher's assistants had brought up three or four fresh sheep and stretched them on the ground, the old man would rise to his feet with considerable effort, cut the throats that were waiting for him very cleanly and expeditiously, and return to his place in the shade, while another assistant spread clean earth over the reeking ground. some of the sheep after being dressed were barbecued. i saw many women and girls bent under the weight of baskets of charcoal, or firewood, or loads of hay, and some late arrivals coming in heavily burdened in this fashion were accompanied by their husband, who rode at ease on a donkey and abused them roundly because they did not go quickly enough. mules and donkeys, with fore and hind leg hobbled, were left in one corner of the market-place, to make up in rest what they lacked in food. needless to say that the marketing was very brisk, but i noted with some interest that very little money changed hands. barter was more common than sale, partly because the government had degraded its own currency until the natives were fighting shy of it, and partly because the owners of the sheep and goats were a company of true bedouins from the extreme south. these bedouins were the most interesting visitors to the tuesday market, and i was delighted when one of them recognised salam as a friend. the two had met in the days when an adventurous scot set up in business at cape juby in the extreme south, where i believe his majesty lebaudy the first is now king. the saharowi was an exceedingly thin man, of wild aspect, with flowing hair and scanty beard. his skin was burnt deep brown, and he was dressed in a blue cotton garment of guinea cloth made in simplest fashion. he was the chief of a little party that had been travelling for two months with faces set toward the north. he reminded salam of sidi[ ] mackenzie, the scot who ruled cape juby, and how the great manager, whose name was known from the fort to tindouf, had nearly poisoned him by giving him bread to eat when he was faint with hunger. these true bedouins live on milk and cheese, with an occasional piece of camel or goat flesh, and a rare taste of mutton. when salam's friend came starving to cape juby, sidi mackenzie had given him bread. the hungry man ate some and at once became violently ill, his stomach could not endure such solid fare. having no milk in the fort, they managed to keep him alive on rice-water. it would appear that the saharowi can easily live on milk for a week, and with milk and cheese can thrive indefinitely, as indeed could most other folk, if they cared to forswear luxury and try. [illustration: on the road to argan forest] the little party was travelling with some hundreds of sheep and goats, which were being tended a little way off by the children, and, large though their flocks seemed, they were in truth sadly reduced by the drought that had driven one and all to the north. the saharowi explained to salam that all the wandering arabs were trekking northwards in search of land that had seen the rain; and that their path was strewn with the skeletons of animals fallen by the way. these nomads carried their wives and little ones, together with tents and household impedimenta, on the camels, and walked on foot with the grown children in charge of the flocks. the sheep they had sold to the butcher were in fair condition, and fetched from four to five shillings in english money, or the equivalent of this sum in goods, for when a saharowi approaches civilised lands he is generally in need of some of the products of civilisation, or thinks he is, though, at need, he manages excellently well without them. among the miscellaneous gathering that the tuesday market had attracted to hanchen i noticed a small company of acrobats from the sus, and a medicine man of fierce aspect, who sat by himself under a rough tent, muttering charms and incantations, and waiting for allah to send victims. this wonder-worker had piercing eyes, that seemed to examine the back of your head, long matted hair and a beard to match. he wore a white djellaba and a pair of new slippers, and was probably more dangerous than any disease he aided and abetted. for the amusement of the people who did not care for acrobatic feats and stood in no need of the primitive methods of the physician, there was a story-teller, who addressed a somewhat attenuated circle of phlegmatic listeners, and a snake-charmer who was surrounded by children. sidi ben aissa undoubtedly kept the snakes--spotted leffas from the sus--from hurting his follower, but not even the saint could draw _floos_ from poor youngsters whose total wealth would probably have failed to yield threepence to the strictest investigator. happily for them the charmer was an artist in his way; he loved his work for its own sake, and abated no part of his performance, although the reward would hardly buy him and his assistant a meal of mutton and bread at their labour's end. the boys of hanchen were doing brisk business in the brass cases of cartridges that had been fired on the previous day, and without a doubt the story of the wonders of a repeating gun lost nothing in the telling. [illustration: the snake-charmer] there was no interval for rest when the hours of greatest heat came round. late arrivals who travelled in on mule- or donkey-back renewed business when it slackened, and brought fresh goods to be sold or exchanged. the "sons of lions" had broken up the market at sidi el muktar on the previous friday before it was properly concluded, and many natives, disappointed there, had come out to hanchen to do their business, until there seemed to be nothing in any stall that lacked buyers. even the old man who had a heap of scrap-iron when the market opened had sold every piece of it by four o'clock, though it would have puzzled a european to find any use for such rubbish. the itinerant mender of slippers was hard at work with three young lads, and i never saw any one of the party idle. hawks and corbies fluttered over the butcher's ground, and i noticed a vulture in the deep vault of the sky. pariah dogs would clear every bit of refuse from the ground before another day dawned, and in their nasty fashion would serve their country, for the weather was very hot and the odours were overpowering. flies covered all unprotected meat until it ceased to look red, and the stall of the seller of sweetmeats was a study in black and white: black when the swarms settled, and white for a brief moment when he switched them off with his feathery bamboo brush. yet, in spite of the many difficulties under which trade was carried on, one could not help feeling that buyers and sellers alike were enjoying themselves hugely. the market did more than help them to make a living. it was at once their club, their newspaper, and their theatre, and supplied the one recreation of lives that--perhaps only to european seeming--were tedious as a twice-told tale. here the village folk were able to keep themselves posted in the country's contemporary history, for traders had come from all points of the compass, and had met men at other markets who, in their turn, brought news from places still more remote. consequently you might learn in hanchen's tuesday market what the sultan was doing in fez, and how the rogui was occupied in er-riff. french penetration in the far-off districts of no man's land beyond tafilalt was well-known to these travelling market-folk; the saharowi had spoken with the heads of a caravan that had come with slaves from ghadames, by way of the tuat, bound for marrakesh. resting by day and travelling by night, they had passed without challenge through the french lines. a visitor knowing arabic and shilha, and able to discount the stories properly, might have had a faithful picture of morocco as its own people see it, had he been admitted to join the weather-worn, hardy traders who sat complacently eyeing their diminished store towards the close of day. truth is nowhere highly esteemed in morocco,[ ] and the colouring superimposed upon most stories must have destroyed their original hue, but it served to please the moors and berbers who, like the men of other countries one knows, have small use for unadorned facts. perhaps the troubles that were reported from every side of the doomed country accounted for the professional story-teller's thin audience. by the side of tales that had some connection with fact the salt of his legends lost its savour. [illustration: in camp] towards evening the crowd melted away silently, as it had come. a few mules passed along the road to mogador, the bedouin and his company moved off in the direction of saffi, and the greater part of the traders turned south-east to m'touga, where there was a thursday market that could be reached in comfort. hanchen retired within its boundaries, rich in the proceeds of the sale of fodder, which had been in great demand throughout the day. small companies of boys roamed over the market-place, seeking to snap up any trifles that had been left behind, just as english boys will at the crystal palace or alexandra park, after a firework display. the moorish youngsters had even less luck than their english brethren, for in morocco, where life is simple and men need and have little, everything has its use, and a native throws nothing away. the dogs, eager to forestall the vultures, were still fighting among themselves for the offal left by the butcher, when the villagers, who had come to take a late cup of tea with salam and m'barak, resumed their slippers, testified to the unity of allah, and turned to ascend hanchen's steep hill. among the stories circulated in the tuesday market was one to the effect that a lion had come down from the atlas, and after taking toll of the cattle belonging to the douars on its road, had been shot at the western end of the forest. this tale was told with so much circumstance that it seemed worth inquiry, and i found in mogador that a great beast had indeed come from the hills and wrought considerable harm; but it was a leopard, not a lion. it may be doubted whether lions are to be found anywhere north of the atlas to-day, though they were common enough in times past, and one is said to have been shot close to tangier in the middle of last century. if they still exist it is in the farthest atlas range, in the country of the beni m'gild, a district that cannot be approached from the west at all, and in far lands beyond, that have been placed under observation lately by the advance-columns of the french algerian army, which does not suffer from scruples where its neighbour's landmarks are concerned. most of the old writers gave the title of lion or tiger to leopards, panthers, and lemurs; indeed, the error flourishes to-day. [illustration: a countryman] on the road once again, i found myself wondering at the way in which british sportsmen have neglected the argan forest. if they had to reach it as we did, after long days and nights in a country that affords little attraction for sportsmen, it would be no matter for wonder that they stay away. but the outskirts of the forest can be reached from mogador at the expense of a five-mile ride across the miniature sahara that cuts off sidi m'godol's city from the fertile lands, and mogador has a weekly service of steamers coming direct from london by way of the other moorish ports. no part of the forest is preserved, gun licenses are unknown, and the woods teem with game. stories about the ouadad or moufflon may be disregarded, for this animal is only found in the passes of the atlas mountains, miles beyond the forest's boundaries. but, on the other hand, the wild boar is plentiful, while lynx, porcupine, hyæna, jackal, and hare are by no means rare. sand-grouse and partridge thrive in large quantities. there are parts of the forest that recall the highlands of scotland, though the vegetation is richer than any that scotland can show, and in these places, unknown save to a very few, the streams are full of trout, and the otter may be hunted along the banks. the small quantity and poor quality of native guns may be held to account for the continual presence of birds and beasts in a part of the world that may not fairly be deemed remote, and where, save in times of stress, a sportsman who will treat the natives with courtesy and consideration may be sure of a hearty welcome and all the assistance he deserves. withal, no man who has once enjoyed a few days in the argan forest can sincerely regret europe's neglect of it: human nature is not unselfish enough for that. the ride through the last part of the forest was uneventful. argan, kharob, and lotus, with the help of a few of the "arar" or gum sandarac trees, shut off the view to the right and left. below them dwarf-palm, aloe, cactus, and sweet broom made a dense undergrowth, and where the woodland opened suddenly the ground was aflame with flowers that recalled england as clearly as the cuckoo's note. pimpernel, convolvulus, mignonette, marigold, and pansy were english enough, and in addition to these the ox-daisies of our meadows were almost as common here. many companies of the true bedouins passed us on the road, heralded by great flocks of sheep and goats, the sheep pausing to eat the tops of the dwarf-palms, the goats to climb the low-lying argan trees, while their owners stayed to ask about the water supply and the state of the country beyond. though we might consider ourselves far removed from civilisation, these bedouins felt that they were all too near it. the change from their desert land, with its few and far-scattered oases, to this country where there was a douar at the end of every day's journey, was like a change from the country to the town. they could not view without concern a part of the world in which men wore several garments, ate bread and vegetables, and slept under cover in a walled village, and one wild fellow, who carried a very old flint-lock musket, lamented the drought that had forced them from their homes to a place so full of men. so far as i was able to observe the matter, the berber muleteers of el arbi bel hadj ben haidah looked with great scorn upon these bedouins, and their contempt was reciprocated. in the eyes of the berbers these men were outcasts and "eaters of sand," and in the eyes of the bedouins the muleteers were puling, town-bred slaves, who dared not say their right hands were their own. perhaps the difficulty in the way of a proper understanding was largely physical. the berbers believe they came to morocco from canaan, forced out of palestine by the movement of the jews under joshua. they settled in the mountains of the "far west," and have never been absorbed or driven out by their arab conquerors. strong, sturdy, temperate men, devoid of imagination, and of the impulse to create or develop an artistic side to their lives, they can have nothing in common with the slenderly built, far-seeing arab of the plains, who dreams dreams and sees visions all the days of his life. between salam and the bedouins, on the other hand, good feeling came naturally. the poor travellers, whose worldly wealth was ever in their sight--a camel or two, a tent with scanty furniture, and a few goats and sheep--had all the unexplored places of the world to wander in, and all the heavens for their canopy. that is the life the arabs love, and it had tempted salam many hundreds of miles from his native place, the sacred city of sheshawan, on the border of er-riff. the wandering instinct is never very far from any of us who have once passed east of suez, and learned that the highest end and aim of life is not to live in a town, however large and ugly, and suffer without complaining the inevitable visits of the tax collector. our tent was set for the night in a valley that we reached by a path half-buried in undergrowth and known only to the head muleteer. it was a spot far removed from the beaten tracks of the travellers. in times past a great southern kaid had set his summer-house there: its skeleton, changed from grey to pink in the rosy light of sun-setting, stood before us, just across a tiny stream fringed by rushes, willows, and oleanders. when the court elevated by allah left marrakesh for the north some years ago, the sorely-tried natives had risen against their master, they had captured and plundered his house, and he had been fortunate in getting away with a whole skin. thereafter the tribesmen had fought among themselves for the spoils of war, the division of the china and cutlery accounting for several deaths. all the land round our little camp had been a garden, a place famous for roses and jessamine, verbena and the geraniums that grow in bushes, together with countless other flowers, that make the garden of sunset land suggest to moors the beauties of the paradise that is to come. now the flowers that had been so carefully tended ran wild, the boar rooted among them, and the porcupine made a home in their shade. as evening closed in, the wreck of the great house became vague and shadowy, a thing without outline, the wraith of the home that had been. grey owls and spectral bats sailed or fluttered from the walls. they might have been past owners or servitors who had suffered metamorphosis. the sight set me thinking of the mutual suspicions of the bedouins and the susi traders, the raiding of sidi el muktar, the other signs of tribal fighting that had been apparent on the road, the persecution of the moor by his protected fellow-subjects,--in short, the whole failure of the administration to which the ruin that stood before me seemed to give fitting expression. this house had not stood, and, after all, i thought morocco was but a house divided against itself. [illustration: moonlight] in the face of all the difficulties and dangers that beset the state, the sultan's subjects are concerned only with their own private animosities. berber cannot unite with moor, village still wars against village, each province is as a separate kingdom, so far as the adjacent province is concerned. as of old, the kaids are concerned only with filling their pockets; the villagers, when not fighting, are equally engrossed in saving some small portion of their earnings and taking advantage of the inability of the central government to collect taxes. they all know that the land is in confusion, that the europeans at the court are intriguing against its independence. in camp and market-place men spread the news of the french advance from the east. yet if the forces of the country could be organised,--if every official would but respond to the needs of the government and the people unite under their masters,--morocco might still hold europe at bay, to the extent at least of making its subjection too costly and difficult a task for any european government to undertake. if morocco could but find its abd el kadr, the day of its partition might even yet be postponed indefinitely. but next year, or the next--who shall say? my journey was well nigh over. i had leisure now to recall all seen and heard in the past few weeks and contrast it with the mental notes i had made on the occasion of previous visits. and the truth was forced upon me that morocco was nearer the brink of dissolution than it had ever been--that instability was the dominant note of social and political life. i recalled my glimpses of the arabs who live in algeria and tunisia, and even egypt under european rule, and thought of the servility and dependence of the lower classes and the gross, unintelligent lives of the rest. morocco alone had held out against europe, aided, to be sure, by the accident of her position at the corner of the mediterranean where no one european power could permit another to secure permanent foothold. and with the change, all the picturesque quality of life would go from the moghreb, and the kingdom founded by mulai idrees a thousand years ago would become as vulgar as algeria itself. there is something very solemn about the passing of a great kingdom--and morocco has been renowned throughout europe. it has preserved for us the essence of the life recorded in the pentateuch; it has lived in the light of its own faith and enforced respect for its prejudices upon one and all. in days when men overrun every square mile of territory in the sacred name of progress, and the company promoter in london, paris, or berlin acquires wealth he cannot estimate by juggling with mineralised land he has never seen, morocco has remained intact, and though her soil teems with evidences of mineral wealth, no man dares disturb it. there is something very fascinating about this defiance of all that the great powers of the world hold most dear. one could not help remembering, too, the charm and courtesy, the simple faith and chivalrous life, of the many who would be swallowed up in the relentless maw of european progress, deliberately degraded, turned literally or morally into hewers of wood and drawers of water--misunderstood, made miserable and discontented. and to serve what end? only that the political and financial ambitions of a restless generation might be gratified--that none might be able to say, "a weak race has been allowed to follow its path in peace." salam disturbed my meditations. "everything shut up, sir," he said. "i think you have forgot: to-morrow we go early to hunt the wild boar, sir." so i left morocco to look after its own business and turned in. footnotes: [ ] sidi is a moorish title, and means "my lord." [ ] it is related of one sultan that when a "bashador" remonstrated with him for not fulfilling a contract, he replied, "am i then a nazarene, that i should be bound by my word?" to the gate of the picture city [illustration: a moorish girl] chapter xii to the gate of the picture city is it pan's breath, fierce in the tremulous maiden-hair, that bids fear creep as a snake through the woodlands, felt in the leaves that it stirs not yet, in the mute bright air, in the stress of the sun? _a nympholept._ by the time the little camp was astir and the charcoal fires had done their duty to eggs, coffee, and porridge, pepe ratto, accompanied by two of his berber trackers, rode into the valley, and dismounted on the level ground where our tent was pitched. at first sight the sportsman stood revealed in our welcome visitor. the man whose name will be handed down to future generations in the annals of morocco's sport would attract attention anywhere. tall, straight, sunburnt, grizzled, with keen grey eyes and an alert expression, suggesting the easy and instantaneous change from thought to action, pepe ratto is in every inch of him a sportsman. knowing south morocco as few europeans know it, and having an acquaintance with the forest that is scarcely exceeded by either moor or berber, he gives as much of his life as he can spare to the pursuit of the boar, and he had ridden out with his hunters this morning from his forest home, the palm tree house, to meet us before we left the argans behind, so that we might turn awhile on the track of a "solitaire" tusker. so the mules were left to enjoy an unexpected rest while their owners enjoyed an uninterrupted breakfast, and the kaid was given ample time in which to groom his horse and prepare it and himself for sufficiently imposing entrance into the picture city[ ] that evening. salam was instructed to pack tents and boxes at his leisure, before he took one of my sporting guns and went to pursue fur and feather in parts of the forest immediately adjacent to the camp. a straight shot and a keen sportsman, i knew that salam would not bother about the hares that might cross his path, or birds that rose in sudden flight away from it. his is the moorish method of shooting, and he is wont to stalk his quarry and fire before it rises. i protested once that this procedure was unsportsmanlike. "yes, sir," he replied simply. "if i wait for bird to fly may be i miss him, an' waste cartridge." [illustration: a narrow street in mogador] this argument was, of course, unanswerable. he would follow birds slowly and deliberately, taking advantage of wind and cover, patient in pursuit and deadly in aim. our points of view were different. i shot for sport, and he, and all moors, for the bag. in this i felt he was my superior. but, barring storks, all creatures were game that came within salam's range. no moor will harm a stork. even moorish children, whose taste for destruction and slaughter is as highly developed as any european's, will pick up a young stork that has fallen from its nest and return it to the mother bird if they can. storks sit at peace among the women of the hareem who come for their afternoon airing to the flat roof-tops of moorish houses. moorish lovers in the streets below tell the story of their hopes and fears to the favoured bird, who, when he is chattering with his mandibles, is doing what he can to convey the message. every true believer knows that the stork was once a sultan, or a grand wazeer at least, who, being vain and irreligious, laughed in the beards of the old men of his city on a sacred day when they came to pay their respects to him. by so doing he roused the wrath of allah, who changed him suddenly to his present form. but in spite of misdeeds, the moors love the stately bird, and there are hospitals for storks in fez and marrakesh, where men whose sanctity surpasses their ignorance are paid to minister to the wants of the sick or injured among them. many a time salam, in pursuit of birds, has passed within a few-yards of the father of the red legs or his children, but it has never occurred to him to do them harm. strange fact, but undeniable, that in great cities of the east, where muslims and christians dwell, the storks will go to the quarter occupied by true believers, and leave the other districts severely alone. i have been assured by moors that the first of these birds having been a muslim, the storks recognise the true faith, and wish to testify to their preference for it. it is hard to persuade a moor to catch a stork or take an egg from the nest, though in pursuit of other birds and beasts he is a stranger to compunction in any form. one of the trackers gave me his horse, and pepe ratto led the way down the stream for a short distance and then into thick scrub that seemed to be part of wild life's natural sanctuary, so quiet it lay, so dense and undisturbed. after the first five minutes i was conscious of the forest in an aspect hitherto unknown to me; i was aware that only a man who knew the place intimately could venture to make a path through untrodden growths that were left in peace from year to year. it was no haphazard way, though bushes required careful watching, the double-thorned lotus being too common for comfort. [illustration: a night scene, mogador] my companion's eye, trained to the observation of the woodlands in every aspect, noted the stories told by the bushes, the gravel, and the sand with a rapidity that was amazing. twenty-five years of tireless hunting have given pepe ratto an instinct that seems to supplement the ordinary human gifts of sight and hearing. our forefathers, who hunted for their living, must have had this gift so developed, and while lying dormant in europeans, whose range of sports is compassed by the life of cities and limited game preserves, it persists among the men who devote the best years of their life to pitting their intelligence against that of the brute creation. the odds are of course very much in favour of the human being, but we may not realise readily the extreme cunning of hunted animals. the keen sportsman, who rode by my side pointing out the track of boar or porcupine, showing where animals had been feeding, and judging how recently they had passed by difference in the marks too faint for my eyes to see, confessed that he had spent months on the track of a single animal, baffled over and over again, but getting back to his quarry because he had with him the mark of the feet as copied when he tracked it for the first time. "no boar has four feet absolutely identical with those of another boar," he said, "so when once you have the prints the animal must leave the forest altogether and get off to the atlas, or you will find him in the end. he may double repeatedly on his own tracks, he may join a herd and travel with them for days into the thick scrub, where the dogs are badly torn in following him, but he can never get away, and the hunter following his tracks learns to realise in the frenzied changes and manoeuvres of the beast pursued, its consciousness of his pursuit." in these matters the trained and confirmed hunter's heart grows cold as the physiologist's, while his senses wax more and more acute, and near to the level of those of his prey. that is but a small part of the hunter's lore. as his eyes and ears develop a power beyond the reach of dwellers of cities with stunted sight and spoiled hearing, he grows conscious of the great forest laws that rule the life of birds and beasts--laws yet unwritten in any language. he finds all living things pursuing their destiny by the light of customs that appeal as strongly to them as ours to us, and learns to know that the order and dignity of the lower forms of life are not less remarkable in their way than the phenomena associated with our own. to me, the whirring of a covey of sand-grouse or partridges could express little more than the swift passage of birds to a place of security. to the man who grew almost as a part of the forest, the movement was something well defined, clearly initiated, and the first step in a sequence that he could trace without hesitation. one part of the forest might be the same as another to the casual rider, or might at best vary in its purely picturesque quality. to the long trained eye, on the other hand, it was a place that would or would not be the haunt of certain beasts or birds at certain hours of the day, by reason of its aspect with regard to the sun, its soil, cover, proximity to the river or other source of water supply, its freedom from certain winds and accessibility to others, its distance from any of the tracks that led to the country beyond the forest and were frequented at certain seasons of the year. the trained hunter reads all this as in a book, but the most of us can do no more than recognise the writing when it has been pointed out to us. [illustration: house-tops, mogador] so it happened that my morning ride with the hardy hunter, whose achievements bulk next to those of the late sir john drummond hay in the history of moorish sport, had an interest that did not depend altogether upon the wild forest paths through which he led the way. he told me how at daybreak the pack of cross-bred hounds came from garden, copse, and woodland, racing to the steps of the palm tree house, and giving tongue lustily, as though they knew there was sport afoot. one or two grizzled huntsmen who had followed every track in the argan forest were waiting in the patio for his final instructions, and he told them of hoof prints that had revealed to his practised eye a "solitaire" boar of more than ordinary size. he had tracked it for more than three hours on the previous day, past the valley where our tents were set, and knew now where the lair was chosen. "he has been lying under an argan tree, one standing well away from the rest at a point where the stream turns sharply, about a mile from the old kasbah in the wood, and he has moved now to make a new lair. i have made a note of his feet in my book; he had been wallowing less than twenty-four hours before when i found him. to-morrow, when we hunt the beast i hope to track to-day, the pack will follow in charge of the huntsmen. they will be taken through the wood all the way, for it is necessary to avoid villages and cattle pasture when you have more than a score of savage dogs that have not been fed since three o'clock on the previous afternoon. they are by no means averse from helping themselves to a sheep or a goat at such times." we had ridden in single file through a part where the lotus, now a tree instead of a bush, snatched at us on either side, and the air was fragrant with broom, syringa, and lavender. behind us the path closed and was hidden; before us it was too thick to see more than a few yards ahead. here and there some bird would scold and slip away, with a flutter of feathers and a quiver of the leaves through which it fled; while ever present, though never in sight, the cuckoo followed us the whole day long. suddenly and abruptly the path ended by the side of a stream where great oleanders spread their scarlet blossoms to the light, and kingfishers darted across the pools that had held tiny fish in waters left by the rainy season. when we pushed our horses to the brink the bushes on either hand showered down their blossoms as though to greet the first visitors to the rivulet's bank. involuntarily we drew rein by the water's edge, acknowledging the splendour of the scene with a tribute of silence. if you have been in the western highlands of scotland, and along the levantine riviera, and can imagine a combination of the most fascinating aspects of both districts, you have but to add to them the charm of silence and complete seclusion, the sense of virgin soil, and the joy of a perfect day in early summer, and then some faint picture of the scene may present itself. it remains with me always, and the mere mention of the argan forest brings it back. pepe ratto soon recovered himself. [illustration: selling grain in mogador] "yes," he said, in reply to my unspoken thoughts, "one seldom sees country like this anywhere else. but the boar went this way." so saying, the hunter uppermost again, he wheeled round, and we followed the stream quite slowly while he looked on either hand for signs of the large tusker. "we must find where he has settled," he continued. "now the weather is getting so warm he will move to some place that is sandy and moist, within reach of the puddles he has chosen to wallow in. and he won't go far from this part, because the maize is not yet ripe." "do they grow maize in this province?" i asked. "yes," replied the hunter. "i give the farmers the seed and they plant it, for a boar is as fond of green maize as a fox is of chickens." he paused and showed me the marks of a herd that had come to the water within the past two days to drink and wallow. while i could see the marks of many feet, he could tell me all about the herd, the approximate numbers, the ages, and the direction they were taking. several times we dismounted, and he examined the banks very carefully until, at the fourth or fifth attempt, tracks that were certainly larger than any we had seen revealed the long-sought tusker. we went through the wood, the hunter bending over a trail lying too faint on the green carpet of the forest for me to follow. we moved over difficult ground, often under the blaze of the african sun, and, intent upon the pursuit, noted neither the heat nor the flight of time. for some two miles of the dense scrub, the boar had gone steadily enough until the ground opened into a clearing, where the soil was sandy and vegetation correspondingly light. here at last the track moved in a circle. "see," said the hunter, a suspicion of enthusiasm in his tone, "he has been circling; that means he is looking for a lair. stay here, if you will, with the horses while i follow him home." and in a minute he was out of sight. i waited patiently enough for what seemed a long time, trying to catch the undersong that thrilled through the forest, "the horns of elf-land faintly blowing," the hum such as bees at home make when late may sees the chestnut trees in flower. here the song was a veritable psalm of life, in which every tree, bird, bush, and insect had its own part to play. it might have been a primeval forest; even the horses were grazing quietly, as though their spirits had succumbed to the solemn influences around us. the great god pan himself could not have been far away, and i felt that he might have shown himself--that it was fitting indeed for him to appear in such a place and at such a season. the hunter came back silently as he had gone. [illustration: selling oranges] "all's well," he said as he remounted; "he is a fine fellow, and has his lair most comfortably placed. and you should have come with me, but your creaking english gaiters would have disturbed him, while my soft native ones let me go within thirty or forty yards of his new home in safety." my companion was wearing the moorish gaiters of the sort his trackers used--things made of palmetto. when they follow on foot the trackers wear leather aprons too, in order to deaden the sound made by their passage through the resisting undergrowth. then we rode back by another route, down paths that only an arab horse could have hoped to negotiate, through densely wooded forest tracks that shut out the sun, but allowed its brightness to filter through a leafy sieve and work a pattern of dappled light and shadow on the grass, for our delectation. most of the way had been made familiar in pursuit of some wild boar that would not stand and fight but hurried into the wildest and most difficult part of the forest, charging through every bush, however thick and thorny, in vain endeavour to shake off the pitiless pack. for my companion no corner of the forest lacked memories, some recent, some remote, but all concerned with the familiar trial of skill in which the boar had at last yielded up his pleasant life. we came quite suddenly upon the stream and past a riot of green bamboo and rushes, saw the kaid's house, more than ever gaunt and dishevelled by daylight, with the shining water in front, the wild garden beyond, and on the other bank the susi muleteers sitting with the black slave in pleasant contemplation of the work salam had done. kaid m'barak dozed on one of the boxes, nursing his beloved gun, while the horse equally dear to him stood quietly by, enjoying the lush grasses. salam and the tracker were not far away, a rendezvous was appointed for the hunt, and pepe ratto, followed by his men, cantered off, leaving me to a delightful spell of rest, while salam persuaded the muleteers to load the animals for the last few miles of the road between us and mogador. then, not without regret, i followed the pack-mules out of the valley, along the track leading to a broad path that has been worn by the feet of countless nomads, travelling with their flocks and herds, from the heat and drought of the extreme south to the markets that receive the trade of the country, or making haste from the turbulent north to escape the heavy hand of the oppressor. it was not pleasant to ride away from the forest, to see the great open spaces increasing and the trees yielding slowly but surely to the dwarf bushes that are the most significant feature of the southern country, outside the woodland and oases. i thought of the seaport town we were so soon to see--a place where the civilisation we had dispensed with happily enough for some weeks past would be forced into evidence once more, where the wild countrymen among whom we had lived at our ease would be seen only on market days, and the native moors would have assimilated just enough of the european life and thought to make them uninteresting, somewhat vicious, and wholly ill-content. the forest was left behind, the land grew bare, and from a hill-top i saw the atlantic some five or six miles away, a desert of sand stretching between. we were soon on these sands--light, shifting, and intensely hot--a sahara in miniature save for the presence of the fragrant broom in brief patches here and there. it was difficult riding, and reduced the pace of the pack-mules to something under three miles an hour. as we ploughed across the sand i saw suera itself, the picture city of sidi m'godol, a saint of more than ordinary repute, who gave the city the name by which it is known to europe. suera or mogador is built on a little tongue of land, and threatens sea and sandhills with imposing fortifications that are quite worthless from a soldier's point of view. though the sight of a town brought regretful recollection that the time of journeying was over, mogador, it must be confessed, did much to atone for the inevitable. it looked like a mirage city that the sand and sun had combined to call into brief existence--moorish from end to end, dazzling white in the strong sun of early summer, and offering some suggestion of social life in the flags that were fluttering from the roof-tops of consuls' houses. a prosperous city, one would have thought, the emporium for the desert trade with europe, and indeed it was all this for many years. now it has fallen from its high commercial estate; french enterprise has cut into and diverted the caravan routes, seeking to turn all the desert traffic to dakkar, the new bizerta in senegal, or to the algerian coast. salam and m'barak praised sidi m'godol, whose zowia lay plainly to be seen below the marrakesh gate; the susi muleteers, the boy, and the slave renewed their shilha songs, thinking doubtless of the store of dollars awaiting them; but i could not conquer my regrets, though i was properly obliged to sidi m'godol for bringing me in safety to his long home. just before us a caravan from the south was pushing its way to the gates. the ungainly camels, seeing a resting-place before them, had plucked up their spirits and were shuffling along at a pace their drivers could hardly have enforced on the previous day. we caught them up, and the leaders explained that they were coming in from tindouf in the draa country, a place unexplored as yet by europeans. they had suffered badly from lack of water on the way, and confirmed the news that the bedouins had brought, of a drought unparalleled in the memory of living man. sociable fellows all, full of contentment, pluck, and endurance, they lightened the last hour upon a tedious road. at length we reached the strip of herbage that divides the desert from the town, a vegetable garden big enough to supply the needs of the picture city, and full of artichokes, asparagus, egg plants, sage, and thyme. the patient labour of many generations had gone to reclaim this little patch from the surrounding waste. we passed the graveyard of the protestants and catholics, a retired place that pleaded eloquently in its peacefulness for the last long rest that awaits all mortal travellers. much care had made it less a cemetery than a garden, and it literally glowed and blazed with flowers--roses, geraniums, verbena, and nasturtiums being most in evidence. a kindly priest of the order of st. francis invited us to rest, and enjoy the colour and fragrance of his lovingly-tended oasis. and while we rested, he talked briefly of his work in the town, and asked me of our journey. the place reminded me strongly of a garden belonging to another brotherhood of the roman catholic church, and set at capernaum on the sea of galilee, where, a few years ago, i saw the monks labouring among their flowers, with results no less happy than i found here. after a brief rest we rode along the beach towards the city gate. just outside, the camels had come to a halt and some town traders had gathered round the bedouins to inquire the price of the goods brought from the interior, in anticipation of the morrow's market. under the frowning archway of the water-port, where true believers of the official class sit in receipt of custom, i felt the town's cobbled road under foot, and the breath of the trade-winds blowing in from the atlantic. then i knew that sunset land was behind me, my journey at an end. footnotes: [ ] mogador, called by the moors "suera," _i.e._ "the picture." the end _printed by_ r. & r. clark, limited, _edinburgh_. life in morocco by the same author in uniform style. demy vo, s. each. the moors: an account of people and customs. with illustrations. contents:--"the madding crowd"--within the gates--where the moors live--how the moors dress--moorish courtesy and etiquette--what the moors eat and drink--everyday life--slavery and servitude--country life--trade--arts and manufactures--matters medical. some moorish characteristics--the mohammedan year (feasts and fasts)--places of worship--alms, hospitality, and pilgrimage--education--saints and superstitions--marriage--funeral rites. the morocco berbers--the jews of morocco--the jewish year. the land of the moors: a comprehensive description. with a new map and illustrations. contents:--physical features--natural resources--vegetable products--animal life. descriptions and histories of tangier, tetuan, laraiche, salli-rabat, dar el baida, mazagan, saffi and mogador; azîla, fedála, mehedia, mansûrîya, azammûr and waladîya; fez, mequinez and marrákesh; zarhôn, wazzán and shesháwan; el kasar, sifrû, tadla, damnát, táza, dibdû and oojda; ceuta, velez, alhucemas, melilla and the zaffarines; sûs, the draa, tafilált, fîgîg, and tûát. reminiscences of travel--in the guise of a moor--to marrákesh on a bicycle--in search of miltsin. the moorish empire: a historical epitome. with maps, illustrations, and a unique chronological, geographical, and genealogical chart. contents:--mauretania--the mohammedan invasion--foundation of empire--consolidation of empire--extension of empire--contraction of empire--stagnation of empire--personification of empire--the reigning shareefs--the moorish government--present administration. europeans in the moorish service--the salli rovers--record of the christian slaves--christian influences in morocco--foreign relations--moorish diplomatic usages--foreign rights and privileges--commercial intercourse--the fate of the empire. works on morocco reviewed ( vols. in languages)--the place of morocco in fiction--journalism in morocco--works recommended--classical authorities on morocco. london: swan sonnenschein, ltd. * * * * * an introduction to the arabic of morocco: vocabulary, grammar notes, etc., in roman characters. specially prepared for visitors and beginners on a new and eminently practical system. crown vo, cloth, round corners for pocket, _ s._ also, uniform with this, in english or spanish, price _ s._ _in arabic characters_ morocco-arabic dialogues, or diÁlogos en arabe maroquÍ. by c.w. baldwin. * * * * * london: bernard quaritch, piccadilly. tangier: british and foreign bible society's depÔt. [illustration: _photograph by edward lee, esq., saffi._ a moorish thoroughfare.] * * * * * =life in morocco= and glimpses beyond by budgett meakin author of "the moors," "the land of the moors," "the moorish empire," "model factories and villages," etc. [illustration] with twenty-four illustrations london chatto & windus printed by william clowes and sons, limited, london and beccles. =foreword= which of us has yet forgotten that first day when we set foot in barbary? those first impressions, as the gorgeous east with all its countless sounds and colours, forms and odours, burst upon us; mingled pleasures and disgusts, all new, undreamed-of, or our wildest dreams enhanced! those yelling, struggling crowds of boatmen, porters, donkey-boys; guides, thieves, and busy-bodies; clad in mingled finery and tatters; european, native, nondescript; a weird, incongruous medley--such as is always produced when east meets west--how they did astonish and amuse us! how we laughed (some trembling inwardly) and then, what letters we wrote home! one-and-twenty years have passed since that experience entranced the present writer, and although he has repeated it as far as possible in practically every other oriental country, each fresh visit to morocco brings back somewhat of the glamour of that maiden plunge, and somewhat of that youthful ardour, as the old associations are renewed. nothing he has seen elsewhere excels morocco in point of life and colour save bokhára; and only in certain parts of india or in china is it rivalled. algeria, tunisia and tripoli have lost much of that charm under turkish or western rule; egypt still more markedly so, while palestine is of a population altogether mixed and heterogeneous. the bazaars of damascus, even, and constantinople, have given way to plate-glass, and nothing remains in the nearer east to rival morocco. notwithstanding the disturbed condition of much of the country, nothing has occurred to interfere with the pleasure certain to be afforded by a visit to morocco at any time, and all who can do so are strongly recommended to include it in an early holiday. the best months are from september to may, though the heat on the coast is never too great for an enjoyable trip. the simplest way of accomplishing this is by one of messrs. forwood's regular steamers from london, calling at most of the morocco ports and returning by the canaries, the tour occupying about a month, though it may be broken and resumed at any point. tangier may be reached direct from liverpool by the papayanni line, or indirectly _viâ_ gibraltar, subsequent movements being decided by weather and local sailings. british consular officials, missionaries, and merchants will be found at the various ports, who always welcome considerate strangers. comparatively few, even of the ever-increasing number of visitors who year after year bring this only remaining independent barbary state within the scope of their pilgrimage, are aware of the interest with which it teems for the scientist, the explorer, the historian, and students of human nature in general. one needs to dive beneath the surface, to live on the spot in touch with the people, to fathom the real morocco, and in this it is doubtful whether any foreigners not connected by ties of creed or marriage ever completely succeed. what can be done short of this the writer attempted to do, mingling with the people as one of themselves whenever this was possible. inspired by the example of lane in his description of the "modern egyptians," he essayed to do as much for the moors, and during eighteen years he laboured to that end. the present volume gathers together from many quarters sketches drawn under those circumstances, supplemented by a _resumé_ of recent events and the political outlook, together with three chapters--viii., xi., and xiv.--contributed by his wife, whose assistance throughout its preparation he has once more to acknowledge with pleasure. to many correspondents in morocco he is also indebted for much valuable up-to-date information on current affairs, but as most for various reasons prefer to remain unmentioned, it would be invidious to name any. for most of the illustrations, too, he desires to express his hearty thanks to the gentlemen who have permitted him to reproduce their photographs. much of the material used has already appeared in more fugitive form in the _times of morocco_, the _london quarterly review_, the _forum_, the _westminster review_, _harper's magazine_, the _humanitarian_, the _gentleman's magazine_, the _independent_ (new york), the _modern church_, the _jewish chronicle_, _good health_, the _medical missionary_, the _pall mall gazette_, the _westminster gazette_, the _outlook_, etc., while chapters ix., xix., and xxv. to xxix. have been extracted from a still unpublished picture of moorish country life, "sons of ishmael." b.m. hampstead, _november ._ contents part i chapter page i. retrospective ii. the present day iii. behind the scenes iv. the berber race v. the wandering arab vi. city life vii. the women-folk viii. social visits ix. a country wedding x. the bairns xi. "dining out" xii. domestic economy xiii. the native "merchant" xiv. shopping xv. a sunday market xvi. play-time xvii. the story-teller xviii. snake-charming xix. in a moorish cafÉ xx. the medicine-man xxi. the human mart xxii. a slave-girl's story xxiii. the pilgrim camp xxiv. returning home part ii xxv. diplomacy in morocco xxvi. prisoners and captives xxvii. the protection system xxviii. justice for the jew xxix. civil war in morocco xxx. the political situation xxxi. france in morocco part iii xxxii. algeria viewed from morocco xxxiii. tunisia viewed from morocco xxxiv. tripoli viewed from morocco xxxv. foot-prints of the moors in spain appendix "morocco news" index list of illustrations to face page a moorish thoroughfare _frontispiece_ gate of the seven virgins, salli crossing a morocco river a berber village in the atlas an arab tent in morocco roofs of tangier from the british consulate a moorish caravan fruit-sellers a tunisian shopkeeper the sunday market, tangier group around performers, marrÁkesh a morocco fandak (caravansarai) rabhah, narrator of the slave-girl's story waiting for the steamer a city gateway in morocco central morocco homestead jewesses of the atlas a moorish kaÏd and attendants tunisia under the french--an execution tent of an algerian sheÏkh a tunisian jewess in street dress outside tripoli a shrine in cordova mosque the market-place, tetuan note.--_the system of transliterating arabic adopted by the author in his previous works has here been followed only so far as it is likely to be adopted by others than specialists, all signs being omitted which are not essential to approximate pronunciation._ =life in morocco= part i i retrospective "the firmament turns, and times are changing." _moorish proverb._ by the western gate of the mediterranean, where the narrowed sea has so often tempted invaders, the decrepit moorish empire has become itself a bait for those who once feared it. yet so far morocco remains untouched, save where a fringe of europeans on the coast purvey the luxuries from other lands that moorish tastes demand, and in exchange take produce that would otherwise be hardly worth the raising. even here the foreign influence is purely superficial, failing to affect the lives of the people; while the towns in which europeans reside are so few in number that whatever influence they do possess is limited in area. moreover, morocco has never known foreign dominion, not even that of the turks, who have left their impress on the neighbouring algeria and tunisia. none but the arabs have succeeded in obtaining a foothold among its berbers, and they, restricted to the plains, have long become part of the nation. thus morocco, of all the north african kingdoms, has always maintained its independence, and in spite of changes all round, continues to live its own picturesque life. picturesque it certainly is, with its flowing costumes and primitive homes, both of which vary in style from district to district, but all of which seem as though they must have been unchanged for thousands of years. without security for life or property, the mountaineers go armed, they dwell in fortresses or walled-in villages, and are at constant war with one another. on the plains, except in the vicinity of towns, the country people group their huts around the fortress of their governor, within which they can shelter themselves and their possessions in time of war. no other permanent erection is to be seen on the plains, unless it be some wayside shrine which has outlived the ruin fallen on the settlement to which it once belonged, and is respected by the conquerors as holy ground. here and there gaunt ruins rise, vast crumbling walls of concrete which have once been fortresses, lending an air of desolation to the scene, but offering no attraction to historian or antiquary. no one even knows their names, and they contain no monuments. if ever more solid remains are encountered, they are invariably set down as the work of the romans. [illustration: _cavilla, photo., tangier._ gate of the seven virgins, salli.] yet morocco has a history, an interesting history indeed, one linked with ours in many curious ways, as is recorded in scores of little-known volumes. it has a literature amazingly voluminous, but there were days when the relations with other lands were much closer, if less cordial, the days of the crusades and the barbary pirates, the days of european tribute to the moors, and the days of christian slavery in morocco. constantly appearing brochures in many tongues made europe of those days acquainted with the horrors of that dreadful land. all these only served to augment the fear in which its people were held, and to deter the victimized nations from taking action which would speedily have put an end to it all, by demonstrating the inherent weakness of the moorish empire. but for those whose study is only the moors as they exist to-day, the story of morocco stretches back only a thousand years, as until then its scattered tribes of berber mountaineers had acknowledged no head, and knew no common interests; they were not a nation. war was their pastime; it is so now to a great extent. every man for himself, every tribe for itself. idolatry, of which abundant traces still remain, had in places been tinged with the name and some of the forms of christianity, but to what extent it is now impossible to discover. in the roman church there still exist titular bishops of north africa, one, in particular, derives his title from the district of morocco of which fez is now the capital, mauretania tingitana. it was among these tribes that a pioneer mission of islám penetrated in the eighth of our centuries. arabs were then greater strangers in barbary than we are now, but they were by no means the first strange faces seen there. ph[oe]nicians, romans and vandals had preceded them, but none had stayed, none had succeeded in amalgamating with the berbers, among whom those individuals who did remain were absorbed. these hardy clansmen, exhibiting the characteristics of hill-folk the world round, still inhabited the uplands and retained their independence. in this they have indeed succeeded to a great extent until the present day, but between that time and this they have given of their life-blood to build up by their side a less pure nation of the plains, whose language as well as its creed is that of arabia. to imagine that morocco was invaded by a muslim host who carried all before them is a great mistake, although a common one. mulai idrees--"my lord enoch" in english--a direct descendant of mohammed, was among the first of the arabian missionaries to arrive, with one or two faithful adherents, exiles fleeing from the khalîfa of mekka. so soon as he had induced one tribe to accept his doctrines, he assisted them with his advice and prestige in their combats with hereditary enemies, to whom, however, the novel terms were offered of fraternal union with the victors, if they would accept the creed of which they had become the champions. thus a new element was introduced into the berber polity, the element of combination, for the lack of which they had always been weak before. each additional ally meant an augmentation of the strength of the new party out of all proportion to the losses from occasional defeats. in course of time the mohammedan coalition became so strong that it was in a position to dictate terms and to impose governors upon the most obstinate of its neighbours. the effect of this was to divide the allies into two important sections, the older of which founded fez in the days of the son of idrees, accounted the second ameer of that name, who there lies buried in the most important mosque of the empire, the very approaches of which are closed to the jew and the nazarene. the only spot which excels it in sanctity is that at zarhôn, a day's journey off, in which the first idrees lies buried. there the whole town is forbidden to the foreigner, and an attempt made by the writer to gain admittance in disguise was frustrated by discovery at the very gate, though later on he visited the shrine in fez. the dynasty thus formed, the shurfà idreeseeïn, is represented to-day by the shareef of wazzán. in southern morocco, with its capital at aghmát, on the atlas slopes, was formed what later grew to be the kingdom of marrákesh, the city of that name being founded in the middle of the eleventh century. towards the close of the thirteenth, the kingdoms of fez and marrákesh became united under one ruler, whose successor, after numerous dynastic changes, is the sultan of morocco now.[ ] [ : for a complete outline of moorish history, see the writer's "moorish empire."] but from the time that the united berbers had become a nation, to prevent them falling out among themselves again it was necessary to find some one else to fight, to occupy the martial instinct nursed in fighting one another. so long as there were ancient scores to be wiped out at home, so long as under cover of a missionary zeal they could continue intertribal feuds, things went well for the victors; but as soon as excuses for this grew scarce, it was needful to fare afield. the pretty story--told, by the way, of other warriors as well--of the arab leader charging the atlantic surf, and weeping that the world should end there, and his conquests too, may be but fiction, but it illustrates a fact. had europe lain further off, the very causes which had conspired to raise a central power in morocco would have sufficed to split it up again. this, however, was not to be. in full view of the most northern strip of morocco, from ceuta to cape spartel, the north-west corner of africa, stretches the coast of sunny spain. between el k'sar es-sagheer, "the little castle," and tarifa point is only a distance of nine or ten miles, and in that southern atmosphere the glinting houses may be seen across the straits. history has it that internal dissensions at the court of spain led to the moors being actually invited over; but that inducement was hardly needed. here was a country of infidels yet to be conquered; here was indeed a land of promise. soon the berbers swarmed across, and in spite of reverses, carried all before them. spain was then almost as much divided into petty states as their land had been till the arabs taught them better, and little by little they made their way in a country destined to be theirs for five hundred years. córdova, sevílle, granáda, each in turn became their capital, and rivalled fez across the sea. the successes they achieved attracted from the east adventurers and merchants, while by wise administration literature and science were encouraged, till the berber empire of spain and morocco took a foremost rank among the nations of the day. judged from the standpoint of their time, they seem to us a prodigy; judged from our standpoint, they were but little in advance of their descendants of the twentieth century, who, after all, have by no means retrograded, as they are supposed to have done, though they certainly came to a standstill, and have suffered all the evils of four centuries of torpor and stagnation. civilization wrought on them the effects that it too often produces, and with refinement came weakness. the sole remaining state of those which the invaders, finding independent, conquered one by one, is the little pyrenean republic of andorra, still enjoying privileges granted to it for its brave defence against the moors, which made it the high-water mark of their dominion. as peace once more split up the berbers, the subjected spaniards became strong by union, till at length the death-knell of moorish rule in europe sounded at the nuptials of the famous ferdinand and isabella, linking aragon with proud castile. expelled from spain, the moor long cherished plans for the recovery of what had been lost, preparing fleets and armies for the purpose, but in vain. though nominally still united, his people lacked that zeal in a common cause which had carried them across the straits before, and by degrees the attempts to recover a kingdom dwindled into continued attacks upon shipping and coast towns. thus arose that piracy which was for several centuries the scourge of christendom. further east a distinct race of pirates flourished, including turks and greeks and ruffians from every shore, but they were not moors, of whom the salli rover was the type. many thousands of europeans were carried off by moorish corsairs into slavery, including not a few from england. those who renounced their own religion and nationality, accepting those of their captors, became all but free, only being prevented from leaving the country, and often rose to important positions. those who had the courage of their convictions suffered much, being treated like cattle, or worse, but they could be ransomed when their price was forthcoming--a privilege abandoned by the renegades--so that the principal object of every european embassy in those days was the redemption of captives. now and then escapes would be accomplished, but such strict watch was kept when foreign merchantmen were in port, or when foreign ambassadors came and went, that few attempts succeeded, though many were made. sympathies are stirred by pictures of the martyrdom of englishmen and irishmen, franciscan missionaries to the moors; and side by side with them the foreign mercenaries in the native service, englishmen among them, who would fight in any cause for pay and plunder, even though their masters held their countrymen in thrall. and thrall it was, as that of israel in egypt, when our sailors were chained to galley seats beneath the lash of a moor, or when they toiled beneath a broiling sun erecting the grim palace walls of concrete which still stand as witnesses of those fell days. bought and sold in the market like cattle, europeans were more despised than negroes, who at least acknowledged mohammed as their prophet, and accepted their lot without attempt to escape. dark days were those for the honour of europe, when the moors inspired terror from the balearics to the scilly isles, and when their rovers swept the seas with such effect that all the powers of christendom were fain to pay them tribute. large sums of money, too, collected at church doors and by the sale of indulgences, were conveyed by the hands of intrepid friars, noble men who risked all to relieve those slaves who had maintained their faith, having scorned to accept a measure of freedom as the reward of apostasy. thousands of english and other european slaves were liberated through the assistance of friendly letters from royal hands, as when the proud queen bess addressed ahmad ii., surnamed "the golden," as "our brother after the law of crown and sceptre," or when queen anne exchanged compliments with the bloodthirsty ismáïl, who ventured to ask for the hand of a daughter of louis xiv. in the midst of it all, when that wonderful man, with a household exceeding solomon's, and several hundred children, had reigned forty-three of his fifty-five years, the english, in , ceded to him their possession of tangier. for twenty-two years the "castle in the streights' mouth," as general monk had described it, had been the scene of as disastrous an attempt at colonization as we have ever known: misunderstanding of the circumstances and mismanagement throughout; oppression, peculation and terror within as well as without; a constant warfare with incompetent or corrupt officials within as with besieging moors without; till at last the place had to be abandoned in disgust, and the expensive mole and fortifications were destroyed lest others might seize what we could not hold. such events could only lower the prestige of europeans, if, indeed, they possessed any, in the eyes of the moors, and the slaves up country received worse treatment than before. even the ambassadors and consuls of friendly powers were treated with indignities beyond belief. some were imprisoned on the flimsiest pretexts, all had to appear before the monarch in the most abject manner, and many were constrained to bribe the favourite wives of the ameers to secure their requests. it is still the custom for the state reception to take place in an open courtyard, the ambassador standing bareheaded before the mounted sultan under his imperial parasol. as late as the brutal sultan el yazeed, who emulated ismáïl the bloodthirsty, did not hesitate to declare war on all christendom except england, agreeing to terms of peace on the basis of tribute. cooperation between the powers was not then thought of, and one by one they struck their bargains as they are doing again to-day. yet even at the most violent period of moorish misrule it is a remarkable fact that europeans were allowed to settle and trade in the empire, in all probability as little molested there as they would have been had they remained at home, by varying religious tests and changing governments. it is almost impossible to conceive, without a perusal of the literature of the period, the incongruity of the position. foreign slaves would be employed in gangs outside the dwellings of free fellow-countrymen with whom they were forbidden to communicate, while every returning pirate captain added to the number of the captives, sometimes bringing friends and relatives of those who lived in freedom as the sultan's "guests," though he considered himself "at war" with their governments. so little did the moors understand the position of things abroad, that at one time they made war upon gibraltar, while expressing the warmest friendship for england, who then possessed it. this was done by mulai abd allah v., in , because, he said, the governor had helped his rebel uncle at arzîla, so that the english, his so-called friends, did more harm than his enemies--the portuguese and spaniards. "my father and i believe," wrote his son, sidi mohammed, to admiral pawkers, "that the king your master has no knowledge of the behaviour towards us of the governor of gibraltar, ... so gibraltar shall be excluded from the peace to which i am willing to consent between england and us, and with the aid of the almighty god, i will know how to avenge myself as i may on the english of gibraltar." previously spain and portugal had held the principal moroccan seaports, the twin towns of rabat and salli alone remaining always moorish, but these two in their turn set up a sort of independent republic, nourished from the berber tribes in the mountains to the south of them. no europeans live in salli yet, for here the old fanaticism slumbers still. so long as a port remained in foreign hands it was completely cut off from the surrounding country, and played no part in moorish history, save as a base for periodical incursions. one by one most of them fell again into the hands of their rightful owners, till they had recovered all their atlantic sea-board. on the mediterranean, ceuta, which had belonged to portugal, came under the rule of spain when those countries were united, and the spaniards hold it still, as they do less important positions further east. the piracy days of the moors have long passed, but they only ceased at the last moment they could do so with grace, before the introduction of steamships. there was not, at the best of times, much of the noble or heroic in their raids, which generally took the nature of lying in wait with well-armed, many-oared vessels, for unarmed, unwieldy merchantmen which were becalmed, or were outpaced by sail and oar together. early in the nineteenth century algiers was forced to abandon piracy before lord exmouth's guns, and soon after the moors were given to understand that it could no longer be permitted to them either, since the moorish "fleets"--if worthy the name--had grown so weak, and those of the nazarenes so strong, that the tables were turned. yet for many years more the nations of europe continued the tribute wherewith the rapacity of the moors was appeased, and to the united states belongs the honour of first refusing this disgraceful payment. the manner in which the rovers of salli and other ports were permitted to flourish so long can be explained in no other way than by the supposition that they were regarded as a sort of necessary nuisance, just a hornet's-nest by the wayside, which it would be hopeless to destroy, as they would merely swarm elsewhere. and then we must remember that the moors were not the only pirates of those days, and that europeans have to answer for the most terrible deeds of the mediterranean corsairs. news did not travel then as it does now. though students of morocco history are amazed at the frequent captures and the thousands of christian slaves so imported, abroad it was only here and there that one was heard of at a time. to-day the plunder of an italian sailing vessel aground on their shore, or the fate of too-confident spanish smugglers running close in with arms, is heard of the world round. and in the majority of cases there is at least a question: what were the victims doing there? not that this in any way excuses the so-called "piracy," but it must not be forgotten in considering the question. almost all these tribes in the troublous districts carry european arms, instead of the more picturesque native flint-lock: and as not a single gun is legally permitted to pass the customs, there must be a considerable inlet somewhere, for prices are not high. ii the present day "what has passed has gone, and what is to come is distant; thou hast only the hour in which thou art." _moorish proverb._ far from being, as hood described them, "poor rejected moors who raised our childish fears," the people of morocco consist of fine, open races, capable of anything, but literally rotting in one of the finest countries of the world. the moorish remains in spain, as well as the pages of history, testify to the manner in which they once flourished, but to-day their appearance is that of a nation asleep. yet great strides towards reform have been made during the past century, and each decade sees steps taken more important than the last. for the present decade is promised complete transformation. but how little do we know of this people! the very name "moor" is a european invention, unknown in morocco, where no more precise definition of the inhabitants can be given than that of "westerners"--maghribîn, while the land itself is known as "the further west"--el moghreb el aksa. the name we give to the country is but a corruption of that of the southern capital, marrákesh ("morocco city") through the spanish version, marueccos. the genuine moroccans are the berbers among whom the arabs introduced islám and its civilization, later bringing negroes from their raids across the atlas to the sudán and guinea. the remaining important section of the people are jews of two classes--those settled in the country from prehistoric times, and those driven to it when expelled from spain. with the exception of the arabs and the blacks, none of these pull together, and in that case it is only because the latter are either subservient to the former, or incorporated with them. first in importance come the earliest known possessors of the land, the berbers. these are not confined to morocco, but still hold the rocky fastnesses which stretch from the atlantic, opposite the canaries, to the borders of egypt; from the sands of the mediterranean to those of the sáhara, that vast extent of territory to which we have given their name, barbary. of these but a small proportion really amalgamated with their muslim victors, and it is only to this mixed race which occupies the cities of morocco that the name "moor" is strictly applicable. on the plains are to be found the arabs, their tents scattered in every direction. from the atlantic to the atlas, from tangier to mogador, and then away through the fertile province of sûs, one of the chief features of morocco is the series of wide alluvial treeless plains, often apparently as flat as a table, but here and there cut up by winding rivers and crossed by low ridges. the fertility of these districts is remarkable; but owing to the misgovernment of the country, which renders native property so insecure, only a small portion is cultivated. the untilled slopes which border the plains are generally selected by the arabs for their encampments, circles or ovals of low goat-hair tents, each covering a large area in proportion to the number of its inhabitants. the third section of the people of morocco--by no means the least important--has still to be glanced at; these are the ubiquitous, persecuted and persecuting jews. everywhere that money changes hands and there is business to be done they are to be found. in the towns and among the thatched huts of the plains, even in the berber villages on the slopes of the atlas, they have their colonies. with the exception of a few ports wherein european rule in past centuries has destroyed the boundaries, they are obliged to live in their own restricted quarters, and in most instances are only permitted to cross the town barefooted and on foot, never to ride a horse. in the atlas they live in separate villages adjoining or close to those belonging to the berbers, and sometimes even larger than they. always clad in black or dark-coloured cloaks, with hideous black skull-caps or white-spotted blue kerchiefs on their heads, they are conspicuous everywhere. they address the moors with a villainous, cringing look which makes the sons of ishmael savage, for they know it is only feigned. in return they are treated like dogs, and cordial hatred exists on both sides. so they live, together yet divided; the jew despised but indispensable, bullied but thriving. he only wins at law when richer than his opponent; against a muslim he can bear no testimony; there is scant pretence at justice. he dares not lift his hand to strike a moor, however ill-treated, but he finds revenge in sucking his life's blood by usury. receiving no mercy, he shows none, and once in his clutches, his prey is fortunate to escape with his life. the happy influence of more enlightened european jews is, however, making itself felt in the chief towns, through excellent schools supported from london and paris, which are turning out a class of highly respectable citizens. while the moors fear the tide of advancing westernization, the town jews court it, and in them centres one of the chief prospects of the country's welfare. into their hands has already been gathered much of the trade of morocco, and there can be little doubt that, by the end of the thirty years' grace afforded to other merchants than the french, they will have practically absorbed it all, even the frenchmen trading through them. they have at least the intimate knowledge of the people and local conditions to which so few foreigners ever attain. when the moorish empire comes to be pacifically penetrated and systematically explored, it will probably be found that little more is known of it than of china, notwithstanding its proximity, and its comparatively insignificant size. a map honestly drawn, from observations only, would astonish most people by its vast blank spaces.[ ] it would be noted that the limit of european exploration--with the exception of the work of two or three hardy travellers in disguise--is less than two hundred miles from the coast, and that this limit is reached at two points only--south of fez and marrákesh respectively,--which form the apices of two well-known triangular districts, the contiguous bases of which form part of the atlantic coast line, under four hundred miles in length. beyond these limits all is practically unknown, the language, customs and beliefs of the people providing abundant ground for speculation, and permitting theorists free play. so much is this the case, that a few years ago an enthusiastic "savant" was able to imagine that he had discovered a hidden race of dwarfs beyond the atlas, and to obtain credence for his "find" among the best-informed students of europe. [ : an approximation to this is given in the writer's "land of the moors."] but there is also another point of view from which morocco is unknown, that of native thought and feeling, penetrated by extremely few europeans, even when they mingle freely with the people, and converse with them in arabic. the real moor is little known by foreigners, a very small number of whom mix with the better classes. some, as officials, meet officials, but get little below the official exterior. those who know most seldom speak, their positions or their occupations preventing the expression of their opinions. sweeping statements about morocco may therefore be received with reserve, and dogmatic assertions with caution. this empire is in no worse condition now than it has been for centuries; indeed, it is much better off than ever since its palmy days, and there is no occasion whatever to fear its collapse. few facts are more striking in the study of morocco than the absolute stagnation of its people, except in so far as they have been to a very limited extent affected by outside influences. of what european--or even oriental--land could descriptions of life and manners written in the sixteenth century apply as fully in the twentieth as do those of morocco by leo africanus? or even to come later, compare the transitions england has undergone since höst and jackson wrote a hundred years ago, with the changes discoverable in morocco since that time. the people of morocco remain the same, and their more primitive customs are those of far earlier ages, of the time when their ancestors lived upon the plain of palestine and north arabia, and when "in the loins of abraham" the now unfriendly jew and arab were yet one. it is the position of europeans among them which has changed. in the time of höst and jackson piracy was dying hard, restrained by tribute from all the powers of europe. the foreign merchant was not only tolerated, but was at times supplied with capital by the moorish sultans, to whom he was allowed to go deeply in debt for custom's dues, and half a century later the british consul at mogador was not permitted to embark to escape a bombardment of the town, because of his debt to the sultan. many of the restrictions complained of to-day are the outcome of the almost enslaved condition of the merchants of those times in consequence of such customs. indeed, the position of the european in morocco is still a series of anomalies, and so it is likely to continue until it passes under foreign rule. the same old spirit of independence reigns in the berber breast to-day as when he conquered spain, and though he has forgotten his past and cares naught for his future, he still considers himself a superior being, and feels that no country can rival his home. in his eyes the embassies from europe and america come only to pay the tribute which is the price of peace with his lord, and when he sees a foreign minister in all his black and gold stand in the sun bareheaded to address the mounted sultan beneath his parasol, he feels more proud than ever of his greatness, and is more decided to be pleasant to the stranger, but to keep him out. instead of increased relations between moors and foreigners tending to friendship, the average foreign settler or tourist is far too bigoted and narrow-minded to see any good in the native, much less to acknowledge his superiority on certain points. wherever the sultan's authority is recognized the european is free to travel and live, though past experience has led officials not to welcome him. at the same time, he remains entirely under the jurisdiction of his own authorities, except in cases of murder or grave crime, when he must be at once handed over to the nearest consul of his country. not only are he and his household thus protected, but also his native employees, and, to a certain extent, his commercial and agricultural agents. thus foreigners in morocco enjoy within the limits of the central power the security of their own lands, and the justice of their own laws. they do not even find in morocco that immunity from justice which some ignorant writers of fiction have supposed; for unless a foreigner abandons his own nationality and creed, and buries himself in the interior under a native name, he cannot escape the writs of foreign courts. in any case, the moorish authorities will arrest him on demand, and hand him over to his consul to be dealt with according to law. the colony of refugees which has been pictured by imaginative raconteurs is therefore non-existent. instead there are growing colonies of business men, officials, missionaries, and a few retired residents, quite above the average of such colonies in the levant, for instance. for many years past, though the actual business done has shown a fairly steady increase, the commercial outlook in morocco has gone from bad to worse. yet more of its products are now exported, and there are more european articles in demand, than were thought of twenty years ago. this anomalous and almost paradoxical condition is due to the increase of competition and the increasing weakness of the government. men who had hope a few years ago, now struggle on because they have staked too much to be able to leave for more promising fields. this has been especially the case since the late sultan's death. the disturbances which followed that event impoverished many tribes, and left behind a sense of uncertainty and dread. no european bourse is more readily or lastingly affected by local political troubles than the general trade of a land like morocco, in which men live so much from hand to mouth. it is a noteworthy feature of moorish diplomatic history that to the moors' love of foreign trade we owe almost every step that has led to our present relations with the empire. even while their rovers were the terror of our merchantmen, as has been pointed out, foreign traders were permitted to reside in their ports, the facilities granted to them forming the basis of all subsequent negotiations. now that concession after concession has been wrung from their unwilling government, and in spite of freedom of residence, travel, and trade in the most important parts of the empire, it is disheartening to see the foreign merchant in a worse condition than ever. the previous generation, fewer in number, enjoying far less privileges, and subjected to restrictions and indignities that would not be suffered to-day, were able to make their fortunes and retire, while their successors find it hard to hold their own. the "hundred tonners" who, in the palmy days of mogador, were wont to boast that they shipped no smaller quantities at once, are a dream of the past. the ostrich feathers and elephants' tusks no longer find their way out by that port, and little gold now passes in or out. merchant princes will never be seen here again; commercial travellers from germany are found in the interior, and quality, as well as price, has been reduced to its lowest ebb. a crowd of petty trading agents has arisen with no capital to speak of, yet claiming and abusing credit, of which a most ruinous system prevails, and that in a land in which the collection of debts is proverbially difficult, and oftentimes impossible. the native jews, who were interpreters and brokers years ago, have now learned the business and entered the lists. these new competitors content themselves with infinitesimal profits, or none at all in cases where the desideratum is cash to lend out at so many hundreds per cent. per annum. indeed, it is no uncommon practice for goods bought on long credit to be sold below cost price for this purpose. against such methods who can compete? yet this is a rich, undeveloped land--not exactly an el dorado, though certainly as full of promise as any so styled has proved to be when reached--favoured physically and geographically, but politically stagnant, cursed with an effete administration, fettered by a decrepit creed. in view of this situation, it is no wonder that from time to time specious schemes appear and disappear with clockwork regularity. now it is in england, now in france, that a gambling public is found to hazard the cost of proving the impossibility of opening the country with a rush, and the worthlessness of so-called concessions and monopolies granted by sheïkhs in the south, who, however they may chafe under existing rule which forbids them ports of their own, possess none of the powers required to treat with foreigners. as normal trade has waned in morocco, busy minds have not been slow in devising illicit, or at least unusual, methods of making money, even, one regrets to say, of making false money. among the drawbacks suffered by the commerce which pines under the shade of the shareefian umbrella, one--and that far from the least--is the unsatisfactory coinage, which till a few years ago was almost entirely foreign. to have to depend in so important a matter on any mint abroad is bad enough, but for that mint to be spanish means much. centuries ago the moors coined more, but with the exception of a horrible token of infinitesimal value called "floos," the products of their extinct mints are only to be found in the hands of collectors, in buried hoards, or among the jewellery displayed at home by mooresses and jewesses, whose fortunes, so invested, may not be seized for debt. some of the older issues are thin and square, with well-preserved inscriptions, and of these a fine collection--mostly gold--may be seen at the british museum; but the majority, closely resembling those of india and persia, are rudely stamped and unmilled, not even round, but thick, and of fairly good metal. the "floos" referred to (_sing._ "fils") are of three sizes, coarsely struck in zinc rendered hard and yellow by the addition of a little copper. the smallest, now rarely met with, runs about , to £ when this is worth - / spanish pesetas; the other two, still the only small change of the country, are respectively double and quadruple its value. the next coin in general circulation is worth _d._, so the inconvenience is great. a few years ago, however, europeans resident in tangier resolutely introduced among themselves the spanish ten and five céntimo pieces, corresponding to our _d._ and / _d._, which are now in free local use, but are not accepted up-country. what passes as moorish money to-day has been coined in france for many years, more recently also in germany; the former is especially neat, but the latter lacks style. the denominations coincide with those of spain, whose fluctuations in value they closely follow at a respectful distance. this autumn the "hasáni" coin--that of mulai el hasan, the late sultan--has fallen to fifty per cent. discount on spanish. with the usual perversity also, the common standard "peseta," in which small bargains are struck on the coast, was omitted, the nearest coin, the quarter-dollar, being nominally worth ptas. . . it was only after a decade, too, that the government put in circulation the dollars struck in france, which had hitherto been laid up in the treasury as a reserve. and side by side with the german issue came abundant counterfeit coins, against which government warnings were published, to the serious disadvantage of the legal issue. even the spanish copper has its rival, and a frenchman was once detected trying to bring in a nominal four hundred dollars' worth of an imitation, which he promptly threw overboard when the port guards raised objections to its quality. the increasing need of silver currency inland, owing to its free use in the manufacture of trinkets, necessitates a constant importation, and till recently all sorts of coins, discarded elsewhere, were in circulation. this was the case especially with french, swiss, belgian, italian, greek, roumanian, and other pieces of the value of twenty céntimos, known here by the turkish name "gursh," which were accepted freely in central morocco, but not in the north. twenty years ago spanish carolus, isabella and philippine shillings and kindred coins were in use all over the country, and when they were withdrawn from circulation in spain they were freely shipped here, till the country was flooded with them. when the merchants and customs at last refused them, their astute importers took them back at a discount, putting them into circulation later at what they could, only to repeat the transaction. in morocco everything a man can be induced to take is legal tender, and for bribes and religious offerings all things pass, this practice being an easier matter than at first sight appears; so in the course of a few years one saw a whole series of coins in vogue, one after the other, the main transactions taking place on the coast with country moors, than whom, though none more suspicious, none are more easily gulled. a much more serious obstacle to inland trade is the periodically disturbed state of the country, not so much the local struggles and uprisings which serve to free superfluous energy, as the regular administrative expeditions of the moorish court, or of considerable bodies of troops. these used to take place in some direction every year, "the time when kings go forth to war" being early summer, just when agricultural operations are in full swing, and every man is needed on his fields. in one district the ranks of the workers are depleted by a form of conscription or "harka," and in another these unfortunates are employed preventing others doing what they should be doing at home. thus all suffer, and those who are not themselves engaged in the campaign are forced to contribute cash, if only to find substitutes to take their places in the ranks. the movement of the moorish court means the transportation of a numerous host at tremendous expense, which has eventually to be recouped in the shape of regular contributions, arrears of taxes and fines, collected _en route_, so the pace is abnormally slow. not only is there an absolute absence of roads, and, with one or two exceptions, of bridges, but the sultan himself, with all his army, cannot take the direct route between his most important inland cities without fighting his way. the configuration of the empire explains its previous sub-division into the kingdoms of fez, marrákesh, tafilált and sûs, and the reef, for between the plains of each run mountain ranges which have never known absolute "foreign" rulers. [illustration: crossing a morocco river. _molinari, photo., tangier._] to european engineers the passes through these closed districts would offer no great obstacles in the construction of roads such as thread the himalayas, but the moors do not wish for the roads; for, while what the government fears to promote thereby is combination, the actual occupants of the mountains, the native berbers, desire not to see the arab tax-gatherers, only tolerating their presence as long as they cannot help it, and then rising against them. often a tribe will be left for several years to enjoy independence, while the slip-shod army of the sultan is engaged elsewhere. when its turn comes it holds out for terms, since it has no hope of successfully confronting such an overwhelming force as is sooner or later brought against it. the usual custom is to send small detachments of soldiers to the support of the over-grasping functionaries, and when they have been worsted, to send down an army to "eat up" the province, burning villages, deporting cattle, ill-treating the women, and often carrying home children as slaves. the men of the district probably flee and leave their homes to be ransacked. they content themselves with hiding behind crags which seem to the plainsmen inaccessible, whence they can in safety harass the troops on the march. after more or less protracted skirmishing, the country having been devastated by the troops, who care only for the booty, women will be sent into the camp to make terms, or one of the shareefs or religious nobles who accompany the army is sent out to treat with the rebels. the terms are usually hard--so much arrears of tribute in cash and kind, so much as a fine for expenses, so many hostages. then hostages and prisoners are driven to the capital in chains, and pickled heads are exposed on the gateways, imperial letters being read in the chief mosques throughout the country, telling of a glorious victory, and calling for rejoicings. to any other people the short spell of freedom would have been too dearly bought for the experiment to be repeated, but as soon as they begin to chafe again beneath the lawless rule of moorish officials, the berbers rebel once more. it has been going on thus for hundreds of years, and will continue till put an end to by france. in morocco each official preys upon the one below him, and on all others within his reach, till the poor oppressed and helpless villager lives in terror of them all, not daring to display signs of prosperity for fear of tempting plunder. merit is no key to positions of trust and authority, and few have such sufficient salary attached to render them attractive to honest men. the holders are expected in most cases to make a living out of the pickings, and are allowed an unquestioned run of office till they are presumed to have amassed enough to make it worth while treating them as they have treated others, when they are called to account and relentlessly "squeezed." the only means of staving off the fatal day is by frequent presents to those above them, wrung from those below. a large proportion of moorish officials end their days in disgrace, if not in dungeons, and some meet their end by being invited to corrosive sublimate tea, a favourite beverage in morocco--for others. yet there is always a demand for office, and large prices are paid for posts affording opportunities for plunder. the moorish financial system is of a piece with this method. when the budget is made out, each tribe or district is assessed at the utmost it is believed capable of yielding, and the candidate for its governorship who undertakes to get most out of it probably has the task allotted to him. his first duty is to repeat on a small scale the operation of the government, informing himself minutely as to the resources under his jurisdiction, and assessing the sub-divisions so as to bring in enough for himself, and to provide against contingencies, in addition to the sum for which he is responsible. the local sheïkhs or head-men similarly apportion their demands among the individuals entrusted to their tender mercy. a fool is said to have once presented the sultan with a bowl of skimmed and watered milk, and on being remonstrated with, to have declared that his majesty received no more from any one, as his wazeers and governors ate half the revenue cream each, and the sheïkhs drank half the revenue milk. the fool was right. the richer a man is, the less proportion he will have to pay, for he can make it so agreeable--or disagreeable--for those entrusted with a little brief authority. it is the struggling poor who have to pay or go to prison, even if to pay they have to sell their means of subsistence. three courses lie before this final victim--to obtain the protection of some influential name, native or foreign, to buy a "friend at court," or to enter nazarene service. but native friends are uncertain and hard to find, and, above all, they may be alienated by a higher bid from a rival or from a rapacious official. such affairs are of common occurrence, and harrowing tales might be told of homes broken up in this way, of tortures inflicted, and of lives spent in dungeons because display has been indulged in, or because an independent position has been assumed under cover of a protection that has failed. but what can one expect with such a standard of honour? foreigners, on the other hand, seldom betray their _protégés_--although, to their shame be it mentioned, some in high places have done so,--wherefore their protection is in greater demand; besides which it is more effectual, as coming from outside, while no moor, however well placed, is absolutely secure in his own position. thus it is that the down-trodden natives desire and are willing to pay for protection in proportion to their means; and it is this power of dispensing protection which, though often abused, does more than anything else to raise the prestige of the foreigner, and in turn to protect him. the claims most frequently made against moors by foreign countries are for debt, claims which afford the greatest scope for controversy and the widest loophole for abuse. although, unfortunately, for the greater part usurious, a fair proportion are for goods delivered, but to evade the laws even loan receipts are made out as for goods to be delivered, a form in which discrimination is extremely difficult. the condition of the country, in which every man is liable to be arrested, thrashed, imprisoned, if not tortured, to extort from him his wealth, is such as furnishes the usurer with crowding clients; and the condition of things among the indian cultivators, bad as it is, since they can at least turn to a fair-handed government, is not to be compared to that of the down-trodden moorish farmer. the assumption by the government of responsibility for the debts of its subjects, or at all events its undertaking to see that they pay, is part of the patriarchal system in force, by which the family is made responsible for individuals, the tribe for families, and so on. no other system would bring offenders to justice without police; but it transforms each man into his brother's keeper. this, however, does not apply only to debts the collection of which is urged upon the government, for whom it is sufficient to produce the debtor and let him prove absolute poverty for him to be released, with the claim cancelled. this in theory: but in practice, to appease these claims, however just, innocent men are often thrown into prison, and untold horrors are suffered, in spite of all the efforts of foreign ministers to counteract the injustice. a mere recital of tales which have come under my own observation would but harrow my readers' feelings to no purpose, and many would appear incredible. with the harpies of the government at their heels, men borrow wildly for a month or two at cent. per cent., and as the moorish law prohibits interest, a document is sworn to before notaries by which the borrower declares that he has that day taken in hard cash the full amount to be repaid, the value of certain crops or produce of which he undertakes delivery upon a certain date. very seldom, indeed, does it happen that by that date the money can be repaid, and generally the only terms offered for an extension of time for another three or six months are the addition of another fifty or one hundred per cent. to the debt, always fully secured on property, or by the bonds of property holders. were not this thing of everyday occurrence in morocco, and had i not examined scores of such papers, the way in which the ignorant moors fall into such traps would seem incredible. it is usual to blame the jews for it all, and though the business lies mostly in their hands, it must not be overlooked that many foreigners engage in it, and, though indirectly, some moors also. but besides such claims, there is a large proportion of just business debts which need to be enforced. it does not matter how fair a claim may be, or how legitimate, it is very rarely that trouble is not experienced in pressing it. the moorish courts are so venal, so degraded, that it is more often the unscrupulous usurer who wins his case and applies the screw, than the honest trader. here lies the rub. another class of claims is for damage done, loss suffered, or compensation for imaginary wrongs. all these together mount up, and a newly appointed minister or consul-general is aghast at the list which awaits him. he probably contents himself at first with asking for the appointment of a commission to examine and report on the legality of all these claims, and for the immediate settlement of those approved. but he asks and is promised in vain, till at last he obtains the moral support of war-ships, in view of which the moorish government most likely pays much more than it would have got off with at first, and then proceeds to victimize the debtors. it is with expressed threats of bombardment that the ships come, but experience has taught the moorish government that it is well not to let things go that length, and they now invariably settle amicably. to our western notions it may seem strange that whatever questions have to be attended to should not be put out of hand without requiring such a demonstration; but while there is sleep there is hope for an oriental, and the rulers of morocco would hardly be moors if they resisted the temptation to procrastinate, for who knows what may happen while they delay? and then there is always the chance of driving a bargain, so dear to the moorish heart, for the wazeer knows full well that although the nazarene may be prepared to bombard, as he has done from time to time, he is no more desirous than the sultan that such an extreme measure should be necessary. so, even when things come to the pinch, and the exasperated representative of christendom talks hotly of withdrawing, hauling down his flag and giving hostile orders, there is time at least to make an offer, or to promise everything in words. and when all is over, claims paid, ships gone, compliments and presents passed, nothing really serious has happened, just the everyday scene on the market applied to the nation, while the moorish government has once more given proof of worldly wisdom, and endorsed the proverb that discretion is the better part of valour. an illustration of the high-handed way in which things are done in morocco has but recently been afforded by the action of france regarding an alleged algerian subject arrested by the moorish authorities for conspiracy. the man, boo zîan miliáni by name, was the son of one of those algerians who, when their country was conquered by the french, preferred exile to submission, and migrated to morocco, where they became naturalized. he was charged with supporting the so-called "pretender" in the reef province, where he was arrested with two others early in august last. his particular offence appears to have been the reading of the "rogi's" proclamations to the public, and inciting them to rebel against the sultan. but when brought a prisoner to tangier, and thence despatched to fez, he claimed french citizenship, and the minister of france, then at court, demanded his release. this being refused, a peremptory note followed, with a threat to break off diplomatic negotiations if the demand were not forthwith complied with. the usual _communiqués_ were made to the press, whereby a chorus was produced setting forth the insult to france, the imminence of war, and the general gravity of the situation. many alarming head-lines were provided for the evening papers, and extra copies were doubtless sold. in morocco, however, not only the english and spanish papers, but also the french one, admitted that the action of france was wrong, though the ultimate issue was never in doubt, and the man's release was a foregone conclusion. elsewhere the rights of the matter would have been sifted, and submitted at least to the law-courts, if not to arbitration. while the infliction of this indignity was stirring up northern morocco, the south was greatly exercised by the presence on the coast of a french vessel, _l'aigle_, officers from which proceeded ostentatiously to survey the fortifications of mogador and its island, and then effected a landing on the latter by night. naturally the coastguards fired at them, fortunately without causing damage, but had any been killed, europe would have rung with the "outrage." from mogador the vessel proceeded after a stay of a month to agadir, the first port of sûs, closed to europeans. here its landing-party was met on the beach by some hundreds of armed men, whose commander resolutely forbade them to land, so they had to retire. had they not done so, who would answer for the consequences? as it was, the natives, eager to attack the "invaders," were with difficulty kept in hand, and one false step would undoubtedly have led to serious bloodshed. of course this was a dreadful rebuff for "pacific penetration," but the matter was kept quiet as a little premature, since in europe the coast is not quite clear enough yet for retributory measures. the effect, however, on the moors, among whom the affair grew more grave each time it was recited, was out of all proportion to the real importance of the incident, which otherwise might have passed unnoticed. iii behind the scenes "he knows of every vice an ounce." _moorish proverb._ though most eastern lands may be described as slip-shod, with reference both to the feet of their inhabitants and to the way in which things are done, there can be no country in the world more aptly described by that epithet than morocco. one of the first things which strikes the visitor to this country is the universality of the slipper as foot-gear, at least, so far as the moors are concerned. in the majority of cases the men wear the heels of their slippers folded down under the feet, only putting them up when necessity compels them to run, which they take care shall not be too often, as they much prefer a sort of ambling gait, best compared to that of their mules, or to that of an english tramp. nothing delights them better as a means of agreeably spending an hour or two, than squatting on their heels in the streets or on some door-stoop, gazing at the passers-by, exchanging compliments with their acquaintances. native "swells" consequently promenade with a piece of felt under their arms on which to sit when they wish, in addition to its doing duty as a carpet for prayer. the most public places, and usually the cool of the afternoon, are preferred for this pastime. the ladies of their jewish neighbours also like to sit at their doors in groups at the same hour, or in the doorways of main thoroughfares on moonlight evenings, while the gentlemen, who prefer to do their gossiping afoot, roam up and down. but this is somewhat apart from the point of the lazy tendencies of the moors. with them--since they have no trains to catch, and disdain punctuality--all hurry is undignified, and one could as easily imagine an elegantly dressed moorish scribe literally flying as running, even on the most urgent errand. "why run," they ask, "when you might just as well walk? why walk, when standing would do? why stand, when sitting is so much less fatiguing? why sit, when lying down gives so much more rest? and why, lying down, keep your eyes open?" in truth, this is a country in which things are left pretty much to look after themselves. nothing is done that can be left undone, and everything is postponed until "to-morrow." slipper-slapper go the people, and slipper-slapper goes their policy. if you can get through a duty by only half doing it, by all means do so, is the generally accepted rule of life. in anything you have done for you by a moor, you are almost sure to discover that he has "scamped" some part; perhaps the most important. this, of course, means doing a good deal yourself, if you like things done well, a maxim holding good everywhere, indeed, but especially here. the moorish government's way of doing things--or rather, of not doing them if it can find an excuse--is eminently slip-shod. the only point in which they show themselves astute is in seeing that their rubicon has a safe bridge by which they may retreat, if that suits their plans after crossing it. to deceive the enemy they hide this as best they can, for the most part successfully, causing the greatest consternation in the opposite camp, which, at the moment when it thinks it has driven them into a corner, sees their ranks gradually thinning from behind, dribbling away by an outlet hitherto invisible. thus, in accepting a moor's promise, one must always consider the conditions or rider annexed. this can be well illustrated by the reluctant permission to transport grain from one moorish port to another, granted from time to time, but so hampered by restrictions as to be only available to a few, the moorish government itself deriving the greatest advantage from it. then, too, there is the property clause in the convention of madrid, which has been described as the sop by means of which the powers were induced to accept other less favourable stipulations. instead of being the step in advance which it appeared to be, it was, in reality, a backward step, the conditions attached making matters worse than before. in this way only do the moors shine as politicians, unless prevarication and procrastination be included, machiavellian arts in which they easily excel. otherwise they are content to jog along in the same slip-shod manner as their fathers did centuries ago, as soon as prosperity had removed the incentive to exert the energy they once possessed. the same carelessness marks their conduct in everything, and the same unsatisfactory results inevitably follow. but to get at the root of the matter it is necessary to go a step further. the absolute lack of morals among the people is the real cause of the trouble. morocco is so deeply sunk in the degradation of vice, and so given up to lust, that it is impossible to lay bare its deplorable condition. in most countries, with a fair proportion of the pure and virtuous, some attempt is made to gloss over and conceal one's failings; but in this country the only vice which public opinion seriously condemns is drunkenness, and it is only before foreigners that any sense of shame or desire for secrecy about others is observable. the moors have not yet attained to that state of hypocritical sanctimoniousness in which modern society in civilized lands delights to parade itself. the taste for strong drink, though still indulged comparatively in secret, is steadily increasing, the practice spreading from force of example among the moors themselves, as a result of the strenuous efforts of foreigners to inculcate this vice. european consular reports not infrequently note with congratulation the growing imports of wines and liqueurs into morocco, nominally for the sole use of foreigners, although manifestly far in excess of their requirements. as yet, it is chiefly among the higher and lower classes that the victims are found, the former indulging in the privacy of their own homes, and the latter at the low drinking-dens kept by the scum of foreign settlers in the open ports. among the country people of the plains and lower hills there are hardly any who would touch intoxicating liquor, though among the mountaineers the use of alcohol has ever been more common. tobacco smoking is very general on the coast, owing to contact with europeans, but still comparatively rare in the interior, although the native preparations of hemp (keef), and also to some extent opium, have a large army of devotees, more or less victims. the latter, however, being an expensive import, is less known in the interior. snuff-taking is fairly general among men and women, chiefly the elderly. what they take is very strong, being a composition of tobacco, walnut shells, and charcoal ash. the writer once saw a young englishman, who thought he could stand a good pinch of snuff, fairly "knocked over" by a quarter as much as the owner of the nut from which it came took with the utmost complacency. the feeling of the moorish government about smoking has long been so strong that in every treaty with europe is inserted a clause reserving the right of prohibiting the importation of all narcotics, or articles used in their manufacture or consumption. till a few years ago the right to deal in these was granted yearly as a monopoly; but in the late sultan, mulai el hasan, and his aoláma, or councillors, decided to abolish the business altogether, so, purchasing the existing stocks at a valuation, they had the whole burned. but first the foreign officials and then private foreigners demanded the right to import whatever they needed "for their own consumption," and the abuse of this courtesy has enabled several tobacco factories to spring up in the country. the position with regard to the liquor traffic is almost the same. if the moors were free to legislate as they wished, they would at once prohibit the importation of intoxicants. of late years, however, a great change has come over the moors of the ports, more especially so in tangier, where the number of taverns and _cafés_ has increased most rapidly. during many years' residence there the cases of drunkenness met with could be counted on the fingers, and were then confined to guides or servants of foreigners; on the last visit paid to the country more were observed in a month than then in years. in those days to be seen with a cigarette was almost a crime, and those who indulged in a whiff at home took care to deodorize their mouths with powdered coffee; now moors sit with europeans, smoking and drinking, unabashed, at tables in the streets, but not those of the better sort. thus morocco is becoming civilized! however ashamed a moor may be of drunkenness, no one thinks of making a pretence of being chaste or moral. on the contrary, no worse is thought of a man who is wholly given up to the pleasures of the flesh than of one who is addicted to the most innocent amusements. if a moor is remonstrated with, he declares he is not half so bad as the "nazarenes" he has come across, who, in addition to practising most of his vices, indulge in drunkenness. it is not surprising, therefore, that the diseases which come as a penalty for these vices are fearfully prevalent in morocco. everywhere one comes across the ravages of such plagues, and is sickened at the sight of their victims. without going further into details, it will suffice to mention that one out of every five patients (mostly males) who attend at the dispensary of the north africa mission at tangier are direct, or indirect, sufferers from these complaints. the moors believe in "sowing wild oats" when young, till their energy is extinguished, leaving them incapable of accomplishing anything. then they think the pardon of god worth invoking, if only in the vain hope of having their youth renewed as the eagle's. yet if this could happen, they would be quite ready to commence a fresh series of follies more outrageous than before. this is a sad picture, but nevertheless true, and, far from being exaggerated, does not even hint at much that exists in morocco to-day. the words of the korán about such matters are never considered, though nominally the sole guide for life. the fact that god is "the pitying, the pitiful, king of the day of judgement," is considered sufficient warrant for the devotees of islám to lightly indulge in breaches of laws which they hold to be his, confident that if they only perform enough "vain repetitions," fast at the appointed times, and give alms, visiting mekka, if possible, or if not, making pilgrimages to shrines of lesser note nearer home, god, in his infinite mercy, will overlook all. an anonymous writer has aptly remarked--"every good mohammedan has a perpetual free pass over that line, which not only secures to him personally a safe transportation to paradise, but provides for him upon his arrival there so luxuriously that he can leave all the cumbersome baggage of his earthly harem behind him, and begin his celestial house-keeping with an entirely new outfit." here lies the whole secret of morocco's backward state. her people, having outstepped even the ample limits of licentiousness laid down in the korán, and having long ceased to be even true mohammedans, by the time they arrive at manhood have no energy left to promote her welfare, and sink into an indolent, procrastinating race, capable of little in the way of progress till a radical change takes place in their morals. nothing betrays their moral condition more clearly than their unrestrained conversation, a reeking vapour arising from a mass of corruption. the foul ejaculations of an angry moor are unreproducible, only serving to show extreme familiarity with vice of every sort. the tales to which they delight to listen, the monotonous chants rehearsed by hired musicians at public feasts or private entertainments, and the voluptuous dances they delight to have performed before them as they lie sipping forbidden liquors, are all of one class, recounting and suggesting evil deeds to hearers or observers. the constant use made of the name of god, mostly in stock phrases uttered without a thought as to their real meaning, is counterbalanced in some measure by cursing of a most elaborate kind, and the frequent mention of the "father of lies," called by them "the liar" _par excellence_. the term "elaborate" is the only one wherewith to describe a curse so carefully worded that, if executed, it would leave no hope of paradise either for the unfortunate addressee or his ancestors for several generations. on the slightest provocation, or without that excuse, the moor can roll forth the most intricate genealogical objurgations, or rap out an oath. in ordinary cases of displeasure he is satisfied with showering expletives on the parents and grand-parents of the object of his wrath, with derogatory allusions to the morals of those worthies' "better halves." "may god have mercy on thy relatives, o my lord," is a common way of addressing a stranger respectfully, and the contrary expression is used to produce a reverse effect. i am often asked, "what would a moor think of this?" probably some great invention will be referred to, or some manifest improvement in our eyes over moorish methods or manufactures. if it was something he could see, unless above the average, he would look at it as a cow looks at a new gate, without intelligence, realizing only the change, not the cause or effect. by this time the moors are becoming familiar, at least by exaggerated descriptions, with most of the foreigner's freaks, and are beginning to refuse to believe that the devil assists us, as they used to, taking it for granted that we should be more ingenious, and they more wise! the few who think are apt to pity the rush of our lives, and write us down, from what they have themselves observed in europe as in morocco, as grossly immoral beside even their acknowledged failings. the faults of our civilization they quickly detect, the advantages are mostly beyond their comprehension. some years ago a friend of mine showed two moors some of the sights of london. when they saw st. paul's they told of the glories of the karûeeïn mosque at fez; with the towers of westminster before them they sang the praises of the kûtûbîya at marrákesh. whatever they saw had its match in morocco. but at last, as a huge dray-horse passed along the highway with its heavy load, one grasped the other's arm convulsively, exclaiming, "m'bark allah! aoûd hadhá!"--"blessed be god! that's a horse!" here at least was something that did appeal to the heart of the arab. for once he saw a creature he could understand, the like of which was never bred in barbary, and his wonder knew no bounds. an equally good story is told of an englishman who endeavoured to convince a moor at home of the size of these horses. with his stick he drew on the ground one of their full-sized shoes. "but we have horses beyond the mountains with shoes _this_ size," was the ready reply, as the native drew another twice as big. annoyed at not being able to convince him, the englishman sent home for a specimen shoe. when he showed it to the moor, the only remark he elicited was that a native smith could make one twice the size. exasperated now, and not to be outdone, the englishman sent home for a cart-horse skull. "now you've beaten me!" at last acknowledged the moor. "you christians can make anything, but _we can't make bones!_" bigoted and fanatical as the moors may show themselves at times, they are generally willing enough to be friends with those who show themselves friendly. and notwithstanding the way in which the strong oppress the weak, as a nation they are by no means treacherous or cruel; on the contrary, the average moor is genial and hospitable, does not forget a kindness, and is a man whom one can respect. yet it is strange how soon a little power, and the need for satisfying the demands of his superiors, will corrupt the mildest of them; and the worst are to be found among families which have inherited office. the best officials are those chosen from among retired merchants whose palms no longer itch, and who, by intercourse with europeans, have had their ideas of life broadened. the greatest obstacle to progress in morocco is the blind prejudice of ignorance. it is hard for the moors to realize that their presumed hereditary foes can wish them well, and it is suspicion, rather than hostility, which induces them to crawl within their shell and ask to be left alone. too often subsequent events have shown what good ground they have had for suspicion. it is a pleasure for me to be able to state that during all the years that i have lived among them, often in the closest intercourse, i have never received the least insult, but have been well repaid in my own coin. what more could be wished? [illustration: _photograph by dr. rudduck._ a berber village in the atlas] iv the berber race "every lion in his own forest roars." _moorish proverb._ few who glibly use the word "barbarian" pause to consider whether the present meaning attached to the name is justified or not, or whether the people of barbary are indeed the uncivilized, uncouth, incapable lot their name would seem to imply to-day. in fact, the popular ignorance regarding the nearest point of africa is even greater than of the actually less known central portions, where the white man penetrates with every risk. to declare that the inhabitants of the four barbary states--morocco, algeria, tunisia, and tripoli--are not "blackamoors" at all, but white like ourselves, is to astonish most folk at the outset. of course in lands where the enslavement of neighbouring negro races has been an institution for a thousand years or more, there is a goodly proportion of mulattoes; and among those whose lives have been spent for generations in field work there are many whose skins are bronzed and darkened, but they are white by nature, nevertheless, and town life soon restores the original hue. the student class of fez, drawn from all sections of the population of morocco, actually makes a boast of the pale and pasty complexions attained by life amid the shaded cloisters and covered streets of the intellectual capital. then again those who are sunburned and bronzed are more of the arab stock than of the berber. these berbers, the original barbarians, known to the romans and greeks as such before the arab was heard of outside arabia, are at once the greatest and the most interesting nation, or rather race, of the whole of africa. had such a coalition as "the united states of north africa" been possible, europe would long ago have learned to fear and respect the title "barbarian" too much to put it to its present use. but the weak point of the berber race has been its lack of homogeneity; it has ever been split up into independent states and tribes, constantly indulging in internecine warfare. this is a principle which has its origin in the relations of the units whereof they are composed, of whom it may be said as of the sons of ishmael, that every man's hand is against his neighbour. the vendetta, a result of the _lex talionis_ of "eye for eye and tooth for tooth," flourishes still. no youth is supposed to have attained full manhood until he has slain his man, and excuses are seldom lacking. the greatest insult that can be offered to an enemy is to tell him that his father died in bed--even greater than the imputation of evil character to his maternal relatives. some years ago i had in my service a lad of about thirteen, one of several reefians whom i had about me for the practice of their language. two or three years later, on returning to morocco, i met him one day on the market. "i am so glad to see you," he said; "i want you to help me buy some guns." "what for?" "well, my father's dead; may god have mercy on him!" "how did he die?" "god knows." "but what has that to do with the gun?" "you see, we must kill my three uncles, i and my two brothers, and we want three guns." "what! did they kill your father?" "god knows." "may he deliver you from such a deed. come round to the house for some food." "but i've got married since you saw me, and expect an heir, yet they chaff me and call me a boy because i have never yet killed a man." i asked an old servant who had been to england, and seemed "almost a christian," to try and dissuade him, but only to meet with an appreciative, "well done! i always thought there was something in that lad." so i tried a second, but with worse results, for he patted the boy on the back with an assurance that he could not dissuade him from so sacred a duty; and at last i had to do what i could myself. i extorted a promise that he would try and arrange to take blood-money, but as he left the door his eye fell on a broken walking-stick. "oh, do give me that! it's no use to you, and it _would_ make such a nice prop for my gun, as i am a very bad shot, and we mean to wait outside for them in the dark." the sequel i have never heard. up in those mountains every one lives in fortified dwellings--big men in citadels, others in wall-girt villages, all from time to time at war with one another, or with the dwellers in some neighbouring valley. fighting is their element; as soon as "the powder speaks" there are plenty to answer, for every one carries his gun, and it is wonderful how soon upon these barren hills an armed crowd can muster. their life is a hard fight with nature; all they ask is to be left alone to fight it out among themselves. even on the plains among the arabs and the mixed tribes described as moors, things are not much better, for there, too, vendettas and cattle lifting keep them at loggerheads, and there is nothing the clansmen like so well as a raid on the governor's kasbah or castle. these kasbahs are great walled strongholds dotted about the country; in times of peace surrounded by groups of huts and tents, whose inhabitants take refuge inside when their neighbours appear. the high walls and towers are built of mud concrete, often red like the alhambra, the surface of which stands the weather ill, but which, when kept in repair, lasts for centuries. the reefian berbers are among the finest men in morocco--warlike and fierce, it is true, from long habit and training; but they have many excellent qualities, in addition to stalwart frames. "if you don't want to be robbed," say they, "don't come our way. we only care to see men who can fight, with whom we may try our luck." they will come and work for europeans, forming friendships among them, and if it were not for the suspicion of those who have not done so, who always fear political agents and spies, they would often be willing to take europeans through their land. i have more than once been invited to go as a moor. but the ideas they get of europeans in tangier do not predispose to friendship, and they will not allow them to enter their territories if they can help it. only those who are in subjection to the sultan permit them to do so freely. the men are a hardy, sturdy race, wiry and lithe, inured to toil and cold, fonder far of the gun and sword than of the ploughshare, and steady riders of an equally wiry race of mountain ponies. their dwellings are of stone and mud, often of two floors, flat-topped, with rugged, projecting eaves, the roofs being made of poles covered with the same material as the walls, stamped and smoothed. these houses are seldom whitewashed, and present a ruinous appearance. their ovens are domes about three feet or less in height outside; they are heated by a fire inside, then emptied, and the bread put in. similar ovens are employed in camp to bake for the court. instead of that forced seclusion and concealment of the features to which the followers of islám elsewhere doom their women, in these mountain homes they enjoy almost as perfect liberty as their sisters in europe. i have been greatly struck with their intelligence and generally superior appearance to such arab women as i have by chance been able to see. once, when supping with the son of a powerful governor from above fez, his mother, wife, and wife's sister sat composedly to eat with us, which could never have occurred in the dwelling of a moor. no attempt at covering their faces was made, though male attendants were present at times, but the little daughter shrieked at the sight of a nazarene. the grandmother, a fine, buxom dame, could read and write--which would be an astonishing accomplishment for a moorish woman--and she could converse better than many men who would in this country pass for educated. the berber dress has either borrowed from or lent much to the moor, but a few articles stamp it wherever worn. one of these is a large black cloak of goat's-hair, impervious to rain, made of one piece, with no arm-holes. at the point of the cowl hangs a black tassel, and right across the back, about the level of the knees, runs an assagai-shaped patch, often with a centre of red. it has been opined that this remarkable feature represents the all-seeing eye, so often used as a charm, but from the scanty information i could gather from the people themselves, i believe that they have lost sight of the original idea, though some have told me that variations in the pattern mark clan distinctions. i have ridden--when in the guise of a native--for days together in one of these cloaks, during pelting rain which never penetrated it. in more remote districts, seldom visited by europeans, the garments are ruder far, entirely of undyed wool, and unsewn, mere blankets with slits cut in the centre for the head. this is, however, in every respect, a great difference between the various districts. the turban is little used by these people, skull-caps being preferred, while their red cloth gun-cases are commonly twisted turban-wise as head-gear, though often a camel's-hair cord is deemed sufficient protection for the head. every successive ruler of north africa has had to do with the problem of subduing the berbers and has failed. in the wars between rome and carthage it was among her sturdy berber soldiers that the southern rival of the great queen city of the world found actual sinews enough to hold the roman legions so long at bay, and often to overcome her vaunted cohorts and carry the war across into europe. where else did rome find so near a match, and what wars cost her more than did those of africa? carthage indeed has fallen, and from her once famed byrsa the writer has been able to count on his fingers the local remains of her greatness, yet the people who made her what she was remain--the berbers of tunisia. the ph[oe]nician settlers, though bringing with them wealth and learning and arts, could never have done alone what they did without the hardy fighting men supplied by the hills around. when rome herself had fallen, and the fames of carthage and utica were forgotten, there came across north africa a very different race from those who had preceded them, the desert arabs, introducing the creed of islám. in the course of a century or two, north africa became mohammedan, pagan and christian institutions being swept away before that onward wave. it is not probable that at any time christianity had any real hold upon the berbers themselves, and islám itself sits lightly on their easy consciences. the arabs had for the moment solved the berber problem. they were the amalgam which, by coalescing with the scattered factions of their race, had bound them up together and had formed for once a nation of them. thus it was that the muslim armies obtained force to carry all before them, and thus was provided the new blood and the active temper to which alone are due the conquest of spain, and subsequent achievements there. the popular description of the mohammedan rulers of spain as "saracens"--easterners--is as erroneous as the supposition that they were arabs. the people who conquered spain were berbers, although their leaders often adopted arabic names with an arab religion and arab culture. the arabic language, although official, was by no means general, nor is it otherwise to-day. the men who fought and the men who ruled were berbers out and out, though the latter were often the sons of arab fathers or mothers, and the great religious chiefs were purely arab on the father's side at least, the majority claiming descent from mohammed himself, and as such forming a class apart of shareefs or nobles. though nominal mohammedans, and in morocco acknowledging the religious supremacy of the reigning shareefian family, the moorish berbers still retain a semi-independence. the mountains of the atlas chain have always been their home and refuge, where the plainsmen find it difficult and dangerous to follow them. the history of the conquest of algeria and tunisia by the french has shown that they are no mean opponents even to modern weapons and modern warfare. the kabyles,[ ] as they are erroneously styled in those countries, have still to be kept in check by the fear of arms, and their prowess no one disputes. these are the people the french propose to subdue by "pacific penetration." the awe with which these mountaineers have inspired the plainsmen and townsfolk is remarkable; as good an illustration of it as i know was the effect produced on a moor by my explanation that a highland friend to whom i had introduced him was not an englishman, but what i might call a "british berber." the man was absolutely awe-struck. [ : _i.e._ "provincials," so misnamed from kabîlah (_pl._ kabáïl), a province.] separated from the arab as well as from the european by a totally distinct, unwritten language, with numerous dialects, these people still exist as a mine of raw material, full of possibilities. in habits and style of life they may be considered uncivilized even in contrast to the mingled dwellers on the lowlands; but they are far from being savages. their stalwart frames and sturdy independence fit them for anything, although the latter quality keeps them aloof, and has so far prevented intercourse with the outside world. many have their own pet theories as to the origin of the berbers and their language, not a few believing them to have once been altogether christians, while others, following native authors, attribute to them canaanitish ancestors, and ethnologists dispute as to the branch of noah's family in which to class them. it is more than probable that they are one with the ancient egyptians, who, at least, were no barbarians, if berbers. but all are agreed that some of the finest stocks of southern and western europe are of kindred origin, if not identical with them, and even if this be uncertain, enough has been said to show that they have played no unimportant part in european history, though it has ever been their lot to play behind the scenes--scene-shifters rather than actors. [illustration: _photograph by dr. rudduck._ an arab tent in morocco.] v the wandering arab "i am loving, not lustful." _moorish proverb._ some strange fascination attaches itself to the simple nomad life of the arab, in whatever country he be found, and here, in the far west of his peregrinations, he is encountered living almost in the same style as on the other side of suez; his only roof a cloth, his country the wide world. sometimes the tents are arranged as many as thirty or more in a circle, and at other times they are grouped hap-hazard, intermingled with round huts of thatch, and oblong ones of sun-dried bricks, thatched also; but in the latter cases the occupants are unlikely to be pure arabs, for that race seldom so nearly approaches to settling anywhere. when the tents are arranged in a circle, the animals are generally picketed in the centre, but more often some are to be found sharing the homes of their owners. the tent itself is of an oval shape, with a wooden ridge on two poles across the middle third of the centre, from front to back, with a couple of strong bands of the same material as the tent fixed on either side, whence cords lead to pegs in the ground, passing over two low stakes leaning outwards. a rude camel's hair canvas is stretched over this frame, being kept up at the edges by more leaning stakes, and fastened by cords to pegs all round. the door space is left on the side which faces the centre of the encampment, and the walls or "curtains" are formed of high thistles lashed together in sheaves. surrounding the tent is a yard, a simple bog in winter, the boundary of which is a ring formed by bundles of prickly branches, which compose a really formidable barrier, being too much for a jump, and too tenacious to one another and to visitors for penetration. the break left for an entrance is stopped at night by another bundle which makes the circle complete. the interior of the tent is often more or less divided by the pole supporting the roof, and by a pile of household goods, such as they are. sometimes a rude loom is fastened to the poles, and at it a woman sits working on the floor. the framework--made of canes--is kept in place by rigging to pegs in the ground. the woman's hand is her only shuttle, and she threads the wool through with her fingers, a span at a time, afterwards knocking it down tightly into place with a heavy wrought-iron comb about two inches wide, with a dozen prongs. she seems but half-dressed, and makes no effort to conceal either face or breast, as a filthy child lies feeding in her lap. her seat is a piece of matting, but the principal covering for the floor of trodden mud is a layer of palmetto leaves. round the "walls" are several hens with chicks nestling under their wings, and on one side a donkey is tethered, while a calf sports at large. the furniture of this humble dwelling consists of two or three large, upright, mud-plastered, split-cane baskets, containing corn, partially sunk in the ground, and a few dirty bags. on one side is the mill, a couple of stones about eighteen inches across, the upper one convex, with a handle at one side. three stones above a small hole in the ground serve as a cooking-range, while the fuel is abundant in the form of sun-dried thistles and other weeds, or palmetto leaves and sticks. fire is obtained by borrowing from one another, but should it happen that no one in the encampment had any, the laborious operation of lighting dry straw from the flash in the pan of a flint-lock would have to be performed. to light the rude lamp--merely a bit of cotton protruding from anything with olive-oil in it--it is necessary to blow some smoking straw or weed till it bursts into a flame. little else except the omnipresent dirt is to be found in the average arab tent. a tin or two for cooking operations, a large earthen water-jar, and a pan or two to match, in which the butter-milk is kept, a sieve for the flour, and a few rough baskets, usually complete the list, and all are remarkable only for the prevailing grime. making a virtue of necessity, the arab prefers sour milk to fresh, for with this almost total lack of cleanliness, no milk would long keep sweet. their food is of the simplest, chiefly the flour of wheat, barley, or indian millet prepared in various ways, for the most part made up into flat, heavy cakes of bread, or as kesk'soo. milk, from which butter is made direct by tossing it in a goat-skin turned inside out, eggs and fowls form the chief animal food, butcher's meat being but seldom indulged in. vegetables do not enter into their diet, as they have no gardens, and beyond possessing flocks and herds, those arabs met with in barbary are wretchedly poor and miserably squalid. the patriarchal display of arabia is here unknown. of children and dogs there is no lack. both abound, and wallow in the mud together. often the latter seem to have the better time of it. two families by one father will sometimes share one tent between them, but generally each "household" is distinct, though all sleep together in the one apartment of their abode. as one approaches a dûár, or encampment, an early warning is given by the hungry dogs, and soon the half-clad children rush out to see who comes, followed leisurely by their elders. hospitality has ever been an arab trait, and these poor creatures, in their humble way, sustain the best traditions of their race. a native visitor of their own class is entertained and fed by the first he comes across, while the foreign traveller or native of means with his own tent is accommodated on the rubbish in the midst of the encampment, and can purchase all he wishes--all that they have--for a trifle, though sometimes they turn disagreeable and "pile it on." a present of milk and eggs, perhaps fowls, may be brought, for which, however, a _quid pro quo_ is expected. luxuries they have not. whatever they need to do in the way of shopping, is done at the nearest market once a week, and nothing but the produce already mentioned is to be obtained from them. in the evenings they stuff themselves to repletion, if they can afford it, with a wholesome dish of prepared barley or wheat meal, sometimes crowned with beans; then, after a gossip round the crackling fire, or, on state occasions, three cups of syrupy green tea apiece, they roll themselves in their long blankets and sleep on the ground. the first blush of dawn sees them stirring, and soon all is life and excitement. the men go off to their various labours, as do many of the stronger women, while the remainder attend to their scanty household duties, later on basking in the sun. but the moment the stranger arrives the scene changes, and the incessant din of dogs, hags and babies commences, to which the visitor is doomed till late at night, with the addition then of neighs and brays and occasional cock-crowing. it never seemed to me that these poor folk enjoyed life, but rather that they took things sadly. how could it be otherwise? no security of life and property tempts them to make a show of wealth; on the contrary, they bury what little they may save, if any, and lead lives of misery for fear of tempting the authorities. their work is hard; their comforts are few. the wild wind howls through their humble dwellings, and the rain splashes in at the door. in sickness, for lack of medical skill, they lie and perish. in health their only pleasures are animal. their women, once they are past the prime of life, which means soon after thirty with this desert race, go unveiled, and work often harder than the men, carrying burdens, binding sheaves, or even perhaps helping a donkey to haul a plough. female features are never so jealously guarded here as in the towns. yet they are a jolly, good-tempered, simple folk. often have i spent a merry evening round the fire with them, squatted on a bit of matting, telling of the wonders of "that country," the name which alternates in their vocabulary with "nazarene land," as descriptive of all the world but morocco and such portions of north africa or arabia as they may have heard of. many an honest laugh have we enjoyed over their wordy tales, or perchance some witty sally; but in my heart i have pitied these down-trodden people in their ignorance and want. home they do not know. when the pasture in shechem is short, they remove to dothan; next month they may be somewhere else. but they are always ready to share their scanty portion with the wayfarer, wherever they are. when the time comes for changing quarters these wanderers find the move but little trouble. their few belongings are soon collected and packed, and the tent itself made ready for transportation. their animals are got together, and ere long the cavalcade is on the road. often one poor beast will carry a fair proportion of the family--the mother and a child or two, for instance--in addition to a load of household goods, and bundles of fowls slung by their feet. at the side men and boys drive the flocks and herds, while as often as not the elder women-folk take a full share in the porterage of their property. to meet such a caravan is to feel one's self transported to bible times, and to fancy jacob going home from padan aram. vi city life "seek the neighbour before the house, and the companion before the road." _moorish proverb._ few countries afford a better insight into typical mohammedan life, or boast a more primitive civilization, than morocco, preserved as it has been so long from western contamination. the patriarchal system, rendered more or less familiar to us by our bibles, still exists in the homes of its people, especially those of the country-side; but moorish city life is no less interesting or instructive. if an englishman's house is his castle, the mohammedan's house is a prison--not for himself, but for his women. here is the radical difference between their life and ours. no one who has not mixed intimately with the people as one of themselves, lodging in their houses and holding constant intercourse with them, can form an adequate idea of the lack of home feeling, even in the happiest families. the moment you enter a town, however, the main facts are brought vividly before you on every hand. you pass along a narrow thoroughfare--maybe six, maybe sixteen feet in width--bounded by almost blank walls, in some towns whitewashed, in others bare mud, in which are no windows, lest their inmates might see or be seen. even above the roofs of the majority of two-storied houses (for very many in the east consist but of ground floor), the wall is continued to form a parapet round the terrace. if you meet a woman in the street, she is enveloped from head to ankle in close disguise, with only a peep-hole for one or both eyes, unless too ugly and withered for such precautions to be needful. you arrive at the door of your friend's abode, a huge massive barrier painted brown or green--if not left entirely uncoloured--and studded all over with nails. a very prison entrance it appears, for the only other breaks in the wall above are slits for ventilation, all placed so high in the room as to be out of reach. in the warmer parts of the country you would see latticed boxes protruding from the walls--meshrabîyahs or drinking-places--shelves on which porous earthen jars may be placed to catch the slightest breeze, that the god-sent beverage to which mohammedans are wisely restricted may be at all times cool. you are terrified, if a stranger, by the resonance of this great door, as you let the huge iron ring which serves as knocker fall on the miniature anvil beneath it. presently your scattered thoughts are recalled by a chirping voice from within-- "who's that?" you recognize the tones as those of a tiny negress slave, mayhap a dozen years of age, and as you give your name you hear a patter of bare feet on the tiles within, but if you are a male, you are left standing out in the street. in a few moments the latch of the inner door is sedately lifted, and with measured tread you hear the slippers of your friend advancing. "is that so-and-so?" he asks, pausing on the other side of the door. "it is, my lord." "welcome, then." the heavy bolt is drawn, and the door swings on its hinges during a volley and counter-volley of inquiries, congratulations, and thanks to god, accompanied by the most graceful bows, the mutual touching and kissing of finger-tips, and the placing of hands on hearts. as these exercises slacken, your host advances to the inner door, and possibly disappears through it, closing it carefully behind him. you hear his stentorian voice commanding, "_amel trek!_"--"make way!"--and this is followed by a scuffle of feet which tells you he is being obeyed. not a female form will be in sight by the time your host returns to lead you in by the hand with a thousand welcomes, entreating you to make yourself at home. the passage is constructed with a double turn, so that you could not look, if you would, from the roadway into the courtyard which you now enter. if one of the better-class houses, the floor will be paved with marble or glazed mosaics, and in the centre will stand a bubbling fountain. round the sides is a colonnade supporting the first-floor landing, reached by a narrow stairway in the corner. above is the deep-blue sky, obscured, perhaps, by the grateful shade of fig or orange boughs, or a vine on a trellis, under which the people live. the walls, if not tiled, are whitewashed, and often beautifully decorated in plaster mauresques. in the centre of three of the four sides are huge horseshoe-arched doorways, two of which will probably be closed by cotton curtains. these suffice to ensure the strictest privacy within, as no one would dream of approaching within a couple of yards of a room with the curtain down, till leave had been asked and obtained. you are led into the remaining room, the guest-chamber, and the curtain over the entrance is lowered. you may not now venture to rise from your seat on the mattress facing the door till the women whom you hear emerging from their retreats have been admonished to withdraw again. the long, narrow apartment, some eight feet by twenty, in which you find yourself has a double bed at each end, for it is sleeping-room and sitting-room combined, as in barbary no distinction is known between the two. however long you may remain, you see no female face but that of the cheery slave-girl, who kisses your hand so demurely as she enters with refreshments. thus the husband receives his friends--perforce all males unless he be "on the spree,"--in apartments from which all women-folk are banished. likewise the ladies of the establishment hold their festive gatherings apart. most moors, however, are too strict to allow much visiting among their women, especially if they be wealthy and have a good complexion, when they are very closely confined, except when allowed to visit the bath at certain hours set apart for the fair sex, or on fridays to lay myrtle branches on the tombs of saints and departed relatives. most of the ladies' calls are roof-to-roof visitations, and very nimble they are in getting over the low partition walls, even dragging a ladder up and down with them if there are high ones to be crossed. the reason is that the roofs, or rather terraces, are especially reserved for women-folk, and men are not even allowed to go up except to do repairs, when the neighbouring houses are duly warned; it is illegal to have a window overlooking another's roof. david's temptation doubtless arose from his exercise of a royal exemption from this all-prevailing custom. but for their exceedingly substantial build, the moorish women in the streets might pass for ghosts, for with the exception of their red morocco slippers, their costume is white--wool-white. a long and heavy blanket of coarse homespun effectually conceals all features but the eyes, which are touched up with antimony on the lids, and are sufficiently expressive. sometimes a wide-brimmed straw hat is jauntily clapped on; but here ends the plate of moorish out-door fashions. in-doors all is colour, light and glitter. in matters of colour and flowing robes the men are not far behind, and they make up abroad for what they lack at home. no garment is more artistic, and no drapery more graceful, than that in which the wealthy moor takes his daily airing, either on foot or on mule back. beneath a gauze-like woollen toga--relic of ancient art--glimpses of luscious hue are caught--crimson and purple; deep greens and "afternoon sun colour" (the native name for a rich orange); salmons, and pale, clear blues. a dark-blue cloak, when it is cold, negligently but gracefully thrown across the shoulders, or a blue-green prayer-carpet folded beneath the arm, helps to set off the whole. _chez lui_ our friend of the flowing garments is a king, with slaves to wait upon him, wives to obey him, and servants to fear his wrath. but his everyday reception-room is the lobby of his stables, where he sits behind the door in rather shabby garments attending to business matters, unless he is a merchant or shopkeeper, when his store serves as office instead. if all that the teuton considers essential to home-life is really a _sine quâ non_, then orientals have no home-life. that is our way of looking upon it, judging in the most natural way, by our own standards. the eastern, from his point of view, forms an equally poor idea of the customs which familiarity has rendered most dear to us. it is as difficult for us to set aside prejudice and to consider his systems impartially, as for him to do so with regard to our peculiar style. there are but two criteria by which the various forms of civilization so far developed by man may be fairly judged. the first is the suitability of any given form to the surroundings and exterior conditions of life of the nation adopting it, and the second is the moral or social effect on the community at large. under the first head the unbiassed student of mankind will approve in the main of most systems adopted by peoples who have attained that artificiality which we call civilization. an exchange among westerners of their time-honoured habits for those of the east would not be less beneficial or more incongruous than a corresponding exchange on the part of orientals. those who are ignorant of life towards the sunrise commonly suppose that they can confer no greater benefit upon the natives of these climes than chairs, top-hats, and so on. hardly could they be more mistaken. the easterner despises the man who cannot eat his dinner without a fork or other implement, and who cannot tuck his legs beneath him, infinitely more than ill-informed westerners despise petticoated men and shrouded women. under the second head, however, a very different issue is reached, and one which involves not only social, but religious life, and consequently the creed on which this last is based. it is in this that moorish civilization fails. * * * * * but list! what is that weird, low sound which strikes upon our ear and interrupts our musings? it is the call to prayer. for the fifth time to-day that cry is sounding--a warning to the faithful that the hour for evening devotions has come. see! yonder moor has heard it too, and is already spreading his felt on the ground for the performance of his nightly orisons. standing mekka-wards, and bowing to the ground, he goes through the set forms used throughout the mohammedan world. the majority satisfy their consciences by working off the whole five sets at once. but that cry! i hear it still; as one voice fails another carries on the strain in ever varying cadence, each repeating it to the four quarters of the heavens. it was yet early in the morning when the first call of the day burst on the stilly air; the sun had not then risen o'er the hill tops, nor had his first, soft rays dispelled the shadows of the night. only the rustling of the wind was heard as it died among the tree tops--that wind which was a gale last night. the hurried tread of the night guard going on his last--perhaps his only--round before returning home, had awakened me from dreaming slumbers, and i was about to doze away into that sweetest of sleeps, the morning nap, when the distant cry broke forth. pitched in a high, clear key, the muslim confession of faith was heard; "lá iláha il' al-lah; wa mohammed er-rasool al-l-a-h!" could ever bell send thrill like that? i wot not. [illustration: _cavilla, photo., tangier._ roofs of tangier from the british consulate, showing flagstaffs of foreign legations.] vii the women-folk "teach not thy daughter letters; let her not live on the roof." _moorish proverb._ of no country in the world can it more truly be said than of the moorish empire that the social condition of the people may be measured by that of its women. holding its women in absolute subjection, the moorish nation is itself held in subjection, morally, politically, socially. the proverb heading this chapter, implying that women should not enjoy the least education or liberty, expresses the universal treatment of the weaker sex among mohammedans. it is the subservient position of women which strikes the visitor from europe more than all the oriental strangeness of the local customs or the local art and colour. advocates of the restriction of the rights of women in our own land, and of the retention of disabilities unknown to men, who fail to recognize the justice and invariability of the principle of absolute equality in rights and liberty between the sexes, should investigate the state of things existing in morocco, where the natural results of a fallacious principle have had free course. no welcome awaits the infant daughter, and few care to bear the evil news to the father, who will sometimes be left uninformed as to the sex of his child till the time comes to name her. it is rarely that girls are taught to read, or even to understand the rudiments of their religious system. here and there a father who ranks in morocco as scholarly, takes the trouble to teach his children at home, including his daughters in the class, but this is very seldom the case. only those women succeed in obtaining even an average education in whom a thirst for knowledge is combined with opportunities in every way exceptional. in the country considerably more liberty is permitted than in the towns, and the condition of the berber women has already been noted. nevertheless, in certain circumstances, women attain a power quite abnormal under such conditions, usually the result of natural astuteness, combined--at the outset, at least--with a reasonable share of good looks, for when a woman is fairly astute she is a match for a man anywhere. a mohammedan woman's place in life depends entirely on her personal attractions. if she lacks good looks, or is thin--which in barbary, as in other muslim countries, amounts to much the same thing--her future is practically hopeless. the chances being less--almost _nil_--of getting her easily off their hands by marriage, the parents feel they must make the best they can of her by setting her to work about the house, and she becomes a general drudge. if the home is a wealthy one, she may be relieved from this lot, and steadily ply her needle at minutely fine silk embroidery, or deck and paint herself in style, but, despised by her more fortunate sisters, she is even then hardly better off. if, on the other hand, a daughter is the beauty of the family, every one pays court to her in some degree, for there is no telling to what she may arrive. perhaps, in morocco, she is even thought good enough for the sultan--plump, clear-skinned, bright-eyed. could she but get a place in the royal hareem, it would be in the hands of god to make her the mother of the coming sultan. but good looks alone will not suffice to take her there. influence--a word translatable in the orient by a shorter one, cash--must be brought to bear. the interest of a wazeer or two must be secured, and finally an interview must take place with one of the "wise women" who are in charge of the imperial ladies. she, too, must be convinced by the eloquence of dollars, that his majesty could not find another so graceful a creature in all his dominions. when permission is given to send her to court, what joy there is, what bedecking, what congratulation! at last she is taken away with a palpitating heart, as she thinks of the possibilities before her, bundled up in her blanket and mounted on an ambling mule under strictest guard. on arrival at her new home her very beauty will make enemies, especially among those who have been there longest, and who feel their chances grow less as each new-comer appears. perhaps one friday the sultan notices her as he walks in his grounds in the afternoon, and taking a fancy to her, decides to make her his wife. at once all jealousies are hidden, and each vies with the other to render her service, and assist the preparations for the coming event. for a while she will remain supreme--a very queen indeed--but only till her place is taken by another. if she has sons her chances are better; but unless she maintains her influence over her husband till her offspring are old enough to find a lasting place in his affections, she will probably one day be despatched to tafilált, beyond the atlas by the sáharah, whence come those luscious dates. there every other man is a direct descendant of some moorish king, as for centuries it has served as a sort of overflow for the prolific royal house. as islám knows no right of primogeniture, each sultan appoints his heir; so each wife strives to obtain this favour for her son, and often enough the story of ishmael and isaac repeats itself among these reputed descendants of hagar. the usual way is for the pet son to be placed in some command, even before really able to discharge the duties of the post, which shall secure him supreme control on his father's death. the treasury and the army are the two great means to this end. those possible rivals who have not been sent away to tafilált are as often as not imprisoned or put to death on some slight charge, as used to be the custom in england a few hundred years ago. this method of bequeathing rights which do not come under the strict scale for the division of property contained in the korán is not confined to royalty. it applies also to religious sanctity. an instance is that of the late shareef, or noble, of wazzán, a feudal "saint" of great influence. his father, on his deathbed, appointed as successor to his title, his holiness, and the estates connected therewith, the son who should be found playing with a certain stick, a common toy of his favourite. but a black woman by whom he had a son was present, and ran out to place the stick in the hands of her own child, who thus inherited his father's honours. some of the queens of morocco have arrived at such power through their influence over their husbands that they have virtually ruled the empire. supposing, however, that the damsel who has at last found admittance to the hareem does not, after all, prove attractive to her lord, she will in all probability be sent away to make room for some one else. she will be bestowed upon some country governor when he comes to court. sometimes it is an especially astute one who is thus transferred, that she may thereafter serve as a spy on his actions. though those before whom lies such a career as has been described will be comparatively few, none who can be considered beautiful are without their chances, however poor. many well-to-do men prefer a poor wife to a rich one, because they can divorce her when tired of her without incurring the enmity of powerful relatives. marriage is enjoined upon every muslim as a religious duty, and, if able to afford it, he usually takes to himself his first wife before he is out of his teens. he is relieved of the choice of a partner which troubles some of us so much, for the ladies of his family undertake this for him: if they do not happen to know of a likely individual they employ a professional go-between, a woman who follows also the callings of pedlar and scandal-monger. it is the duty of this personage, on receipt of a present from his friends, to sing his praises and those of his family in the house of some beautiful girl, whose friends are thereby induced to give her a present to go and do likewise on their behalf in the house of so promising a youth. personal negotiations will then probably take place between the lady friends, and all things proving satisfactory, the fathers or brothers of the might-be pair discuss the dowry and marriage-settlement from a strictly business point of view. at this stage the bride-elect will perhaps be thought not fat enough, and will have to submit to a course of stuffing. this consists in swallowing after each full meal a few small sausage-shaped boluses of flour, honey and butter, flavoured with anise-seed or something similar. a few months of this treatment give a marvellous rotundity to the figure, thus greatly increasing her charms in the native eye. but of these the bridegroom will see nothing, if not surreptitiously, till after the wedding, when she is brought to his house. by that time formal documents of marriage will have been drawn up, and signed by notaries before the kádi or judge, setting forth the contract--with nothing in it about love or honour,--detailing every article which the wife brings with her, including in many instances a considerable portion of the household utensils. notwithstanding all this, she may be divorced by her husband simply saying, "i divorce thee!" and though she may claim the return of all she brought, she has no option but to go home again. he may repent and take her back a first and a second time, but after he has put her away three times he may not marry her again till after she has been wedded to some one else and divorced. theoretically she may get a divorce from him, but practically this is a matter of great difficulty. the legal expression employed for the nuptial tie is one which conveys the idea of purchasing a field, to be put to what use the owner will, according him complete control. this idea is borne out to the full, and henceforward the woman lives for her lord, with no thought of independence or self-assertion. if he is poor, all work too hard for him that is not considered unwomanly falls to her share, hewing of wood and drawing of water, grinding of corn and making of bread, weaving and washing; but, strange to us, little sewing. when decidedly _passée_, she saves him a donkey in carrying wood and charcoal and grass to market, often bent nearly double under a load which she cannot lift, which has to be bound on her back. her feet are bare, but her sturdy legs are at times encased in leather to ward off the wayside thorns. no longer jealously covered, she and her unmarried daughters trudge for many weary miles at dawn, her decidedly better-off half and a son or two riding the family mule. from this it is but a short step to helping the cow or donkey draw the plough, and this step is sometimes taken. until a woman's good looks have quite disappeared, which generally occurs about the time they become grandmothers--say thirty,--intercourse of any sort with men other than her relatives of the first degree is strictly prohibited, and no one dare salute a woman in the street, even if her attendant or mount shows her to be a privileged relative. the slightest recognition of a man out-of-doors--or indeed anywhere--would be to proclaim herself one of that degraded outcaste class as common in moorish towns as in europe. of companionship in wedlock the moor has no conception, and his ideas of love are those of lust. though matrimony is considered by the muslim doctors as "half of islám," its value in their eyes is purely as a legalization of license by the substitution of polygamy for polyandry. slavishly bound to the observance of wearisome customs, immured in a windowless house with only the roof for a promenade, seldom permitted outside the door, and then most carefully wrapped in a blanket till quite unrecognizable, the life of a moorish woman, from the time she has first been caught admiring herself in a mirror, is that of a bird encaged. lest she might grow content with such a lot, she has before her eyes from infancy the jealousies and rivalries of her father's wives and concubines, and is early initiated into the disgusting and unutterable practices employed to gain the favour of their lord. her one thought from childhood is man, and distance lends enchantment. a word, the interchange of a look, with a man is sought for by the moorish maiden more than are the sighs and glances of a coy brunette by a spaniard. nothing short of the unexpurgated arabian nights' entertainments can convey an adequate idea of what goes on within those whited sepulchres, the broad, blank walls of moorish towns. a word with the mason who comes to repair the roof, or even a peep at the men at work on the building over the way, on whose account the roof promenade is forbidden, is eagerly related and expatiated on. in short, all the training a moorish woman receives is sensual, a training which of itself necessitates most rigorous, though often unavailing, seclusion. both in town and country intrigues are common, but intrigues which have not even the excuse of the blindness of love, whose only motive is animal passion. the husband who, on returning home, finds a pair of red slippers before the door of his wife's apartment, is bound to understand thereby that somebody else's wife or daughter is within, and he dare not approach. if he has suspicions, all he can do is to bide his time and follow the visitor home, should the route lie through the streets, or despatch a faithful slave-girl or jealous concubine on a like errand, should the way selected be over the roof-tops. in the country, under a very different set of conventionalities, much the same takes place. in a land where woman holds the degraded position which she does under islám, such family circles as the briton loves can never exist. the foundation of the home system is love, which seldom links the members of these families, most seldom of all man and wife. anything else is not to be expected when they meet for the first time on their wedding night. to begin with, no one's pleasure is studied save that of the despotic master of the house. all the inmates, from the poor imprisoned wives down to the lively slave-girl who opens the door, all are there to serve his pleasure, and woe betide those who fail. the first wife may have a fairly happy time of it for a season, if her looks are good, and her ways pleasing, but when a second usurps her place, she is generally cast aside as a useless piece of furniture, unless set to do servile work. although four legal wives are allowed by the korán, it is only among the rich that so many are found, on account of the expense of their maintenance in appropriate style. the facility of divorce renders it much cheaper to change from time to time, and slaves are more economical. to the number of such women that a man may keep no limit is set; he may have "as many as his right hand can possess." then, too, these do the work of the house, and if they bear their master no children, they may be sold like any other chattels. the consequence of such a system is that she reigns who for the time stands highest in her lord's favour, so that the strife and jealousies which disturb the peace of the household are continual. this rivalry is naturally inherited by the children, who side with their several mothers, which is especially the case with the boys. very often the legal wife has no children, or only daughters, while quite a little troop of step-children play about her house. in these cases it is not uncommon for at least the best-looking of these youngsters to be taught to call her "mother," and their real parent "dadda m'barkah," or whatever her name may be. the offspring of wives and bondwomen stand on an equal footing before the law, in which islám is still ahead of us. such is the sad lot of women in morocco. religion itself being all but denied them in practice, whatever precept provides, it is with blank astonishment that the majority of them hear the message of those noble foreign sisters of theirs who have devoted their lives to showing them a better way. the greatest difficulty is experienced in arousing in them any sense of individuality, any feeling of personal responsibility, or any aspiration after good. they are so accustomed to be treated as cattle, that their higher powers are altogether dormant, all possibilities of character repressed. the welfare of their souls is supposed to be assured by union with a muslim, and few know even how to pray. instead of religion, their minds are saturated with the grossest superstition. if this be the condition of the free woman, how much worse that of the slave! the present socially degraded state in which the people live, and their apparent, though not real, incapacity for progress and development, is to a great extent the curse entailed by this brutalization of women. no race can ever rise above the level of its weaker sex, and till morocco learns this lesson it will never rise. the boy may be the father of the man, but the woman is the mother of the boy, and so controls the destiny of the nation. nothing can indeed be hoped for in this country in the way of social progress till the minds of the men have been raised, and their estimation of women entirely changed. though turkey was so long much in the position in which morocco remains to-day, it is a noteworthy fact that as she steadily progresses in the way of civilization, one of the most apparent features of this progress is the growing respect for women, and the increasing liberty which is allowed them, both in public and private. viii social visits[ ] [ : contributed by my wife.--b. m.] "every country its customs." _moorish proverb._ "calling" is not the common, every-day event in barbary which it has grown to be in european society. the narrowed-in life of the moorish woman of the higher classes, and the strict watch which is kept lest some other man than her husband should see her, makes a regular interchange of visits practically impossible. no doubt the moorish woman would find them quite as great a burden as her western sister, and in this particular her ignorance may be greater bliss than her knowledge. in spite of the paucity of the "calls" she receives or pays, she is by no means ignorant of the life and character of her neighbours, thanks to certain old women (amongst them the professional match-makers) who go about as veritable gossip-mongers, and preserve their more cloistered sisters at least from dying of inanition. thus the veriest trifles of house arrangement or management are thoroughly canvassed. nor is it a privilege commonly extended to european women to be received into the hareems of the high-class and wealthy moors, although lady missionaries have abundant opportunities for making the acquaintance of the women of the poorer classes, especially when medical knowledge and skill afford a key. but the wives of the rich are shut away to themselves, and if you are fortunate enough to be invited to call upon them, do not neglect your opportunity. you will find that the time named for calling is not limited to the afternoon. thus it may be when the morning air is blowing fresh from the sea, and the sun is mounting in the heavens, that you are ushered, perhaps by the master of the house, through winding passages to the quarters of the women. if there is a garden, this is frequently reserved for their use, and jealously protected from view, and as in all cases they are supposed to have the monopoly of the flat roof, the courteous male foreigner will keep his gaze from wandering thither too frequently, or resting there too long. do not be surprised if you are ushered into an apparently empty room, furnished after the moorish manner with a strip of richly coloured carpet down the centre, and mattresses round the edge. if there is a musical box in the room, it will doubtless be set going as a pleasant accompaniment to conversation, and the same applies to striking or chiming clocks, for which the moors have a strong predilection as _objets d'art_, rather than to mark the march of time. of course you will not have forgotten to remove your shoes at the door, and will be sitting cross-legged and quite at ease on one of the immaculate mattresses, when the ladies begin to arrive from their retreats. as they step forward to greet you, you may notice their henna-stained feet, a means of decoration which is repeated on their hands, where it is sometimes used in conjunction with harkos, a black pigment with which is applied a delicate tracery giving the effect of black silk mittens. the dark eyes are made to appear more lustrous and almond-shaped by the application of antimony, and the brows are extended till they meet in a black line above the nose. the hair is arranged under a head-dress frequently composed of two bright-coloured, short-fringed silk handkerchiefs, knotted together above the ears, sometimes with the addition of an artificial flower: heavy ear-rings are worn, and from some of them there are suspended large silver hands, charms against the "evil eye." but undoubtedly the main feature of the whole costume is the kaftán or tunic of lustrous satin or silk, embroidered richly in gold and silver, of a colour showing to advantage beneath a white lace garment of similar shape. the women themselves realize that such fine feathers must be guarded from spot or stain, for they are in many cases family heir-looms, so after they have greeted you with a slight pressure of their finger tips laid upon yours, and taken their seats, tailor fashion, you will notice that each sedulously protects her knees with a rough turkish towel, quite possibly the worse for wear. in spite of her love for personal decoration, evidenced by the strings of pearls with which her neck is entwined, and the heavy silver armlets, the well-bred moorish woman evinces no more curiosity than her european sister about the small adornments of her visitor, and this is the more remarkable when you remember how destitute of higher interests is her life. she will make kindly and very interested inquiries about your relatives, and even about your life, though naturally, in spite of your explanations, it remains a sealed book to her. the average moorish woman, however, shows herself as inquisitive as the chinese. it is quite possible that you may see some of the children, fascinating, dark-eyed, soft-skinned morsels of humanity, with henna-dyed hair, which may be plaited in a pig-tail, the length of which is augmented by a strange device of coloured wool with which the ends of the hair are interwoven. but children of the better class in morocco are accustomed to keep in the background, and unless invited, do not venture farther than the door of the reception room, and then with a becoming modesty. if any of the slave-wives enter, you will have an opportunity of noticing their somewhat quaint greeting of those whom they desire to honour, a kiss bestowed on each hand, which they raise to meet their lips, and upon each shoulder, before they, too, take their seats upon the mattresses. probably you will not have long to wait before a slave-girl enters with the preparations for tea, orange-flower water, incense, a well-filled tray, a samovar, and two or three dishes piled high with cakes. if you are wise, you will most assuredly try the "gazelle's hoofs," so-called from their shape, for they are a most delicious compound of almond paste, with a spiciness so skilfully blended as to be almost elusive. if you have a sweet tooth, the honey cakes will be eminently satisfactory, but if your taste is plainer, you will enjoy the f'kákis, or dry biscuit. three cups of their most fragrant tea is the orthodox allowance, but a moorish host or hostess is not slow to perceive any disinclination, however slight, and will sometimes of his or her own accord pave your way to a courteous refusal, by appearing not over anxious either for the last cup. if you have already had an experience of dining in morocco, the whole process of the tea-making will be familiar; if not, you will be interested to notice how the tea ("gunpowder") is measured in the hand, then emptied into the pot, washed, thoroughly sweetened, made with boiling water from the samovar, and flavoured with mint or verbena. if the master of the house is present, he is apt to keep the tea-making in his own hands, although he may delegate it to one of his wives, who thus becomes the hostess of the occasion. after general inquiries as to the purpose of your visit to morocco, you may be asked if you are a tabeebah or lady doctor, the one profession which they know, by hearsay at least, is open to women. if you can claim ever so little knowledge, you will probably be asked for a prescription to promote an increase of adipose tissue, which they consider their greatest charm; perhaps a still harder riddle may be propounded, with the hope that its satisfactory solution may secure to them the wavering affection of their lord, and prevent alienation and, perhaps, divorce. yet all you can say is, "in shá allah" (if god will!) when you bid them farewell it will be with a keen realization of their narrow, cramped lives, and an appreciation of your own opportunities. did you but know it, they too are full of sympathy for that poor, over-strained nazarene woman, who is obliged to leave the shelter of her four walls, and face the world unveiled, unprotected, unabashed. and thus our proverb is proved true. ix a country wedding "silence is at the door of consent." _moorish proverb._ thursday was chosen as auspicious for the wedding, but the ceremonies commenced on the sunday before. the first item on an extensive programme was the visit of the bride with her immediate female relatives and friends to the steam bath at the kasbah, a rarity in country villages, in this case used only by special favour. at the close of an afternoon of fun and frolic in the bath-house, zóharah, the bride, was escorted to her home closely muffled, to keep her bed till the following day. next morning it was the duty of mokhtar, the bridegroom, to send his betrothed a bullock, with oil, butter and onions; pepper, salt and spices; charcoal and wood; figs, raisins, dates and almonds; candles and henna, wherewith to prepare the marriage feast. he had already, according to the custom of the country, presented the members of her family with slippers and ornaments. as soon as the bullock arrived it was killed amid great rejoicings and plenty of "tom-tom," especially as in the villages a sheep is usually considered sufficient provision. on this day mokhtar's male friends enjoyed a feast in the afternoon, while in the evening the bride had to undergo the process of re-staining with henna to the accompaniment of music. the usual effect of this was somewhat counteracted, however, by the wails of those who had lost relatives during the year. on each successive night, when the drumming began, the same sad scene was repeated--a strange alloy in all the merriment of the wedding. on the tuesday zóharah received her maiden friends, children attending the reception in the afternoon, till the none too roomy hut was crowded to suffocation, and the bride exhausted, although custom prescribed that she should lie all day on the bed, closely wrapped up, and seen by none of her guests, from whom she was separated by a curtain. every visitor had brought with her some little gift, such as handkerchiefs, candles, sugar, tea, spices and dried fruits, the inspection of which, when all were gone, was her only diversion that day. throughout that afternoon and the next the neighbouring villages rivalled one another in peaceful sport and ear-splitting ululation, as though, within the memory of man, no other state of things had ever existed between them. meanwhile mokhtar had a more enlivening time with his bachelor friends, who, after feasting with him in the evening, escorted him, wrapped in a háïk or shawl, to the house of his betrothed, outside which they danced and played for three or four hours by the light of lanterns. on returning home, much fun ensued round the supper-basin on the floor, while the palms of the whole company were stained with henna. then their exuberant spirits found relief in dancing round with basins on their heads, till one of them dropped his basin, and snatching off mokhtar's cloak as if for protection, was immediately chased by the others till supper was ready. after supper all lay back to sleep. for four days the bridegroom's family had thus to feast and amuse his male friends, while the ladies were entertained by that of the bride. on wednesday came the turn of the married women visitors, whose bulky forms crowded the hut, if possible more closely than had their children. gossip and scandal were now retailed with a zest and minuteness of detail not permissible in england, while rival belles waged wordy war in shouts which sounded like whispers amid the din. the walls of the hut were hung with the brightest coloured garments that could be borrowed, and the gorgeous finery of the guests made up a scene of dazzling colour. green tea and cakes were first passed round, and then a tray for offerings for the musicians, which, when collected, were placed on the floor beneath a rich silk handkerchief. presents were also made by all to the bride's mother, on behalf of her daughter, who sat in weary state on the bed at one end of the room. as each coin was put down for the players, or for the hostess, a portly female who acted as crier announced the sum contributed, with a prayer for blessing in return, which was in due course echoed by the chief musician. at the bridegroom's house a similar entertainment was held, the party promenading the lanes at dusk with torches and lanterns, after which they received from the bridegroom the powder for next day's play. [illustration: a moorish caravan.] thursday opened with much-needed rest for zóharah and her mother till the time came for the final decking; but mokhtar had to go to the bath with his bachelor friends, and on returning to his newly prepared dwelling, to present many of them with small coins, receiving in return cotton handkerchiefs and towels, big candles and matches. then all sat down to a modest repast, for which he had provided raisins and other dried fruits, some additional fun being provided by a number of the married neighbours, who tried in vain to gain admission, and in revenge made off with other people's shoes, ultimately returning them full of dried fruits and nuts. then mokhtar's head was shaved to the accompaniment of music, and the barber was feasted, while the box in which the bride was to be fetched was brought in, and decked with muslin curtains, surmounted by a woman's head-gear, handkerchiefs, and a sash. the box was about two and a half feet square, and somewhat more in height, including its pointed top. after three drummings to assemble the friends, a procession was formed about a couple of hours after sunset, lit by torches, lanterns and candles, led by the powder-players, followed by the mounted bridegroom, and behind him the bridal box lashed on the back of a horse; surrounded by more excited powder-players, and closed by the musicians. as they proceeded by a circuitous route the women shrieked, the powder spoke, till all were roused to a fitting pitch of fervour, and so reached the house of the bride. "behold, the bridegroom cometh!" presently the "litter" was deposited at the door, mokhtar remaining a short distance off, while the huge old negress, who had officiated so far as mistress of the ceremonies, lifted zóharah bodily off the bed, and placed her, crying, in the cage. in this a loaf of bread, a candle, some sugar and salt had been laid by way of securing good luck in her new establishment. her valuables, packed in another box, were entrusted to the negress, who was to walk by her side, while strong arms mounted her, and lashed the "amariah" in its place. as soon as the procession had reformed, the music ceased, and a fátihah[ ] was solemnly recited. then they started slowly, as they had come, mokhtar leaving his bride as she was ushered, closely veiled, from her box into her new home, contenting himself with standing by the side and letting her pass beneath his arm in token of submission. the door was then closed, and the bridegroom took a turn with his friends while the bride should compose herself, and all things be made ready by the negress. later on he returned, and being admitted, the newly married couple met at last. [ : the beautiful opening prayer of the korán.] next day they were afforded a respite, but on saturday the bride had once more to hold a reception, and on the succeeding thursday came the ceremony of donning the belt, a long, stiff band of embroidered silk, folded to some six inches in width, wound many times round. standing over a dish containing almonds, raisins, figs, dates, and a couple of eggs, in the presence of a gathering of married women, one of whom assisted in the winding, two small boys adjusted the sash with all due state, after which a procession was formed round the house, and the actual wedding was over. thus commenced a year's imprisonment for the bride, as it was not till she was herself a mother that she was permitted to revisit her old home. x the bairns "every monkey is a gazelle to its mother." _moorish proverb._ if there is one point in the character of the moor which commends itself above others to the mind of the european it is his love for his children. but when it is observed that in too many cases this love is unequally divided, and that the father prefers his sons to his daughters, our admiration is apt to wane. though by no means an invariable rule, this is the most common outcome of the pride felt in being the father of a son who may be a credit to the house, and the feeling that a daughter who has to be provided for is an added responsibility. all is well when the two tiny children play together on the floor, and quarrel on equal terms, but it is another thing when little hamed goes daily to school, and as soon as he has learned to read is brought home in triumph on a gaily dressed horse, heading a procession of shouting schoolfellows, while his pretty sister fátimah is fast developing into a maid-of-all-work whom nobody thinks of noticing. and the distinction widens when hamed rides in the "powder-play," or is trusted to keep shop by himself, while fátimah is closely veiled and kept a prisoner indoors, body and mind unexercised, distinguishable by colour and dress alone from habîbah, the ebony slave-girl, who was sold like a calf from her mother's side. yes, indeed, far different paths lie before the two play-mates, but while they are treated alike, let us take a peep at them in their innocent sweetness. their mother, ayeshah, went out as usual one morning to glean in the fields, and in the evening returned with two bundles upon her back; the upper one was to replace crowing hamed in his primitive cradle: it was fátimah. next day, as ayeshah set off to work again, she left her son kicking up his heels on a pile of blankets, howling till he should become acquainted with his new surroundings, and a little skinny mite lay peacefully sleeping where he had hitherto lived. no mechanical bassinette ever swung more evenly, and no soft draperies made a better cot than the sheet tied up by the corners to a couple of ropes, and swung across the room like a hammock. the beauty of it was that, roll as he would, even active hamed had been safe in it, and all his energies only served to rock him off to sleep again, for the sides almost met at the top. yet he was by no means dull, for through a hole opposite his eye he could watch the cows and goats and sheep as they wandered about the yard, not to speak of the cocks and hens that roamed all over the place. at last the time came when both the wee ones could toddle, and ayeshah carried them no more to the fields astride her hips or slung over her shoulders in a towel. they were then left to disport themselves as they pleased--which, of course, meant rolling about on the ground,--their garments tied up under their arms, leaving them bare from the waist. no wonder that sitting on cold and wet stones had threatened to shrivel up their thin legs, which looked wonderfully shaky at best. it seems to be a maxim among the moors that neither head, arms nor legs suffer in any way from exposure to cold or heat, and the mothers of the poorer classes think nothing of carrying their children slung across their backs with their little bare pates exposed to the sun and rain, or of allowing their lower limbs to become numbed with cold as just described. the sole recommendation of such a system is that only the fittest--in a certain sense--survive. of the attention supposed to be bestowed in a greater or less degree upon all babes in our own land they get little. one result, however, is satisfactory, for they early give up yelling, as an amusement which does not pay, and no one is troubled to march them up and down for hours when teething. yet it is hardly surprising that under such conditions infant mortality is very great, and, indeed, all through life in this doctorless land astonishing numbers are carried off by diseases we should hardly consider dangerous. beyond the much-enjoyed dandle on father's knee, or the cuddle with mother, delights are few in moorish child-life, and of toys such as we have they know nothing, whatever they may find to take their place. but when a boy is old enough to amuse himself, there is no end to the mischief and fun he will contrive, and the lads of barbary are as fond of their games as we of ours. you may see them racing about after school hours at a species of "catch-as-catch-can," or playing football with their heels, or spinning tops, sometimes of european make. or, dearest sport of all, racing a donkey while seated on its far hind quarters, with all the noise and enjoyment we threw into such pastimes a few years ago. to look at the merry faces of these lively youths, and to hear their cheery voices, is sufficient to convince anyone of their inherent capabilities, which might make them easily a match for english lads if they had their chances. but what chances have they? at the age of four or five they are drafted off to school, not to be educated, but to be taught to read by rote, and to repeat long chapters of the korán, if not the whole volume, by heart, hardly understanding what they read. beyond this little is taught but the four great rules of arithmetic in the figures which we have borrowed from them, but worked out in the most primitive style. in "long" multiplication, for instance, they write every figure down, and "carry" nothing, so that a much more formidable addition than need be has to conclude the calculation. but they have a quaint system of learning their multiplication tables by mnemonics, in which every number is represented by a letter, and these being made up into words, are committed to memory in place of the figures. a moorish school is a simple affair. no forms, no desks, few books. a number of boards about the size of foolscap, painted white on both sides, on which the various lessons--from the alphabet to portions of the korán--are plainly written in large black letters; a switch or two, a pen and ink and a book, complete the furnishings. the dominie, squatted tailor-fashion on the ground, like his pupils, who may number from ten to thirty, repeats the lesson in a sonorous sing-song voice, and is imitated by the little urchins, who accompany their voices by a rocking to and fro, which occasionally enables them to keep time. a sharp application of the switch is wonderfully effectual in re-calling wandering attention. lazy boys are speedily expelled. on the admission of a pupil the parents pay some small sum, varying according to their means, and every wednesday, which is a half-holiday, a payment is made from a farthing to twopence. new moons and feasts are made occasions for larger payments, and count as holidays, which last ten days on the occasion of the greater festivals. thursday is a whole holiday, and no work is done on friday morning, that being the mohammedan sabbath, or at least "meeting day," as it is called. at each successive stage of the scholastic career the schoolmaster parades the pupils one by one, if at all well-to-do, in the style already alluded to, collecting gifts from the grateful parents to supplement the few coppers the boys bring to school week by week. if they intend to become notaries or judges, they go on to study at fez, where they purchase the key of a room at one of the colleges, and read to little purpose for several years. in everything the korán is the standard work. the chapters therein being arranged without any idea of sequence, only according to length,--with the exception of the fátihah,--the longest at the beginning and the shortest at the end, after the first the last is learned, and so backwards to the second. most of the lads are expected to do something to earn their bread at quite an early age, in one way or another, even if not called on to assist their parents in something which requires an old head on young shoulders. such youths being so early independent, at least in a measure, mix with older lads, who soon teach them all the vices they have not already learned, in which they speedily become as adept as their parents. those intended for a mercantile career are put into the shop at twelve or fourteen, and after some experience in weighing-out and bargaining by the side of a father or elder brother, they are left entirely to themselves, being supplied with goods from the main shop as they need them. it is by this means that the multitudinous little box-shops which are a feature of the towns are enabled to pay their way, this being rendered possible by an expensive minutely retail trade. the average english tradesman is a wholesale dealer compared to these petty retailers, and very many middle-class english households take in sufficient supplies at a time to stock one of their shops. one reason for this is the hand-to-mouth manner in which the bulk of the people live, with no notion of thrift. they earn their day's wage, and if anything remains above the expense of living, it is invested in gay clothing or jimcracks. another reason is that those who could afford it have seldom any member of their household whom they can trust as housekeeper, of which more anon. it seems ridiculous to send for sugar, tea, etc., by the ounce or less; candles, boxes of matches, etc., one by one; needles, thread, silk, in like proportion, even when cash is available, but such is the practice here, and there is as much haggling over the price of one candle as over that of an expensive article of clothing. often quite little children, who elsewhere would be considered babes, are sent out to do the shopping, and these cheapen and bargain like the sharpest old folk, with what seems an inherent talent. very little care is taken of even the children of the rich, and they get no careful training. the little sons and daughters of quite important personages are allowed to run about as neglected and dirty as those of the very poor. hence the practice of shaving the head cannot be too highly praised in a country where so much filth abounds, and where cutaneous diseases of the worst type are so frequent. it is, however, noteworthy that while the moors do not seem to consider it any disgrace to be scarred and covered with disgusting sores, the result of their own sins and those of their fathers, they are greatly ashamed of any ordinary skin disease on the head. but though the shaven skulls are the distinguishing feature of the boys in the house, where their dress closely resembles that of their sisters, the girls may be recognized by their ample locks, often dyed to a fashionable red with henna; yet they, too, are often partially shaved, sometimes in a fantastic style. it may be the hair in front is cut to a fringe an inch long over the forehead, and a strip a quarter of an inch wide is shaved just where the visible part of a child's comb would come, while behind this the natural frizzy or straight hair is left, cut short, while the head is shaved again round the ears and at the back of the neck. to perform these operations a barber is called in, who attends the family regularly. little boys of certain tribes have long tufts left hanging behind their ears, and occasionally they also have their heads shaved in strange devices. since no attempt is made to bring the children up as useful members of the community at the age when they are most susceptible, they are allowed to run wild. thus, bright and tractable as they are naturally, no sooner do the lads approach the end of their 'teens, than a marked change comes over them, a change which even the most casual observer cannot fail to notice. the hitherto agreeable youths appear washed-out and worthless. all their energy has disappeared, and from this time till a second change takes place for the worse, large numbers drag out a weary existence, victims of vices which hold them in their grip, till as if burned up by a fierce but short-lived fire, they ultimately become seared and shattered wrecks. from this time every effort is made to fan the flickering or extinguished flame, till death relieves the weary mortal of the burden of his life. xi "dining out"[ ] [ : contributed by my wife.--b. m.] "a good supper is known by its odour." _moorish proverb._ there are no more important qualifications for the diner-out in morocco than an open mind and a teachable spirit. then start with a determination to forget european table manners, except in so far as they are based upon consideration for the feelings of others, setting yourself to do in morocco as the moors do, and you cannot fail to gain profit and pleasure from your experience. one slight difficulty arises from the fact that it is somewhat hard to be sure at any time that you have been definitely invited to partake of a moorish meal. a request that you would call at three o'clock in the afternoon, mid-way between luncheon and dinner, would seem an unusual hour for a heavy repast, yet that is no guarantee that you may not be expected to partake freely of an elaborate feast. if you are a member of the frail, fair sex, the absence of all other women will speedily arouse you to the fact that you are in an oriental country, for in morocco the sons and chief servants, though they eat after the master of the house, take precedence of the wives and women-folk, who eat what remains of the various dishes, or have specially prepared meals in their own apartments. for the same reason you need not be surprised if you are waited upon after the men of the party, though this order is sometimes reversed where the host is familiar with european etiquette with regard to women. if a man, perhaps a son will wait upon you. the well-bred moor is quite as great a stickler for the proprieties as the most conservative anglo-saxon, and you will do well if you show consideration at the outset by removing your shoes at the door of the room, turning a deaf ear to his assurance that such a proceeding is quite unnecessary on your part. a glance round the room will make it clear that your courtesy will be appreciated, for the carpet on the floor is bright and unmarked by muddy or dusty shoes (in spite of the condition of the streets outside), and the mattresses upon which you are invited to sit are immaculate in their whiteness. having made yourself comfortable, you will admire the arrangements for the first item upon the programme. the slave-girl appears with a handsome tray, brass or silver, upon which there are a goodly number of cups or tiny glass tumblers, frequently both, of delicate pattern and artistic colouring, a silver tea-pot, a caddy of green tea, a silver or glass bowl filled with large, uneven lumps of sugar, which have been previously broken off from the loaf, and a glass containing sprigs of mint and verbena. the brass samovar comes next, and having measured the tea in the palm of his right hand, and put it into the pot, the host proceeds to pour a small amount of boiling water upon it, which he straightway pours off, a precaution lest the nazarenes should have mingled some colouring matter therewith. he then adds enough sugar to ensure a semi-syrupy result, with some sprigs of peppermint, and fills the pot from the samovar. a few minutes later he pours out a little, which he tastes himself, frequently returning the remainder to the pot, although the more europeanized consume the whole draught. if the test has been satisfactory, he proceeds to fill the cups or glasses, passing them in turn to the guests in order of distinction. to make a perceptible noise in drawing it from the glass to the mouth is esteemed a delicate token of appreciation. the tray is then removed; the slave in attendance brings a chased brass basin and ewer of water, and before the serious portion of the meal begins you are expected to hold out your right hand just to cleanse it from any impurities which may have been contracted in coming. orange-flower water in a silver sprinkler is then brought in, followed by a brass incense burner filled with live charcoal, on which a small quantity of sandal-wood or other incense is placed, and the result is a delicious fragrance which you are invited to waft by a circular motion of your hands into your hair, your ribbons and your laces, while your moorish host finds the folds of his loose garments invaluable for the retention of the spicy perfume. a circular table about eight inches high is then placed in the centre of the guests; on this is placed a tray with the first course of the dinner, frequently puffs of delicate pastry fried in butter over a charcoal fire, and containing sometimes meat, sometimes a delicious compound of almond paste and cinnamon. this, being removed, is followed by a succession of savoury stews with rich, well-flavoured gravies, each with its own distinctive spiciness, but all excellently cooked. the host first dips a fragment of bread into the gravy, saying as he does so, "b'ísm illah!" ("in the name of god!"), which the guests repeat, as each follows suit with a sop from the dish. there is abundant scope for elegance of gesture in the eating of the stews, but still greater opportunity when the _pièce de résistance_ of a moorish dinner, the dish of kesk'soo, is brought on. this kesk'soo is a small round granule prepared from semolina, which, having been steamed, is served like rice beneath and round an excellent stew, which is heaped up in the centre of the dish. with the thumb and two first fingers of the right hand you are expected to secure some succulent morsel from the stew,--meat, raisins, onions, or vegetable marrow,--and with it a small quantity of the kesk'soo. by a skilful motion of the palm the whole is formed into a round ball, which is thrown with a graceful curve of hand and wrist into the mouth. woe betide you if your host is possessed by the hospitable desire to make one of these boluses for you, for he is apt to measure the cubic content of your mouth by that of his own, and for a moment your feelings will be too deep for words; but this is only a brief discomfort, and you will find the dish an excellent one, for moorish cooks never serve tough meat. if your fingers have suffered from contact with the kesk'soo, it is permitted to you to apply your tongue to each digit in turn in the following order; fourth (or little finger), second, thumb, third, first; but a few moments later the slave appears, and after bearing away the table with the remains of the feast gives the opportunity for a most satisfactory ablution. in this case you are expected to use soap, and to wash both hands, over which water is poured three times. if you are at all acquainted with moorish ways, you will not fail at the same time to apply soap and water to your mouth both outwardly and inwardly, being careful to rinse it three times with plenty of noise, ejecting the water behind your hand into the basin which is held before you. orange-flower water and incense now again appear, and you may be required to drink three more glasses of refreshing tea, though this is sometimes omitted at the close of a repast. of course "the feast of reason and the flow of soul" have not been lacking, and you have been repeatedly assured of your welcome, and invited to partake beyond the limit of human possibility, for the moor believes you can pay no higher compliment to the dainties he has provided than by their consumption. for a while you linger, reclining upon the mattress as gracefully as may be possible for a tyro, with your arm upon a pile of many-coloured cushions of embroidered leather or cloth. then, after a thousand mutual thanks and blessings, accompanied by graceful bowings and bendings, you say farewell and step to the door, where your slippers await you, and usher yourself out, not ill-satisfied with your initiation into the art of dining-out in barbary. [illustration: _photograph by dr. rudduck._ fruit-sellers.] xii domestic economy "manage with bread and butter till god sends the jam." _moorish proverb._ if the ordinary regulations of social life among the moors differ materially from those in force among ourselves, how much more so must the minor details of the housekeeping when, to begin with, the husband does the marketing and keeps the keys! and the consequential moor does, indeed, keep the keys, not only of the stores, but also often of the house. what would an english lady think of being coolly locked in a windowless house while her husband went for a journey, the provisions for the family being meanwhile handed in each morning through a loophole by a trusty slave left as gaoler? that no surprise whatever would be elicited in barbary by such an arrangement speaks volumes. woman has no voice under mohammed's creed. early in the morning let us take a stroll into the market, and see how things are managed there. round the inside of a high-walled enclosure is a row of the rudest of booths. over portions of the pathway, stretching across to other booths in the centre--if the market is a wide one--are pieces of cloth, vines on trellis, or canes interwoven with brushwood. as the sun gains strength these afford a most grateful shade, and during the heat of the day there is no more pleasant place for a stroll, and none more full of characteristic life. in the wider parts, on the ground, lie heaps two or three feet high of mint, verbena and lemon thyme, the much-esteemed flavourings for the national drink--green-tea syrup--exhaling a most delicious fragrance. it is early summer: the luscious oranges are not yet over, and in tempting piles they lie upon the stalls made of old packing-cases, many with still legible familiar english and french inscriptions. apricots are selling at a halfpenny or less the pound, and plums and damsons, not to speak of greengages, keep good pace with them in price and sales. the bright tints of the lettuces and other fresh green vegetables serve to set off the rich colours of the god-made delicacies, but the prevailing hue of the scene is a restful earth-brown, an autumnal leaf-tint; the trodden ground, the sun-dried brush-wood of the booths and awnings, and the wet-stained wood-work. no glamour of paint or gleam of glass destroys the harmony of the surroundings. but with all the feeling of cool and repose, rest there is not, or idleness, for there is not a brisker scene in an oriental town than its market-place. thronging those narrow pathways come the rich and poor--the portly merchant in his morning cloak, a spotless white wool jelláb, with a turban and girth which bespeak easy circumstances; the labourer in just such a cloak with the hood up, but one which was always brown, and is now much mended; the slave in shirt and drawers, with a string round his shaven pate; the keen little jew boy pushing and bargaining as no other could; the bearded son of israel, with piercing eyes, and his daughter with streaming hair; lastly, the widow or time-worn wife of the poor mohammedan, who must needs market for herself. her wrinkled face and care-worn look tell a different tale from the pompous self-content of the merchant by her side, who drives as hard a bargain as she does. in his hand he carries a palmetto-leaf basket, already half full, as with slippered feet he carefully picks his way among puddles and garbage. "good morning, o my master; god bless thee!" exclaims the stall-keeper as his customer comes in sight. sáïd el faráji has to buy cloth of the merchant time and time again, so makes a point of pleasing one who can return a kindness. "no ill, praise god; and thyself, o sáïd?" comes the cheery reply; then, after five minutes' mutual inquiry after one another's household, horses and other interests, health and general welfare, friend sáïd points out the daintiest articles on his stall, and in the most persuasive of tones names his "lowest price." all the while he is sitting cross-legged on an old box, with his scales before him. "what? now, come, i'll give you _so_ much," says the merchant, naming a price slightly less than that asked. "make it _so_ much," exclaims sáïd, even more persuasively than before, as he "splits the difference." "well, i'll give you _so_ much," offering just a little less than this sum. "i can't go above that, you know." "all right, but you always get the better of me, you know. that is just what i paid. anyhow, don't forget that when i want a new cloak," and he proceeds to measure out the purchases, using as weights two or three bits of old iron, a small cannon-ball, some bullets, screws, coins, etc. "go with prosperity, my friend; and may god bless thee!" "and may god increase thy prosperity, and grant to thee a blessing!" rejoins the successful man, as he proceeds to another stall. by the time he reaches home his basket will contain meat, fish, vegetables, fruit and herbs, besides, perhaps, a loaf of sugar, and a quarter of a pound of tea, with supplies of spices and some candles. bread they make at home. the absurdly minute quantities of what we should call "stores," which a man will purchase who could well afford to lay in a supply, seem very strange to the foreigner; but it is part of his domestic economy--or lack of that quality. he will not trust his wife with more than one day's supply at a time, and to weigh things out himself each morning would be trouble not to be dreamed of; besides which it would deprive him of the pleasure of all that bargaining, not to speak of the appetite-promoting stroll, and the opportunities for gossip with acquaintances which it affords. in consequence, wives and slaves are generally kept on short allowances, if these are granted at all. an amusing incident which came under my notice in tangier shows how little the english idea of the community of interest of husband and wife is appreciated here. a moorish woman who used to furnish milk to an english family being met by the lady of the house one morning, when she had brought short measure, said, pointing to the husband in the distance, "_you_ be my friend; take this" (slipping a few coppers worth half a farthing into her hand), "don't tell _him_ anything about it. i'll share the profit with you!" she probably knew from experience that the veriest trifle would suffice to buy over the wife of a moor. instructions having been given to his wife or wives as to what is to be prepared, and how--he probably pretends to know more of the art culinary than he does--the husband will start off to attend to his shop till lunch, which will be about noon. then a few more hours in the shop, and before the sun sets a ride out to his garden by the river, returning in time for dinner at seven, after which come talk, prayers, and bed, completing what is more or less his daily round. his wives will probably be assisted in the house-work--or perhaps entirely relieved of it--by a slave-girl or two, and the water required will be brought in on the shoulders of a stalwart negro in skins or barrels filled from some fountain of good repute, but of certain contamination. in cooking the moorish women excel, as their first-rate productions afford testimony. it is the custom of some europeans to systematically disparage native preparations, but such judges have been the victims either of their own indiscretion in eating too many rich things without the large proportion of bread or other digestible nutriment which should have accompanied them, or of the essays of their own servants, usually men without any more knowledge of how their mothers prepare the dishes they attempt to imitate than an ordinary english working man would have of similar matters. of course there are certain flavourings which to many are really objectionable, but none can be worse to us than any preparation of pig would be to a moor. prominent among such is the ancient butter which forms the basis of much of their spicings, butter made from milk, which has been preserved--usually buried a year or two--till it has acquired the taste, and somewhat the appearance, of ripe gorgonzola. those who commence by trying a very slight flavour of this will find the fancy grow upon them, and there is no smell so absolutely appetizing as the faintest whiff of anything being cooked in this butter, called "smin." another point, much misunderstood, which enables them to cook the toughest old rooster or plough-ox joint till it can be eaten readily with the fingers, is the stewing in oil or butter. when the oil itself is pure and fresh, it imparts no more taste to anything cooked in it than does the fresh butter used by the rich. articles plunged into either at their high boiling point are immediately browned and enclosed in a kind of case, with a result which can be achieved in no other manner than by rolling in paste or clay, and cooking amid embers. moorish pastry thus cooked in oil is excellent, flaky and light. xiii the native "merchant" "a turban without a beard shows lack of modesty." _moorish proverb._ háj mohammed et-tájir, a grey-bearded worthy, who looks like a prince when he walks abroad, and dwells in a magnificent house, sits during business hours on a diminutive tick and wool mattress, on the floor of a cob-webbed room on one side of an ill-paved, uncovered, dirty court-yard. light and air are admitted by the door in front of which he sits, while the long side behind him, the two ends, and much of the floor, are packed with valuable cloths, manchester goods, silk, etc. two other sides of the court-yard consist of similar stores, one occupied by a couple of jews, and the other by another fine-looking háj, his partner. enters a moor, in common clothing, market basket in hand. he advances to the entrance of the store, and salutes the owner respectfully--"peace be with thee, uncle pilgrim!" "with thee be peace, o my master," is the reply, and the new-comer is handed a cushion, and motioned to sit on it at the door. "how doest thou?" "how fares thy house?" "how dost thou find thyself this morning?" "is nothing wrong with thee?" these and similar inquiries are showered by each on the other, and an equal abundance is returned of such replies as, "nothing wrong;" "praise be to god;" "all is well." when both cease for lack of breath, after a brief pause the new arrival asks, "have you any of that 'merican?" (unbleached calico). the dealer puts on an indignant air, as if astonished at being asked such a question. "_have_ i? there is no counting what i have of it," and he commences to tell his beads, trying to appear indifferent as to whether his visitor buys or not. presently the latter, also anxious not to appear too eager, exclaims, "let's look at it." a piece is leisurely handed down, and the customer inquires in a disparaging tone, "how much?" "six and a half," and the speaker again appears absorbed in meditation. "give thee six," says the customer, rising as if to go. "wait, thou art very dear to us; to thee alone will i give a special price, six and a quarter." "no, no," replies the customer, shaking his finger before his face, as though to emphasize his refusal of even such special terms. "al-l-láh!" piously breathes the dealer, as he gazes abstractedly out of the door, presently adding in the same devout tone, "there is no god but god! god curse the infidels!" "come, i'll give thee six and an okea"--of which latter six and a half go to the 'quarter' peseta or franc of which six were offered. "no, six and five is the lowest i can take." the might-be purchaser made his last offer in a half-rising posture, and is now nearly erect as he says, "then i can't buy; give it me for six and three," sitting down as though the bargain were struck. "no, i never sell that quality for less than six and four, and it's a thing i make no profit on; you know that." the customer doesn't look as though he did, and rising, turns to go. "send a man to carry it away," says the dealer. "at six and three!" "no, at six and four!" and the customer goes away. "send the man, it is thine," is hastily called after him, and in a few moments he returns with a jewish porter, and pays his "six and three." so our worthy trader does business all day, and seems to thrive on it. occasionally a friend drops in to chat and not to buy, and now and then there is a beggar; here is one. an aged crone she is, of most forbidding countenance, swathed in rags, it is a wonder she can keep together. she leans on a formidable staff, and in a piteous voice, "for the face of the lord," and "in the name of my lord slave-of-the-able" (mulai abd el káder, a favourite saint), she begs something "for god." one copper suffices to induce her to call down untold blessings on the head of the donor, and she trudges away in the mud, barefooted, repeating her entreaties till they sound almost a wail, as she turns the next corner. but beggars who can be so easily disposed of at the rate of a hundred and ninety-five for a shilling can hardly be considered troublesome. a respectable-looking man next walks in with measured tread, and leaning towards us, says almost in a whisper-- "o friend of the prophet, is there anything to-day?" "nothing, o my master," is the courteously toned reply, for the beggar appears to be a shareef or noble, and with a "god bless thee," disappears. a miserable wretch now turns up, and halfway across the yard begins to utter a whine which is speedily cut short by a curt "god help thee!" whereat the visitor turns on his heel and is gone. with a confident bearing an untidy looking figure enters a moment later, and after due salaams inquires for a special kind of cloth. "call to-morrow morning," he is told, for he has not the air of a purchaser, and he takes his departure meekly. a creaky voice here breaks in from round the corner-- "hast thou not a copper for the sake of the lord?" "no, o my brother." after a few minutes another female comes on the scene, exhibiting enough of her face to show that it is a mass of sores. "only a trifle, in the name of my lord idrees," she cries, and turns away on being told, "god bring it!" then comes a policeman, a makházni, who seats himself amid a shower of salutations-- "hast thou any more of those selháms" (hooded cloaks)? "come on the morrow, and thou shalt see." the explanation of this answer given by the "merchant" is that he sees such folk only mean to bother him for nothing. and this appears to be the daily routine of "business," though a good bargain must surely be made some time to have enabled our friend to acquire all the property he has, but so far as an outsider can judge, it must be a slow process. anyhow, it has heartily tired the writer, who has whiled away the morning penning this account on a cushion on one side of the shop described. yet it is a fair specimen of what has been observed by him on many a morning in this sleepy land. xiv shopping[ ] [ : contributed by my wife.--b. m.] "debt destroys religion." _moorish proverb._ if any should imagine that time is money in morocco, let them undertake a shopping expedition in tangier, the town on which, if anywhere in morocco, occidental energy has set its seal. not that one such excursion will suffice, unless, indeed, the purchaser be of the class who have more money than wit, or who are absolutely at the mercy of the guide and interpreter who pockets a commission upon every bargain he brings about. for the ordinary mortal, who wants to spread his dollars as far as it is possible for dollars to go, a tour of inspection, if not two or three, will be necessary before such a feat can be accomplished. to be sure, there is always the risk that between one visit and another some coveted article may find its way into the hands of a more reckless, or at least less thrifty, purchaser, but that risk may be safely taken. [illustration: _albert, photo., tunis._ a tunisian shopkeeper.] there is something very attractive in the small cupboard-like shops of the main street. their owners sit cross-legged ready for a chat, looking wonderfully picturesque in cream-coloured jelláb, or in semi-transparent white farrajîyah, or tunic, allowing at the throat a glimpse of saffron, cerise, or green from the garment beneath. the white turban, beneath which shows a line of red fez cap, serves as a foil to the clear olive complexion and the dark eyes and brows, while the faces are in general goodly to look upon, except where the lines have grown coarse and sensuous. so strong is the impression of elegant leisure, that it is difficult to imagine that these men expect to make a living from their trade, but they are more than willing to display their goods, and will doubtless invite you to a seat upon the shop ledge--where your feet dangle gracefully above a rough cobble-stone pavement--and sometimes even to a cup of tea. one after another, in quick succession, carpets of different dimensions (but all oblong, for moorish rooms are narrow in comparison with their length) are spread out in the street, and the shop-owners' satellite, by reiterated cries of "bálak! bálak!" (mind out! mind out!) accompanied by persuasive pushes, keeps off the passing donkeys. a miniature crowd of interested spectators will doubtless gather round you, making remarks upon you and your purchases. charmed by the artistic colourings, rich but never garish, you ask the price, and if you are wise you will immediately offer just half of that named. it is quite probable that the carpets will be folded up and returned to their places upon the shelf at the back of the shop, but it is equally probable that by slow and tactful yielding upon either side, interspersed with curses upon your ancestors and upon yourself, the bargain will be struck about halfway between the two extremes. the same method must be adopted with every article bought, and if you purpose making many purchases in the same shop, you will be wise to obtain and write down the price quoted in each case as "the _very_ lowest," and make your bid for the whole at once, lest, made cunning by one experience of your tactics, the shopman should put on a wider marginal profit in every other instance to circumvent you. it is also well for the purchaser to express ardent admiration in tones of calm indifference, for the moor has quick perceptions, and though he may not understand english, when enthusiasm is apparent, he has the key to the situation, and refuses to lower his prices. nevertheless, it is sometimes difficult to avoid a warm expression of admiration at the handsome brass trays, the morocco leather bags into which such charming designs of contrasting colours are skilfully introduced, or the graceful utensils of copper and brass with which a closer acquaintance was made when you were the guest at a moorish dinner. many and interesting are the curious trifles which may be purchased, but they will be found in the greatest profusion in the bazaars established for the convenience of nazarene tourists, where prices will frequently be named in english money, for an english "yellow-boy" is nowhere better appreciated than in tangier. in the shops in the sôk, or market-place, prices are sometimes more moderate, and there you may discover some of the more distinctively moorish articles, which are brought in from the country; nor can there be purchased a more interesting memento than a flint-lock, a pistol, or a carved dagger, all more or less elaborately decorated, such as are carried by town or country moor, the former satisfied with a dagger in its chased sheath, except at the time of "powder-play," when flint-locks are in evidence everywhere. but in the market-place there are exposed for sale the more perishable things of moorish living. some of the small cupboards are grocers' shops, where semolina for the preparation of kesk'soo, the national dish, may be purchased, as well as candles for burning at the saints' shrines, and a multitude of small necessaries for the moorish housewives. in the centre of the market sit the bread-sellers, for the most part women whose faces are supposed to be religiously kept veiled from the gaze of man, but who are apt to let their háïks fall back quite carelessly when only europeans are near. an occasional glimpse may sometimes be thus obtained of a really pretty face of some lass on the verge of womanhood. look at that girl in front of us, stooping over the stall of a vendor of what some one has dubbed "sticky nastinesses," her háïk lightly thrown back; her bent form and the tiny hand protruding at her side show that she is not alone, her little baby brother proving almost as much as she can carry. her teeth are pearly white; her hair and eyebrows are jet black; her nut-brown cheeks bear a pleasant smile, and as she stretches out one hand to give the "confectioner" a few coppers, with the other clutching at her escaping garment, and moves on amongst the crowd, we come to the conclusion that if not fair, she is at least comely. the country women seated on the ground with their wares form a nucleus for a dense crowd. they have carried in upon their backs heavy loads of grass for provender, or firewood and charcoal which they sell in wholesale quantities to the smaller shopkeepers, who purchase from other countryfolk donkey loads of ripe melons and luscious black figs. there is a glorious inconsequence in the arrangement of the wares. here you may see a pile of women's garments exposed for sale, and not far away are sweet-sellers with honey-cakes and other unattractive but toothsome delicacies. if you can catch a glimpse of the native brass-workers busily beating out artistic designs upon trays of different sizes and shapes, do not fail to seize the opportunity of watching them. you may form one in the ring gathered round the snake-charmer, or join the circle which listens open-mouthed and with breathless attention to that story-teller, who breaks off at a most critical juncture in his narrative to shake his tambourine, declaring that so close-fisted an audience does not deserve to hear another word, much less the conclusion of his fascinating tale. but before you join either party, indeed before you mingle at all freely in the crowd upon a moorish market-place, it is well to remember that the flea is a common domestic insect, impartial in the distribution of his favours to moor, jew and nazarene, and is in fact not averse to "fresh fields and pastures new." if you are clad in perishable garments, beware of the water-carrier with his goat-skin, his tinkling bell, his brass cup, and his strange cry. beware, too, of the strings of donkeys with heavily laden packs, and do not scruple to give them a forcible push out of your way. if you are mounted upon a donkey yourself, so much the better; by watching the methods of your donkey-boy to ensure a clear passage for his beast, you will realize that dwellers in barbary are not strangers to the spirit of the saying, "each man for himself, and the de'il take the hindmost." yet they are a pleasant crowd to be amongst, in spite of insect-life, water-carriers, and bulky pack-saddles, and there is an exhaustless store of interest, not alone in the wares they have for sale, and in the trades they ply, but more than all in the faces, so often keen and alert, and still more often bright and smiling. one typical example of moorish methods of shopping, and i have done. among those who make their money by trade, you may find a man who spends his time in bringing the would-be purchaser into intimate relations with the article he desires to obtain. he has no shop of his own, but may often be recognized as an interested spectator of some uncompleted bargain. having discovered your dwelling-place, he proceeds to "bring the mountain to mohammed," and you will doubtless be confronted in the court-yard of your hotel by the very article for which you have been seeking in vain. of course he expects a good price which shall ensure him a profit of at least fifty per cent. upon his expenditure, but he too is open to a bargain, and a little skilful pointing out of flaws in the article which he has brought for purchase, in a tone of calm and supreme indifference, is apt to ensure a very satisfactory reduction of price in favour of the shopper in barbary. xv a sunday market "a climb with a friend is a descent." _moorish proverb._ one of the sights of tangier is its market. sundays and thursdays, when the weather is fine, see the disused portion of the mohammedan graveyard outside _báb el fahs_ (called by the english port st. catherine, and now known commonly as the sôk gate) crowded with buyers and sellers of most quaint appearance to the foreign eye, not to mention camels, horses, mules, and donkeys, or the goods they have brought. hither come the sellers from long distances, trudging all the way on foot, laden or not, according to means, all eager to exchange their goods for european manufacturers, or to carry home a few more dollars to be buried with their store. sunday is no sabbath for the sons of israel, so the money-changers are doing a brisk trade from baskets of filthy native bronze coin, the smallest of which go five hundred to the shilling, and the largest three hundred and thirty-three! hard by a venerable rabbi is leisurely cutting the throats of fowls brought to him for the purpose by the servants or children of jews, after the careful inspection enjoined by the mosaic law. the old gentleman has the coolest way of doing it imaginable; he might be only peeling an orange for the little girl who stands waiting. after apparently all but turning the victim inside out, he twists back its head under its wings, folding these across its breast as a handle, and with his free hand removing his razor-like knife from his mouth, nearly severs its neck and hands it to the child, who can scarcely restrain its struggles except by putting her foot on it, while he mechanically wipes his blade and prepares to despatch another. eggs and milk are being sold a few yards off by country women squatted on the ground, the former in baskets or heaps on the stones, the latter in uninviting red jars, with a round of prickly-pear leaf for a stopper, and a bit of palmetto rope for a handle. by this time we are in the midst of a perfect babel--a human maëlstrom. in a european crowd one is but crushed by human beings; here all sorts of heavily laden quadrupeds, with packs often four feet across, come jostling past, sometimes with the most unsavoury loads. we have just time to observe that more country women are selling walnuts, vegetables, and fruits, on our left, at the door of what used to be the tobacco and hemp fandak, and that native sweets, german knick-knacks and spanish fruit are being sold on our right, as amid the din of forges on either side we find ourselves in the midst of the crush to get through the narrow gate. here an exciting scene ensues. continuous streams of people and beasts of burden are pushing both ways; a drove of donkeys laden with rough bundles of cork-wood for the ovens approaches, the projecting ends prodding the passers-by; another drove laden with stones tries to pass them, while half a dozen mules and horses vainly endeavour to pass out. a european horseman trots up and makes the people fly, but not so the beasts, till he gets wedged in the midst, and must bide his time after all. meanwhile one is almost deafened by the noise of shouting, most of it good-humoured. "zeed! arrah!" vociferates the donkey-driver. "bálak!" shouts the horseman. "bálak! guarda!" (pronounced warda) in a louder key comes from a man who is trying to pilot a minister plenipotentiary and envoy extraordinary through the gate, with her excellency on his arm. at last we seize a favourable opportunity and are through. now we can breathe. in front of us, underneath an arch said to have been built to shelter the english guard two hundred years ago (which is very unlikely, since the english destroyed the fortifications of this gate), we see the native shoeing-smiths hacking at the hoofs of horses, mules, and donkeys, in a manner most extraordinary to us, and nailing on triangular plates with holes in the centre--though most keep a stock of english imported shoes and nails for the fastidious nazarenes. spanish and jewish butchers are driving a roaring trade at movable stalls made of old boxes, and the din is here worse than ever. now we turn aside into the vegetable market, as it is called, though as we enter we are almost sickened by the sight of more butchers' stalls, and further on by putrid fish. this market is typical. low thatched booths of branches and canes are the only shops but those of the butchers, the arcade which surrounds the interior of the building being chiefly used for stores. here and there a filthy rag is stretched across the crowded way to keep the sun off, and anon we have to stop to avoid some drooping branch. fruit and vegetables of all descriptions in season are sold amid the most good-humoured haggling. emerging from this interesting scene by a gate leading to the outer sôk, we come to one quite different in character. a large open space is packed with country people, their beasts and their goods, and towns-people come out to purchase. women seem to far outnumber the men, doubtless on account of their size and their conspicuous head-dress. they are almost entirely enveloped in white háïks, over the majority of which are thrown huge native sun-hats made of palmetto, with four coloured cords by way of rigging to keep the brim extended. when the sun goes down these are to be seen slung across the shoulders instead. very many of the women have children slung on their backs, or squatting on their hips if big enough. this causes them to stoop, especially if some other burden is carried on their shoulders as well. [illustration: the sunday market, tangier. _cavilla, photo., tangier._] on our right are typical moorish shops,--grocers', if you please,--in which are exposed to view an assortment of dried fruits, such as nuts, raisins, figs, etc., with olive and argan oil, candles, tea, sugar, and native soap and butter. certainly of all the goods that butter is the least inviting; the soap, though the purest of "soft," looks a horribly repulsive mass, but the butter which, like it, is streaked all over with finger marks, is in addition full of hairs. similar shops are perched on our left, where old english biscuit-boxes are conspicuous. beyond these come slipper- and clothes-menders. the former are at work on native slippers of such age that they would long ago have been thrown away in any less poverty-stricken land, transforming them into wearable if unsightly articles, after well soaking them in earthen pans. just here a native "medicine man" dispenses nostrums of doubtful efficacy, and in front a quantity of red moorish pottery is exposed for sale. this consists chiefly of braziers for charcoal and kesk'soo steamers for stewing meat and vegetables as well. a native _café_ here attracts our attention. under the shade of a covered way the káhwajî has a brazier on which he keeps a large kettle of water boiling. a few steps further on we light upon the sellers of native salt. this is in very large crystals, heaped in mule panniers, from which the dealers mete it out in wooden measures. it comes from along the beach near old tangier, where the heaps can be seen from the town, glistening in the sunlight. ponds are dug along the shore, in which sea water is enclosed by miniature dykes, and on evaporating leaves the salt. pressing on with difficulty through a crowd of horses, mules and donkeys, mostly tethered by their forefeet, we reach some huts in front of which are the most gorgeous native waistcoats exposed for sale, together with manchester goods, by fat, ugly old women of a forbidding aspect. further on we come upon "confectioners." a remarkable peculiarity of the tables on which the sweets are being sold in front of us is the total absence of flies, though bees abound, in spite of the lazy whisking of the sweet-seller. the sweets themselves consist of red, yellow and white sticks of what cousin jonathan calls "candy;" almond and gingelly rock, all frizzling in the sun. a small basin, whose contents resemble a dark plum-pudding full of seeds, contains a paste of the much-lauded hasheesh, the opiate of morocco, which, though contraband, and strictly prohibited by imperial decrees, is being freely purchased in small doses. on the opposite side of the way some old spaniards are selling a kind of coiled-up fritter by the yard, swimming in oil. then we come to a native restaurant. trade does not appear very brisk, so we shall not interrupt it by pausing for a few moments to watch the cooking. in a tiny lean-to of sticks and thatch two men are at work. one is cutting up liver and what would be flead if the moors ate pigs, into pieces about the size of a filbert. these the other threads on skewers in alternate layers, three or four of each. having rolled them in a basin of pepper and salt, they are laid across an earthen pot resembling a log scooped out, like some primæval boat. in the bottom of the hollow is a charcoal fire, which causes the khotbán, as they are called, to give forth a most appetizing odour--the only thing tempting about them after seeing them made. half loaves of native bread lie ready to hand, and the hungry passer-by is invited to take an _al fresco_ meal for the veriest trifle. another sort of kabáb--for such is the name of the preparation--is being made from a large wash-basin full of ready seasoned minced meat, small handfuls of which the jovial _chef_ adroitly plasters on more skewers, cooking them like the others. squatted on the ground by the side of this "bar" is a retailer of ripened native butter, "warranted five years old." this one can readily smell without stooping; it is in an earthenware pan, and looks very dirty, but is weighed out by the ounce as very precious after being kept so long underground. opposite is the spot where the camels from and for the interior load and unload. some forty of these ungainly but useful animals are here congregated in groups. at feeding-time a cloth is spread on the ground, on which a quantity of barley is poured in a heap. each animal lies with its legs doubled up beneath it in a manner only possible to camels, with its head over the food, munching contentedly. in one of the groups we notice the driver beating his beast to make it kneel down preparatory to the removal of its pack, some two hundred-weight and a half. after sundry unpleasant sounds, and tramping backwards and forwards to find a comfortable spot, the gawky creature settles down in a stately fashion, packing up his stilt-like legs in regular order, limb after limb, till he attains the desired position. a short distance off one of them is making hideous noises by way of protest against the weight of the load being piled upon him, threatening to lose his temper, and throw a little red bladder out of his mouth, which, hanging there as he breathes excitedly, makes a most unpleasing sound. here one of the many water-carriers who have crossed our path does so again, tinkling his little bell of european manufacture, and we turn to watch him as he gives a poor lad to drink. slung across his back is the "bottle" of the east--a goat-skin with the legs sewn up. a long metal spout is tied into the neck, and on this he holds his left thumb, which he uses as a tap by removing it to aim a long stream of water into the tin mug in his right hand. two bright brass cups cast and engraved in fez hang from a chain round his neck, but these are reserved for purchasers, the urchin who is now enjoying a drink receiving it as charity. tinkle, tinkle, goes the bell again, as the weary man moves on with his ever-lightening burden, till he is confronted by another wayfarer who turns to him to quench his thirst. as these skins are filled indiscriminately from wells and tanks, and cleaned inside with pitch, the taste must not be expected to satisfy all palates; but if hunger is the best sauce for food, thirst is an equal recommendation for drink. a few minutes' walk across a cattle-market brings us at last to the english church, a tasteful modern construction in pure moorish style, and banishing the thoughts of our stroll, we join the approaching group of fellow-worshippers, for after all it is sunday. xvi play-time "according to thy shawl stretch thy leg." _moorish proverb._ few of us realize to what an extent our amusements, pastimes, and recreations enter into the formation of our individual, and consequently of our national, character. it is therefore well worth our while to take a glance at the moor at play, or as near play as he ever gets. the stately father of a family must content himself, as his years and flesh increase, with such amusements as shall not entail exertion. by way of house game, since cards and all amusements involving chance are strictly forbidden, chess reigns supreme, and even draughts--with which the denizens of the coffee-house, where he would not be seen, disport themselves--are despised by him. in shiráz, however, the sheïkh ul islám, or chief religious authority, declared himself shocked when i told him how often i had played this game with moorish theologians, whereupon ensued a warm discussion as to whether it was a game of chance. at last i brought this to a satisfactory close by remarking that as his reverence was ignorant even of the rules of the game,--and therefore no judge, since he had imagined it to be based on hazard,--he at least was manifestly innocent of it. the connection between chess and arabdom should not be forgotten, especially as the very word with which it culminates, "checkmate," is but a corruption of the arabic "sheïkh mát"--"chief dead." the king of games is, however, rare on the whole, requiring too much concentration for a weary or lazy official, or a merchant after a busy day. their method of playing does not materially differ from ours, but they play draughts with very much more excitement and fun. the jocular vituperation which follows a successful sally, and the almost unintelligible rapidity with which the moves are made, are as novel to the european as appreciated by the natives. gossip, the effervescence of an idle brain, is the prevailing pastime, and at no afternoon tea-table in great britain is more aimless talk indulged in than while the cup goes round among the moors. the ladies, with a more limited scope, are not far behind their lords in this respect. otherwise their spare time is devoted to minutely fine embroidery. this is done in silk on a piece of calico or linen tightly stretched on a frame, and is the same on both sides; in this way are ornamented curtains, pillow-cases, mattress-covers, etc. it is, nevertheless, considered so far a superfluity that few who have not abundant time to spare trouble about it, and the material decorated is seldom worth the labour bestowed thereon. the fact is that in these southern latitudes as little time as possible is passed within doors, and for this reason we must seek the real amusements of the people outside. when at home they seem to think it sufficient to loll about all the day long if not at work, especially if they have an enclosed flower-garden, beautifully wild and full of green and flowers, with trickling, splashing water. i exclude, of course, all feasts and times when the musicians come, but i must not omit mention of dancing. easterns think their western friends mad to dance themselves, when they can so easily get others to do it for them, so they hire a number of women to go through all manner of quaint--too often indecent--posings and wrigglings before them, to the tune of a nasal chant, which, aided by fiddles, banjos, and tambourines, is being drawled out by the musicians. some of these seemingly inharmonious productions are really enjoyable when one gets into the spirit of the thing. at times the moors are themselves full of life and vigour, especially in the enjoyment of what may be called the national sport of "powder-play," not to speak of boar-hunting, hawking, rabbit-chasing, and kindred pastimes. just as in the days of yore their forefathers excelled in the use of the spear, brandishing and twirling it as easily as an indian club or singlestick, so they excel to-day in the exercise of their five-foot flint-locks, performing the most dexterous feats on horseback at full gallop. here is such a display about to commence. it is the feast of mohammed's birthday, and the market-place outside the gate, so changed since yesterday, is crowded with spectators; men and boys in gay, but still harmonious, colours, decked out for the day, and women shrouded in their blankets, plain wool-white. an open space is left right through the centre, up a gentle slope, and a dozen horsemen are spurring and holding in their prancing steeds at yonder lower end. at some unnoticed signal they have started towards us. they gallop wildly, the beat of their horses' hoofs sounding as iron hail on the stony way. a cloud of dust flies upward, and before we are aware of it they are abreast of us--a waving, indistinguishable mass of flowing robes, of brandished muskets, and of straining, foaming steeds. we can just see them tossing their guns in the air, and then a rider, bolder than the rest, stands on his saddle, whirling round his firearm aloft without stopping, while another swings his long weapon underneath his horse, and seizes it upon the other side. but now they are in line again, and every gun is pointed over the right, behind the back, the butt grasped by the twisted left arm, and the lock by the right under the left armpit. in this constrained position they fire at an imaginary foe who is supposed to have appeared from ambush as they pass. immediately the reins--which have hitherto been held in the mouth, the steed guided by the feet against his gory flanks--are pulled up tight, throwing the animal upon his haunches, and wheeling him round for a sober walk back. this is, in truth, a practice or drill for war, for such is the method of fighting in these parts. a sortie is made to seek the hidden foe, who may start up anywhere from the ravines or boulders, and who must be aimed at instanter, before he regains his cover, while those who have observed him must as quickly as possible get beyond his range to reload and procure reinforcements. the only other active sports of moment, apart from occasional horse races, are football and fencing, indulged in by boys. the former is played with a stuffed leather ball some six or eight inches across, which is kicked into the air with the back of the heel, and caught in the hands, the object being to drive it as high as possible. the fencing is only remarkable for its free and easy style, and the absence of hilts and guards. yet there are milder pastimes in equal favour, and far more in accordance with the fancy of southerners in warm weather, such as watching a group of jugglers or snake-charmers, or listening to a story-teller. these are to be met with in the market-place towards the close of hot and busy days, when the wearied bargainers gather in groups to rest before commencing the homeward trudge. the jugglers are usually poor, the production of fire from the mouth, of water from an empty jar, and so on, forming stock items. but often fearful realities are to be seen--men who in a frenzied state catch cannon balls upon their heads, blood spurting out on every side; or, who stick skewers through their legs. these are religious devotees who live by such performances. from the public _raconteur_ the moor derives the excitement the european finds in his novel, or the tale "to be continued in our next," and it probably does him less harm. xvii the story-teller "gentleman without reading, dog without scent." _moorish proverb._ the story-teller is, _par excellence_, the prince of moorish performers. even to the stranger unacquainted with the language the sight of the arab bard and his attentive audience on some erstwhile bustling market at the ebbing day is full of interest--to the student of human nature a continual attraction. after a long trudge from home, commenced before dawn, and a weary haggling over the most worthless of "coppers" during the heat of the day, the poor folk are quite ready for a quiet resting-time, with something to distract their minds and fill them with thoughts for the homeward way. here have been fanned and fed the great religious and political movements which from time to time have convulsed the empire, and here the pulse of the nation throbs. in the cities men lead a different life, and though the townsfolk appreciate tales as well as any, it is on these market-places that the wandering troubadour gathers the largest crowds. like public performers everywhere, a story-teller of note always goes about with regular assistants, who act as summoners to his entertainment, and as chorus to his songs. they consist usually of a player on the native fiddle, another who keeps time on a tambourine, and a third who beats a kind of earthenware drum with his fingers. less pretentious "professors" are content with themselves manipulating a round or square tambourine or a two-stringed fiddle, and to many this style has a peculiar charm of its own. each pause, however slight, is marked by two or three sharp beats on the tightly stretched skin, or twangs with a palmetto leaf plectrum, loud or soft, according to the subject of the discourse at that point. the dress of this class--the one most frequently met with--is usually of the plainest, if not of the scantiest; a tattered brown jelláb (a hooded woollen cloak) and a camel's-hair cord round the tanned and shaven skull are the garments which strike the eye. waving bare arms and sinewy legs, with a wild, keen-featured face, lit up by flashing eyes, complete the picture. this is the man from whom to learn of love and fighting, of beautiful women and hairbreadth escapes, the whole on the model of the "thousand nights and a night," of which versions more or less recognizable may now and again be heard from his lips. commencing with plenty of tambourine, and a few suggestive hints of what is to follow, he gathers around him a motley audience, the first comers squatting in a circle, and later arrivals standing behind. gradually their excitement is aroused, and as their interest grows, the realistic semi-acting and the earnest mien of the performer rivet every eye upon him. suddenly his wild gesticulations cease at the entrancing point. one step more for liberty, one blow, and the charming prize would be in the possession of her adorer. now is the time to "cash up." with a pious reference to "our lord mohammed--the prayer of god be on him, and peace,"--and an invocation of a local patron saint or other equally revered defunct, an appeal is made to the pockets of the faithful "for the sake of mulai abd el káder"--"lord slave-of-the-able." arousing as from a trance, the eager listeners instinctively commence to feel in their pockets for the balance from the day's bargaining; and as every blessing from the legion of saints who would fill the mohammedan calendar if there were one is invoked on the cheerful giver, one by one throws down his hard-earned coppers--one or two--and as if realizing what he has parted with, turns away with a long-drawn breath to untether his beasts, and set off home. but exciting as are these acknowledged fictions, specimens are so familiar to most readers from the pages of the collection referred to that much more interest will be felt in an attempt to reproduce one of a higher type, pseudo-historical, and alleged to be true. such narratives exhibit much of native character, and shades of thought unencountered save in daily intercourse with the people. let us, therefore, seize the opportunity of a visit from a noted _raconteur_ and reputed poet to hear his story. tame, indeed, would be the result of an endeavour to transfer to black and white the animated tones and gestures of the narrator, which the imagination of the reader must supply. [illustration: _photograph by a. lennox, esq._ group around performers, marrÁkesh.] the initial "voluntary" by the "orchestra" has ended; every eye is directed towards the central figure, this time arrayed in ample turban, white jelláb and yellow slippers, with a face betokening a lucrative profession. after a moment's silence he commences the history of-- "mulai abd el kÁder and the monk of monks." "the thrones of the nazarenes were once in number sixty, but the star of the prophet of god--the prayer of god be on him, and peace--was in the ascendant, and the religion of resignation [islám] was everywhere victorious. many of the occupiers of those thrones had either submitted to the lieutenant ['caliph'] of our lord, and become muslimeen, or had been vanquished by force of arms. the others were terrified, and a general assembly was convoked to see what was to be done. as the rulers saw they were helpless against the decree of god, they called for their monks to advise them. the result of the conference was that it was decided to invite the resigned ones (muslimeen) to a discussion on their religious differences, on the understanding that whichever was victorious should be thenceforth supreme. "the leader of the faithful having summoned his wise men, their opinion was asked. 'o victorious of god,' they with one voice replied, 'since god, the high and blessed, is our king, what have we to fear? having on our side the truth revealed in the "book to be read" [the korán] by the hand of the messenger of god--the prayer of god be on him, and peace--we _must_ prevail. let us willingly accept their proposal.' an early day was accordingly fixed for the decisive contest, and each party marshalled its forces. at the appointed time they met, a great crowd on either side, and it was asked which should begin. knowing that victory was on his side, the lieutenant of the prophet--the prayer of god be on him, and peace--replied, 'since ye have desired this meeting, open ye the discussion.' "then the chief of the nazarene kings made answer, 'but we are here so many gathered together, that if we commence to dispute all round we shall not finish by the judgement day. let each party therefore choose its wisest man, and let the two debate before us, the remainder judging the result.' "'well hast thou spoken,' said the leader of the faithful; 'be it even so.' then the learned among the resigned selected our lord abd el káder of baghdad,[ ] a man renowned the world over for piety and for the depth of his learning. now a prayer [fátihah] for mulai abd el káder!" [ : so called because buried near that city. for an account of his life, and view of his mausoleum, see "the moors," pp. - .] here the speaker, extending his open palms side by side before him, as if to receive a blessing thereon, is copied by the by-standers.[ ] "in the name of god, the pitying, the pitiful!" all draw their hands down their faces, and, if they boast beards, end by stroking them out. [ : "the hands are raised in order to catch a blessing in them, and are afterwards drawn over the face to transfer it to every part of the body."--hughes, "dictionary of islám."] [ : a term applied by mohammedans to christians on account of a mistaken conception of the doctrine of the trinity.] "then the polytheists[ ] likewise chose their man, one held among them in the highest esteem, well read and wise, a monk of monks. between these two, then, the controversy commenced. as already agreed, the nazarene was the first to question: "'how far is it from the earth to the first heaven?' "'five hundred years.' "'and thence to the second heaven?' "'five hundred years.' "'thence to the third?' "'five hundred years.' "'thence to the fourth?' "'five hundred years.' "'thence to the fifth?' "'five hundred years.' "'thence to the sixth?' "'five hundred years.' "'thence to the seventh?' "'five hundred years.' "'and from mekka to jerusalem?' "'forty days.' "'add up the whole.' "'three thousand, five hundred years, and forty days.' "'in his famous ride on el borak [lightning] where did mohammed go?' "'from the sacred temple [of mekka] to the further temple [of jerusalem], and from the holy house [jerusalem] to the seventh heaven, and the presence of god.'[ ] [ : this was the occasion on which mohammed visited the seven heavens under the care of gabriel, riding on an ass so restive that he had to be bribed with a promise of paradise.] "'how long did this take?' "'the tenth of one night.' "'did he find his bed still warm on his return?' "'yes.' "'dost thou think such a thing possible; to travel three thousand five hundred years and back, and find one's bed still warm on returning?' "'canst thou play chess?' then asked mulai abd el káder. "'of course i can,' said the monk, surprised. "'then, wilt thou play with me?' "'certainly not,' replied the monk, indignantly. 'dost thou think me a fool, to come here to discuss the science of religion, and to be put off with a game of chess?' "'then thou acknowledgest thyself beaten; thou hast said thou couldst play chess, yet thou darest not measure thy skill at it with me. thy refusal proves thy lie.' "'nay, then, since thou takest it that way, i will consent to a match, but under protest.' "so the board was brought, and the players seated themselves. move, move, move, went the pieces; kings and queens, elephants, rooks, and knights, with the soldiers everywhere. one by one they disappeared, as the fight grew fast and furious. but mulai abd el káder had another object in view than the routing of his antagonist at a game of chess. by the exercise of his superhuman power he transported the monk to 'the empty third' [of the world], while his image remained before him at the board, to all appearances still absorbed in the contest. "meanwhile the monk could not tell where he was, but being oppressed with a sense of severe thirst, rose from where he sat, and made for a rising ground near by, whence he hoped to be able to descry some signs of vegetation, which should denote the presence of water. giddy and tired out, he approached the top, when what was his joy to see a city surrounded by palms but a short way off! with a cry of delight he quickened his steps and approached the gate. as he did so, a party of seven men in gorgeous apparel of wool and silk came out of the gate, each with a staff in his hand. "on meeting him they offered him the salutation of the faithful, but he did not return it. 'who mayest _thou_ be,' they asked, 'who dost not wish peace to the resigned?' [muslimeen]. 'my lords,' he made answer, 'i am a monk of the nazarenes, i merely seek water to quench my thirst.' "'but he who comes here must resign himself [to mohammedanism] or suffer the consequences. testify that 'there is no god but god, and mohammed is his messenger!' 'never,' he replied; and immediately they threw him on the ground and flogged him with their staves till he cried for mercy. 'stop!' he implored. 'i will testify.' no sooner had he done so than they ceased their blows, and raising him up gave him water to drink. then, tearing his monkish robe to shreds, each deprived himself of a garment to dress him becomingly. having re-entered the city they repaired to the judge. "'my lord,' they said, 'we bring before thee a brother resigned, once a monk of the monks, now a follower of the prophet, our lord--the prayer of god be on him, and peace. we pray thee to accept his testimony and record it in due form.' "'welcome to thee; testify!' exclaimed the kádi, turning to the convert. then, holding up his forefinger, the quondam monk witnessed to the truth of the unity [of god]. 'call for a barber!' cried the kádi; and a barber was brought. seven believers of repute stood round while the deed was done, and the convert rose a circumcised muslim--blessed be god. "then came forward a notable man of that town, pious, worthy, and rich, respected of all, who said, addressing the kádi: 'my lord--may god bless thy days,--thou knowest, all these worthy ones know, who and what i am. in the interests of religion and to the honour of god, i ask leave to adopt this brother newly resigned. what is mine shall be his to share with my own sons, and the care i bestow on them and their education shall be bestowed equally on him. god is witness.' 'well said; so be it,' replied the learned judge; 'henceforth he is a member of thy family.' "so to the hospitable roof of this pious one went the convert. a tutor was obtained for him, and he commenced to taste the riches of the wisdom of the arab. day after day he sat and studied, toiling faithfully, till teacher after teacher had to be procured, as he exhausted the stores of each in succession. so he read: first the book 'to be read' [the korán], till he could repeat it faultlessly, then the works of the poets, kálûn, el mikki, el bisri, and sîdi hamzah; then the 'lesser' and 'greater ten.'[ ] then he commenced at sîdi íbnu ashîr, following on through the ajrûmiyah,[ ] and the alfîyah,[ ] to the commentaries of sîdi khalîl, of the sheïkh el bokhári, and of ibnu asîm, till there was nothing left to learn. [ : grammarians and commentators of the korán.] [ : a preliminary work on rhetoric.] [ : the "thousand verses" of grammar.] "thus he continued growing in wisdom and honour, the first year, the second year, the third year, even to the twentieth year, till no one could compete with him. then the judge of judges of that country died, and a successor was sought for, but all allowed that no one's claims equalled those of the erstwhile monk. so he was summoned to fill the post, but was disqualified as unmarried. when they inquired if he was willing to do his duty in this respect, and he replied that he was, the father of the most beautiful girl in the city bestowed her on him, and that she might not be portionless, the chief men of the place vied one with another in heaping riches upon him. so he became judge of judges, rich, happy, revered. "and there was born unto him one son, then a second son, and even a third son. and there was born unto him a daughter, then a second daughter, and even a third daughter. so he prospered and increased. and to his sons were born sons, one, two, three, and four, and daughters withal. and his daughters were given in marriage to the elders of that country, and with them it was likewise. "now there came a day, a great feast day, when all his descendants came before him with their compliments and offerings, some small, some great, each receiving tenfold in return, garments of fine spun wool and silk, and other articles of value. "when the ceremony was over he went outside the town to walk alone, and approached the spot whence he had first descried what had so long since been his home. as he sat again upon that well-remembered spot, and glanced back at the many years which had elapsed since last he was there, a party of the faithful drew near. he offered the customary salute of 'peace be on you,' but they simply stared in return. presently one of them brusquely asked what he was doing there, and he explained who he was. but they laughed incredulously, and then he noticed that once again he was clad in robe and cowl, with a cord round his waist. they taunted him as a liar, but he re-affirmed his statements, and related his history. he counted up the years since he had resigned himself, telling of his children and children's children. "'wouldst thou know them if you sawst them?' asked the strangers. 'indeed i would,' was the reply, 'but they would know me first.' "'and you are really circumcised? we'll see!' was their next exclamation. just then a caravan appeared, wending its way across the plain, and the travellers hailed it. as he looked up at the shout, he saw mulai abd el káder still sitting opposite him at the chess-board, reminding him that it was his move. he had been recounting his experiences for the last half century to mulai abd el káder himself, and to the wise ones of both creeds who surrounded them! "indeed it was too true, and he had to acknowledge that the events of a life-time had been crowded into a period undefinably minute, by the god-sent power of my lord slave-of-the-able [mulai abd el káder]. "now, where is the good man and true who reveres the name of this holy one? who will say a prayer to mulai abd el káder?" here the narrator extends his palms as before, and all follow him in the motion of drawing them down his face. "in the name of the pitying and pitiful! now another!" the performance is repeated. "who is willing to yield himself wholly and entirely to mulai abd el káder? who will dedicate himself from the soles of his feet to the crown of his head? another prayer!" another repetition of the performance. "now let those devoted men earn the effectual prayers of that holy one by offering their silver in his name. nothing less than a peseta[ ] will do. that's right," as one of the bystanders throws down the coin specified. [ : about eightpence, a labourer's daily wage in tangier.] "now let us implore the blessing of god and mulai abd el káder on the head of this liberal believer." the palm performance is once more gone through. the earnestness with which he does it this time induces more to follow suit, and blessings on them also are besought in the same fashion. "now, my friends, which among you will do business with the palms of all these faithful ones? pay a peseta and buy the prayers of them all. now then, deal them out, and purchase happiness." so the appeal goes wearisomely on. as no more pesetas are seen to be forthcoming, a shift is made with reals--nominally - / _d._ pieces--the story-teller asking those who cannot afford more to make up first one dollar and then another, turning naïvely to his assistant to ask if they haven't obtained enough yet, as though it were all for them. as they reply that more is needed, he redoubles his appeals and prayers, threading his way in and out among the crowd, making direct for each well-dressed individual with a confidence which renders flight or refusal a shame. meanwhile the "orchestra" has struck up, and only pauses when the "professor" returns to the centre of the circle to call on all present to unite in prayers for the givers. a few coppers which have been tossed to his feet are distributed scornfully amongst half a dozen beggars, in various stages of filthy wretchedness and deformity, who have collected on the ground at one side. here a water-carrier makes his appearance, with his goat-skin "bottle" and tinkling bell--a swarthy soudanese in most tattered garb. the players and many listeners having been duly refreshed for the veriest trifle, the performance continues. a prayer is even said for the solitary european among the crowd, on his being successfully solicited for his quota, and another for his father at the request of some of the crowd, who style him the "friend of the moors." at last a resort is made to coppers, and when the story-teller condescendingly consents to receive even such trifles in return for prayers, from those who cannot afford more, quite a pattering shower falls at his feet, which is supplemented by a further hand-to-hand collection. in all, between four and five dollars must have been received--not a bad remuneration for an hour's work! already the ring has been thinning; now there is a general uprising, and in a few moments the scene is completely changed, the entertainer lost among the entertained, for the sun has disappeared below yon hill, and in a few moments night will fall. xviii snake-charming "whom a snake has bitten starts from a rope." _moorish proverb._ descriptions of this art remembered in a book for boys read years before had prepared me for the most wonderful scenes, and when i first watched the performance with snakes which delights the moors i was disappointed. yet often as i might look on, there was nothing else to see, save in the faces and gestures of the crowd, who with child-like simplicity followed every step as though for the first time. these have for me a never-ending fascination. thus it is that the familiar sounds of rapid and spasmodic beating on a tambourine, which tell that the charmer is collecting an audience, still prove an irresistible attraction for me as well. the ring in which i find myself is just a reproduction of that surrounding the story-teller of yester-e'en, but where his musicians sat there is a wilder group, more striking still in their appearance. this time, also, the instruments are of another class, two or three of the plainest sheep-skin tambourines with two gut strings across the centre under the parchment, which gives them a peculiar twanging sound; and a couple of reeds, mere canes pierced with holes, each provided with a mouthpiece made of half an inch of flattened reed. nothing is needed to add to the discord as all three are vigorously plied with cheek and palm. the principal actor has an appearance of studied weirdness as he gesticulates wildly and calls on god to protect him against the venom of his pets. contrary to the general custom of the country, he has let his black hair grow till it streams over his shoulders in matted locks. his garb is of the simplest, a dirty white shirt over drawers of similar hue completing his outfit. selecting a convenient stone as a seat, notebook in hand, i make up my mind to see the thing through. the "music" having continued five or ten minutes with the desired result of attracting a circle of passers-by, the actual performance is now to commence. on the ground in the centre lies a spare tambourine, and on one side are the two cloth-covered bottle-shaped baskets containing the snakes. the chief charmer now advances, commencing to step round the ring with occasional beats on his tambourine, rolling his eyes and looking demented. presently, having reached a climax of rapid beating and pacing, he suddenly stops in the centre with an extra "bang!" "now, every man who believes in our lord mohammed ben aïsa,[ ] say with me a fátihah." [ : for the history of this man and his snake-charming followers see "the moors," p. .] each of the onlookers extending his palms side by side before his face, they repeat the prayer in a sing-song voice, and as it concludes with a loud "ameen," the charmer gives an agonized cry, as though deeply wrought upon. "ah rijál el blád" ("oh saints of the town!"), he shouts, as he recommences his tambourining, this time even with increased vigour, beating the ground with his feet, and working his body up and down in a most extraordinary manner. the two others are also playing, and the noise is deafening. the chief figure appears to be raving mad; his starting eyes, his lithe and supple figure, and his streaming hair, give him the air of one possessed. his face is a study, a combination of fierceness and madness, yet of good-nature. at last he sinks down exhausted, but after a moment rises and advances to the centre of the circle, picking up a tambourine. "now, sîdi aïsa"--turning to one of the musicians, whom he motions to cease their din--"what do you think happens to the man who puts a coin in there? why, the holy saint, our lord mohammed ben aïsa, puts a ring round him like that," drawing a ring round a stone on the ground. "is it not so?" "it is, ameen," from sidi aïsa. "and what happens to him in the day time?" "he is in the hands of god, and his people too." "and in the night time?" "he is in the hands of god, and his people too." "and when at home?" "he is in the hands of god, and his people too." "and when abroad?" "he is in the hands of god, and his people too." at this a copper coin is thrown into the ring, and the charmer replies, "now he who is master of sea and land, my lord abd el káder el jîláni,[ ] bless the giver of that coin! now, for the love of god and of his blessed prophet, i offer a prayer for that generous one." here the operation of passing their hands down their faces is performed by all. [ : the surname of the baghdád saint.] "now, there's another,"--as a coin falls--"and from a child, too! god bless thee now, my son. may my lord ben aïsa, my lord abd es-slám, and my lord abd el káder, protect and keep thee!" then, as more coppers fall, similar blessings are invoked upon the donors, interspersed with catechising of the musicians with a view to making known the advantages to be reaped by giving something. at last, as nothing more seems to be forthcoming, the performance proper is proceeded with, and the charmer commences to dance on one leg, to a terrible din from the tambourines. then he pauses, and summons a little boy from the audience, seating him in the midst, adjuring him to behave himself, to do as he is bid, and to have faith in "our lord ben aïsa." then, seating himself behind the boy, he places his lips against his skull, and blows repeatedly, coming round to the front to look at the lad, to see if he is sufficiently affected, and returning to puff again. finally he bites off a piece of the boy's cloak, and chews it. now he wets his finger in his mouth, and after putting it into the dust makes lines across his legs and arms, all the time calling on his patron saint; next holding the piece of cloth in his hands and walking round the ring for all to see it. "come hither," he says to a bystander; "search my mouth and see if there be anything there." the search is conducted as a farmer would examine a horse's mouth, with the result that it is declared empty. "now i call on the prophet to witness that there is no deception," as he once more restores the piece of cloth to his mouth, and pokes his fingers into his neck, drawing them now up his face. "enough!" the voices of the musicians, who have for the latter part of the time been giving forth a drawling chorus, cease, but the din of the tambourines continues, while the performer dances wildly, till he stops before the lad on the ground, and takes from his mouth first one date and then another, which the lad is told to eat, and does so, the on-lookers fully convinced that they were transformed from the rag. now it is the turn of one of the musicians to come forward, his place being taken by the retiring performer, after he has made another collection in the manner already described. "he who believes in god and in the power of our lord mohammed ben aïsa, say with me a fátihah," cries the new man, extending his palms turned upwards before him to receive the blessings he asks, and then brings one of the snake-baskets forward, plunging his hand into its sack-like mouth, and sharply drawing it out a time or two, as if afraid of being bitten. finally he pulls the head of one of the reptiles through, and leaves it there, darting out its fangs, while he snatches up and wildly beats the tambourine by his side. he now seizes the snake by the neck, and pulls it right out, the people starting back as it coils round in the ring, or uncoils and makes a plunge towards someone. now he pulls out another, and hangs it round his neck, saying, "i take refuge with the saint who was dead and is alive, with our lord mohammed son of aïsa, and with the most holy abd el káder el jîláni, king of land and sea. now, let every one who believes bear witness with me and say a fátihah!" "say a fátihah!" echoes one of the still noisy musicians, by way of chorus. "now may our lord abd el káder see the man who makes a contribution with his eyes." _chorus:_ "with his eyes!" "and may his heart find rest, and our lord abd er-rahmán protect him!" _chorus:_ "protect him!" "now, i call you to witness, i bargain with our lord abd el káder for a forfeit!" _chorus:_ "for a forfeit!" a copper is thrown into the ring, and as he picks it up and hands it to the musician, the performer exclaims-- "take this, see, and at the last day may the giver of it see our lord abd el káder before him!" _chorus:_ "before him!" "may he ever be blessed, whether present or absent!" _chorus:_ "present or absent!" "who wishes to have a good conscience and a clean heart? oh, ye beloved of the lord! see, take from that dear one" (who has thrown down a copper). the contributions now apparently sufficing for the present, the performance proceeds, but the crowd having edged a little too close, it is first necessary to increase the space in the centre by swinging one of the reptiles round by the tail, whereat all start back. "ah! you may well be afraid!" exclaims the charmer. "their fangs mean death, if you only knew it, but for the mercies of my lord, the son of aïsa." "ameen!" responds the chorus. hereupon he proceeds to direct the head of the snake to his mouth, and caressingly invites it to enter. darting from side to side, it finally makes a plunge down his throat, whereon the strangers shudder, and the _habitués_ look with triumphant awe. wildly he spins on one foot that all may see, still holding the creature by the neck with one hand, and by the tail with the other. at length, having allowed the greater part of its length to disappear in this uncanny manner, he proceeds to withdraw it, the head emerging with the sound of a cork from a bottle. the sight has not been pleasant, but the audience, transfixed, gives a sigh of relief as the tambourines strike up again, and the reed chimes in deafeningly. "who says they are harmless? who says their fangs are extracted?" challenges the performer. "look here!" the seemingly angry snake has now fastened on his arm, and is permitted to draw blood, as though in reward for its recent treatment. "is any incredulous here? shall i try it on thee?" the individual addressed, a poverty-stricken youth whose place was doubtless required for some more promising customer behind, flees in terror, as the gaping jaws approach him. one and another having been similarly dismissed from points of vantage, and a redistribution of front seats effected, the incredulous are once more tauntingly addressed and challenged. this time the challenge is accepted by a foreigner, who hands in a chicken held by its wings. "so? blessed be god! its doom is sealed if it comes within reach of the snake. see here!" all eagerly press forward, many rising to their feet, and it is difficult to see over their shoulders the next gruesome act. the reptile, held by the neck in the performer's right hand, is shown the chicken in the other, and annoyed by having it poked in its face, too frightened to perceive what is happening. in a moment the fangs are shot out, and a wound inflicted in the exposed part under the wing. blood appears, and the bird is thrown down, being held in place by the performer's foot till in a few minutes its struggles cease. then, picking the victim up, he holds it aloft by one wing to show its condition, and exultingly calls for a fátihah. it is enough: my patience is exhausted, and i rise to make off with stiff knees, content at last with what i have seen and heard of the "charming" of snakes in morocco. [illustration: _cavilla, photo., tangier._ a morocco fandak (caravansarai).] xix in a moorish cafÉ "a little from a friend is much." _moorish proverb._ to the passer-by, least of all to the european, there is nothing in its external appearance to recommend old hashmi's _café_. from the street, indeed, it is hardly visible, for it lies within the threshold of a caravansarai or fandak, in which beasts are tethered, goods accumulated and travellers housed, and of which the general appearance is that of a neglected farm-yard. round an open court a colonnade supports the balcony by which rooms on the upper story are approached, a narrow staircase in the corner leading right up to the terraced roof. in the daytime the sole occupants of the rooms are women whose partners for the time being have securely locked them in before going to work. beside the lofty archway forming the gate of this strange hostelry, is hashmi's stall, at which green tea or a sweet, pea-soupy preparation of coffee may be had at all hours of the day, but the _café_ proper, gloomy by daylight, lies through the door behind. here, of an evening, the candles lit, his regular customers gather with tiny pipes, indulging in flowing talk. each has before him his harmless glass, as he squats or reclines on the rush-matted floor. nothing of importance occurs in the city but is within a little made known here with as much certainty as if the proprietor subscribed to an evening paper. any man who has something fresh to tell, who can interest or amuse the company, and by his frequent visits give the house a name, is always welcome, and will find a glass awaiting him whenever he chooses to come. old hashmi knows his business, and if the evening that i was there may be taken as a sample, he deserves success. that night he was in the best of humours. his house was full and trade brisk. fattah, a negro, was keeping the house merry, so in view of coming demands, he brewed a fresh pot of real "mekkan." the surroundings were grimy, and outside the rain came down in torrents: but that was a decided advantage, since it not only drove men indoors, but helped to keep them there. mesaôd, the one-eyed, had finished an elaborate tuning of his two-stringed banjo, his ginbri--a home-made instrument--and was proceeding to arrive at a convenient pitch of voice for his song. with a strong nasal accent he commenced reciting the loves of si marzak and his fair azîzah: how he addressed her in the fondest of language, and how she replied by caresses. when he came to the chorus they all chimed in, for the most part to their own tune and time, as they rocked to and fro, some clapping, some beating their thighs, and all applauding at the end. the whole ballad would not bear translation--for english ears,--and the scanty portion which may be given has lost its rhythm and cadence by the change, for arabic is very soft and beautiful to those who understand it. the time has come when azîzah, having quarrelled with si marzak in a fit of perhaps too well-founded jealousy, desires to "make it up again," and thus addresses her beloved-- "oh, how i have followed thy attractiveness, and halted between give and take! oh, how i'd from evil have protected thee by my advice, hadst thou but heeded it! yet to-day taste, o my master, of the love that thou hast taught to me! "oh, how i have longed for the pleasure of thy visits, and poured out bitter tears for thee; until at last the sad truth dawned on me that of thy choice thou didst put me aside! yet to-day taste, o my master, of the love that thou hast taught to me! "thou wast sweeter than honey to me, but thou hast become more bitter than gall. is it thus thou beginnest the world? beware lest thou make me thy foe! yet to-day taste, o my master, of the love that thou hast taught to me! "i have hitherto been but a name to thee, and thou took'st to thy bosom a snake, but to-day i perceive thou'st a fancy for me: o god, i will not be deceived! yes, to-day taste, o my master, of the love that thou hast taught to me! "thou know'st my complaint and my only cure: why, then, wilt thou heal me not? thou canst do so to-day, o my master, and save me from all further woe. yes, to-day taste, o my master, of the love that thou hast taught to me!" to which the hard-pressed swain replies-- "of a truth thine eyes have bewitched me, for death itself is in fear of them: and thine eyebrows, like two logs of wood, have battered me each in its turn. so if thou sayest die, i'll die; and for god shall my sacrifice be! "i have neither yet died nor abandoned hope, though slumber at night i ne'er know. with the staff of deliverance still afar off, so that all the world knows of my woe. and if thou sayest die, i'll die, but for god shall my sacrifice be!" while the singing was proceeding sáïd and drees had been indulging in a game of draughts, and as it ceased their voices could be heard in eager play. "call thyself a mallem (master). there, thy father was bewitched by a hyena; there, and there again!" shouted sáïd, as he swept a first, a second and a third of his opponent's pieces from the board. but drees was equal with him in another move. "so, verily, thou art my master! let us, then, praise god for thy wisdom: thou art like indeed unto him who verily shot the fox, but who killed his own cow with the second shot! see, thus i teach thee to boast before thy betters: ha, i laugh at thee, i ride the donkey on thy head. i shave that beard of thine!" he ejaculated, taking one piece after another from his adversary, as the result of an incautious move. the board had the appearance of a well-kicked footstool, and the "men"--called "dogs" in barbary--were more like baseless chess pawns. the play was as unlike that of europeans as possible; the moves from "room" to "room" were of lightning swiftness, and accompanied by a running fire of slang ejaculations, chiefly sarcastic, but, on the whole, enlivened with a vein of playful humour not to be englished politely. just as the onlookers would become interested in the progress of one or the other, a too rapid advance by either would result in an incomprehensible wholesale clearing of the board by his opponent's sleeve. yet without a stop the pieces would be replaced in order, and a new game commenced, the vanquished too proud to acknowledge that he did not quite see how the victor had won. then fattah, whose _forte_ was mimicry, attracted the attention of the company by a representation of a fat wazeer at prayers. amid roars of laughter he succeeded in rising to his feet with the help of those beside him, who had still to lend occasional support, as his knees threatened to give way under his apparently ponderous carcase. before and behind, his shirt was well stuffed with cushions, and the sides were not forgotten. his cheeks were puffed out to the utmost, and his eyes rolled superbly. at last the moment came for him to go on his knees, when he had to be let gently down by those near him, but his efforts to bow his head, now top-heavy with a couple of shirts for a turban, were most ludicrous, as he fell on one side in apparently vain endeavours. the spectators roared with laughter till the tears coursed down their cheeks; but that black and solemn face remained unmoved, and at the end of the prescribed motions the pseudo-great man apparently fell into slumber as heavy as himself, and snored in a style that a prize pig might have envied. "Áfuk! Áfuk!" the deafening bravos resounded, for fattah had excelled himself, and was amply rewarded by the collection which followed. a tale was next demanded from a jovial man of fez, who, nothing loth, began at once-- "evening was falling as across the plain of háhá trudged a weary traveller. the cold wind whistled through his tattered garments. the path grew dim before his eyes. the stars came out one by one, but no star of hope shone for him. he was faint and hungry. his feet were sore. his head ached. he shivered. "'may god have pity on me!' he muttered. "god heard him. a few minutes later he descried an earthly star--a solitary light was twinkling on the distant hillside. thitherward he turned his steps. "hope rose within him. his step grew brisk. the way seemed clear. onward he pushed. "presently he could make out the huts of a village. "'thank god!' he cried; but still he had no supper. "his empty stomach clamoured. his purse was empty also. the fiendish dogs of the village yelped at him. he paused discomfited. he called. "widow záïdah stood before her light. "'who's there?' "'a god-guest' "'in god's name, then, welcome! silence there, curs!' "abd el hakk approached. "'god bless thee, my mother, and repay thee a thousand-fold!' "but záïdah herself was poor. her property consisted only of a hut and some fowls. she set before him eggs--two, hard-boiled,--bread also. he thanked god. he ate. "'yes, god will repay,' she said. "next day abd el hakk passed on to marrákesh. there god blessed him. years passed on; one, two, three, four, five, six, seven. abd el hakk was rich. melûdi the lawyer disliked him. said he to widow záïdah-- "'abd el hakk, whom once thou succouredst, is rich. the two eggs were never yet paid for. hadst thou not given them to him they would have become two chickens. these would each have laid hundreds. those hundreds, when hatched, would have laid their thousands. in seven years, think to what amount abd el hakk is indebted to thee. sue him.' "widow záïdah listened. what is more, she acted. abd el hakk failed to appear to rebut the claim. he was worth no more. "'why is the defendant not here?' asked the judge. "'my lord,' said his attorney, 'he is gone to sow boiled beans.' "'boiled beans!' "'boiled beans, my lord.' "'is he mad?' "'he is very wise, my lord.' "'thou mockest.' "'my lord, if boiled eggs can be hatched, sure boiled beans will grow!' "'dismissed with costs!' "the tree that bends with every wind that blows will seldom stand upright." * * * * * a round of applause greeted the clever tale, of which the speaker's gestures had told even more than his words. but the merriment of the company only began there, for forthwith a babel of tongues was occupied in the discussion of all the points of the case, in imagining every impossible or humorous alternative, and laughter resounded on every side, as the glasses were quickly refilled with an innocent drink. xx the medicine-man "wine is a key to all evil." _moorish proverb._ under the glare of an african sun, its rays, however, tempered by a fresh atlantic breeze; no roof to his consulting-room save the sky, no walls surrounding him to keep off idle starers like ourselves; by the roadside sits a native doctor of repute. his costume is that of half the crowd around, outwardly consisting of a well-worn brown woollen cloak with a hood pulled over his head, from beneath the skirts of which protrude his muddy feet. by his side lies the basket containing his supplies and less delicate instruments; the finer ones we see him draw from a capacious wallet of leather beneath his cloak. though personally somewhat gaunt, he is nevertheless a jolly-looking character, totally free from that would-be professional air assumed by some of our medical students to hide lack of experience; for he, empiric though he be, has no idea of any of his own shortcomings, and greets us with an easy smile. he is seated on the ground, hugging his knees till his attention is drawn to us, when, observing our gaze at his lancets on the ground, he picks one up to show it. both are of rude construction, merely pieces of flat steel filed to double-edged points, and protected by two flaps slightly bigger, in the one case of bone, in the other of brass. a loose rivet holding all together at one end completes the instrument. the brass one he says was made by a jew in fez out of an old clock; the other by a jew in marrákesh. for the purpose of making scratches for cupping he has a piece of flat steel about half an inch wide, sharpened across the end chisel-fashion. then he has a piece of an old razor-blade tied to a stick with a string. that this is sharp he soon demonstrates by skilfully shaving an old man's head, after only damping the eighth of an inch stub with which it is covered. a stone and a bit of leather, supplemented by the calves of his legs, or his biceps, serve to keep the edges in condition. from a finger-shaped leather bag in his satchel he produces an antiquated pair of tooth extractors, a small pair of forceps for pulling out thorns, and a stiletto. the first-named article, he informs us, came from france to tafilált, his home, _viâ_ tlemçen; it is of the design known as "fox's claw," and he explains to us that the difference between the french and the english article is that the one has no spring to keep the jaws open, while the other has. a far more formidable instrument is the genuine native contrivance, a sort of exaggerated corkscrew without a point. but here comes a patient to be treated. he troubles the doctor with no diagnosis, asking only to be bled. he is a youth of medium height, bronzed by the sun. telling him to sit down and bare his right arm, the operator feels it well up and down, and then places the tips of the patient's fingers on the ground, bidding him not to move. pouring out a little water into a metal dish, he washes the arm on the inside of the elbow, drying it with his cloak. next he ties a piece of list round the upper arm as tightly as he can, and selecting one of the lancets, makes an incision into the vein which the washing has rendered visible. a bright stream issues, squirting into the air some fifteen inches; it is soon, however, directed into a tin soup-plate holding fourteen ounces, as we ascertained by measurement. the operator washes and dries his lancet, wraps the two in a white rag, and puts them into a piece of cane which forms an excellent case. meanwhile the plate has filled, and he turns his attention once more to the patient. one or two passers-by have stopped, like ourselves, to look on. "i knew a man," says one, "who was being bled like that, and kept on saying, 'take a little more,' till he fell back dead in our arms." "yes," chimes in another, "i have heard of such cases; it is very dangerous." although the patient is evidently growing very nervous, our surgical friend affects supreme indifference to all this tittle-tattle, and after a while removes the bandage, bending the forearm inward, with the effect of somewhat checking the flow of blood. when he has bound up with list the cane that holds the lancets, he closes the forearm back entirely, so that the flow is stopped. opening it again a little, he wipes a sponge over the aperture a few times, and closes it with his thumb. then he binds a bit of filthy rag round the arm, twisting it above and below the elbow alternately, and crossing over the incision each time. when this is done, he sends the patient to throw away the blood and wash the plate, receiving for the whole operation the sum of three half-pence. another patient is waiting his turn, an old man desiring to be bled behind the ears for headache. after shaving two patches for the purpose, the "bleeder," as he is justly called, makes eighteen scratches close together, about half an inch long. over these he places a brass cup of the shape of a high italian hat without the brim. from near the edge of this protrudes a long brass tube with a piece of leather round and over the end. this the operator sucks to create a vacuum, the moistened leather closing like a valve, which leaves the cup hanging _in situ_. repeating this on the other side, he empties the first cup of the blood which has by this time accumulated in it, and so on alternately, till he has drawn off what appears to him to be sufficient. all that remains to be done is to wipe the wounds and receive the fee. some years ago such a worthy as this earned quite a reputation for exorcising devils in southern morocco. his mode of procedure was brief, but as a rule effective. the patient was laid on the ground before the wise man's tent, face downward, and after reading certain mystic and unintelligible passages, selected from one of the ponderous tomes which form a prominent part of the "doctor's" stock-in-trade, he solemnly ordered two or three men to hold the sufferer down while two more thrashed him till they were tired. if, when released, the patient showed the least sign of returning violence, or complained that the whole affair was a fraud, it was taken as a sure sign that he had not had enough, and he was forthwith seized again and the dose repeated till he had learned that discretion was the better part of valour, and slunk off, perhaps a wiser, certainly a sadder man. it is said, and i do not doubt it--though it is more than most medical men can say of their patients--that no one was ever known to return in quest of further treatment. all this, however, is nothing compared with the moor's love of fire as a universal panacea. not only for his mules and his horses, but also for himself and his family, cauterization is in high repute, especially as he estimates the value of a remedy as much by its immediate and visible action as by its ultimate effects. the "fire-doctor" is therefore even a greater character in his way than the "bleeder," whom we have just visited. his outfit includes a collection of queer-shaped irons designed to cauterize different parts of the body, a portable brazier, and bellows made from a goat-skin with a piece of board at one side wherewith to press and expel the air through a tube on the other side. he, too, sits by the roadside, and disposes of his groaning though wonderfully enduring "patients" much as did his rival of the lancet. rohlfs, a german doctor who explored parts of morocco in the garb of a native, exercising what he could of his profession for a livelihood, tells how he earned a considerable reputation by the introduction of "cold fire" (lunar caustic) as a rival to the original style; and pellow, an english slave who made his escape in , found cayenne pepper of great assistance in ingratiating himself with the moors in this way, and even in delaying a pursuer suffering from ophthalmia by blowing a little into his eyes before his identity was discovered. in extenuation of this trick, however, it must be borne in mind that cayenne pepper is an accredited moorish remedy for ophthalmia, being placed on the eyelids, though it is only a mixture of canary seed and sugar that is blown in. every european traveller in morocco is supposed to know something about medicine, and many have been my own amusing experiences in this direction. nothing that i used gave me greater fame than a bottle of oil of cantharides, the contents of which i applied freely behind the ears or upon the temples of such victims of ophthalmia as submitted themselves to my tender mercies. only i found that when my first patient began to dance with the joy and pain of the noble blister which shortly arose, so many people fancied they needed like treatment that i was obliged to restrict the use of so popular a cure to special cases. one branch of moroccan medicine consists in exorcising devils, of which a most amusing instance once came under my notice. an english gentleman gave one of his servants who complained of being troubled with these unwelcome guests two good-sized doses of tartaric acid and carbonate of soda a second apart. the immediate exit of the devil was so apparent that the fame of the prescriber as a medical man was made at once. but many of the cases which the amateur is called upon to treat are much more difficult to satisfy than this. superstition is so strongly mingled with the native ideas of disease,--of being possessed,--that the two can hardly be separated. during an epidemic of cholera, for instance, the people keep as close as possible to walls, and avoid sand-hills, for fear of "catching devils." all disease is indeed more or less ascribed to satanic agency, and in morocco that practitioner is most in repute who claims to attack this cause of the malady rather than its effect. although the moors have a certain rudimentary acquaintance with simple medicinal agents--and how rudimentary that acquaintance is, will better appear from what is to follow,--in all their pharmacop[oe]ia no remedy is so often recommended or so implicitly relied on as the "writing" of a man of reputed sanctity. such a writing may consist merely of a piece of paper scribbled over with the name of god, or with some sentence from the korán, such as, "and only god is the healer," repeated many times, or in special cases it may contain a whole series of pious expressions and meaningless incantations. for an ordinary external complaint, such as general debility arising from the evil eye of a neighbour or a jealous wife, or as a preventative against bewitchment, or as a love philtre, it is usually considered sufficient to wear this in a leather bag around the neck or forehead; but in case of unfathomable internal disease, such as indigestion, the "writing" is prescribed to be divided into so many equal portions, and taken in a little water night and morning. the author of these potent documents is sometimes a hereditary saint descended from mohammed, sometimes a saint whose sanctity arises from real or assumed insanity--for to be mad in barbary is to have one's thoughts so occupied with things of heaven as to have no time left for things of earth,--and often they are written by ordinary public scribes, or schoolmasters, for among the moors reading and religion are almost synonymous terms. there are, however, a few professional gentlemen who dispense these writings among their drugs. such alone of all their quacks aspire to the title of "doctor." most of these spend their time wandering about the country from fair to fair, setting up their tents wherever there are patients to be found in sufficient numbers. attired as natives, let us visit one. arrived at the tent door, we salute the learned occupant with the prescribed "salám oo alaïkum" ("to you be peace"), to which, on noting our superior costumes, he replies with a volley of complimentary inquiries and welcomes. these we acknowledge with dignity, and with as sedate an air as possible. we leisurely seat ourselves on the ground in orthodox style, like tailors. as it would not be good form to mention our business at once, we defer professional consultation till we have inquired successfully after his health, his travels, and the latest news at home and from abroad. in the course of conversation he gives us to understand that he is one of the sultan's uncles, which is by no means impossible in a country where it has not been an unknown thing for an imperial father to lose count of his numerous progeny. feeling at last that we have broken the ice, we turn the conversation to the subject of our supposed ailments. my own complaint is a general internal disorder resulting in occasional feverishness, griping pains, and loss of sleep. after asking a number of really sensible questions, such as would seem to place him above the ordinary rank of native practitioners, he gravely announces that he has "the very thing" in the form of a powder, which, from its high virtues, and the exceeding number of its ingredients, some of them costly, is rather expensive. we remember the deference with which our costumes were noted, and understand. but, after all, the price of a supply is announced to be only seven-pence halfpenny. the contents of some of the canisters he shows us include respectively, according to his account, from twenty to fifty drugs. for our own part, we strongly suspect that all are spices to be procured from any moorish grocer. together with the prescription i receive instructions to drink the soup from a fat chicken in the morning, and to eat its flesh in the evening; to eat hot bread and drink sweet tea, and to do as little work as possible, the powder to be taken daily for a fortnight in a little honey. whatever else he may not know, it is evident that our doctor knows full well how to humour his patients. the next case is even more easy of treatment than mine, a "writing" only being required. on a piece of very common paper two or three inches square, the doctor writes something of which the only legible part is the first line: "in the name of god, the pitying, the pitiful," followed, we subsequently learn, by repetitions of "only god is the healer." for this the patient is to get his wife to make a felt bag sewed with coloured silk, into which the charm is to be put, along with a little salt and a few parings of garlic, after which it is to be worn round his neck for ever. sometimes, in wandering through morocco, one comes across much more curious remedies than these, for the worthy we have just visited is but a commonplace type in this country. a medical friend once met a professional brother in the interior who had a truly original method of proving his skill. by pressing his finger on the side of his nose close to his eye, he could send a jet of liquid right into his interlocutor's face, a proceeding sufficient to satisfy all doubts as to his alleged marvellous powers. on examination it was found that he had a small orifice near the corner of the eye, through which the pressure forced the lachrymal fluid, pure tears, in fact. this is just an instance of the way in which any natural defect or peculiarity is made the most of by these wandering empirics, to impose on their ignorant and credulous victims. even such of them as do give any variety of remedies are hardly more to be trusted. whatever they give, their patients like big doses, and are not content without corresponding visible effects. epsom salts, which are in great repute, are never given to a man in less quantities than two tablespoonfuls. on one occasion a poor woman came to me suffering from ague, and looking very dejected. i mixed this quantity of salts in a tumblerful of water, with a good dose of quinine, bidding her drink two-thirds of it, and give the remainder to her daughter, who evidently needed it as much as she did. her share was soon disposed of with hardly more than a grimace, to the infinite enjoyment of a fat, black slave-girl who was standing by, and who knew from personal experience what a tumblerful meant. but to induce the child to take hers was quite another matter. "what! not drink it?" the mother cried, as she held the potion to her lips. "the devil take thee, thou cursed offspring of an abandoned woman! may god burn thy ancestors!" but though the child, accustomed to such mild and motherly invectives, budged not, it had proved altogether too much for the jovial slave, who was by this time convulsed with laughter, and so, i may as well confess, was i. at last the woman's powers of persuasion were exhausted, and she drained the glass herself. when in fez some years ago, a dog i had with me needed dosing, so i got three drops of croton oil on sugar made ready for him. mine host, a man of fifty or more, came in meanwhile, and having ascertained the action of the drug from my servant, thought it might possibly do him good, and forthwith swallowed it. of this the first intimation i had was from the agonizing screams of the old man, who loudly proclaimed that his last hour was come, and from the terrified wails of the females of his household, who thought so too. when i saw him he was rolling on the tiles of the courtyard, his heels in the air, bellowing frantically. i need hardly dilate upon the relief i felt when at last we succeeded in alleviating his pain, and knew that he was out of danger. among the favourite remedies of morocco, hyena's head powder ranks high as a purge, and the dried bones and flesh may often be seen in the native spice-shops, coated with dust as they hang. some of the prescriptions given are too filthy to repeat, almost to be believed. as a specimen, by no means the worst, i may mention a recipe at one time in favour among the jewesses of mogador, according to one writer. this was to drink seven draughts from the town drain where it entered the sea, beaten up with seven eggs. for diseases of the "heart," by which they mean the stomach and liver, and of eyes, joints, etc., a stone, which is found in an animal called the horreh, the size of a small walnut, and valued as high as twelve dollars, is ground up and swallowed, the patient thereafter remaining indoors a week. ants, prepared in various ways, are recommended for lethargy, and lion's flesh for cowardice. privet or mallow leaves, fresh honey, and chameleons split open alive, are considered good for wounds and sores, while the fumes from the burning of the dried body of this animal are often inhaled. among more ordinary remedies are saraparilla, senna, and a number of other well-known herbs and roots, whose action is more or less understood. roasted pomegranate rind in powder is found really effectual in dysentery and diarrh[oe]a. men and women continually apply for philtres, and women for means to prevent their husbands from liking rival wives, or for poison to put them out of the way. as arsenic, corrosive sublimate, and other poisons are sold freely to children in every spice-shop, the number of unaccounted-for deaths is extremely large, but inquiry is seldom or never made. when it is openly averred that so-and-so died from "a cup of tea," the only mental comment seems to be that she was very foolish not to be more careful what she drank, and to see that whoever prepared it took the first sip according to custom. the highest recommendation of any particular dish or spice is that it is "heating." great faith is also placed in certain sacred rocks, tree-stumps, etc., which are visited in the hope of obtaining relief from all sorts of ailments. visitors often leave rags torn from their garments by which to be remembered by the guardian of the place. others repair to the famous sulphur springs of zarhôn, supposed to derive their benefit from the interment close by of a certain st. jacob--and dance in the waters, yelling without intermission, "cold and hot, o my lord yakoob! cold and hot!" fearful lest any cessation of the cry might permit the temperature to be increased or diminished beyond the bearable point. xxi the human mart "who digs a pit for his brother will fall into it." _moorish proverb._ the slave-market differs in no respect from any other in morocco, save in the nature of the "goods" exposed. in most cases the same place is used for other things at other times, and the same auctioneers are employed to sell cattle. the buyers seat themselves round an open courtyard, in the closed pens of which are the slaves for sale. these are brought out singly or in lots, inspected precisely as cattle would be, and expatiated upon in much the same manner. for instance, here comes a middle-aged man, led slowly round by the salesman, who is describing his "points" and noting bids. he has first-class muscles, although he is somewhat thin. he is made to lift a weight to prove his strength. his thighs are patted, and his lips are turned to show the gums, which at merrier moments would have been visible without such a performance. with a shame-faced, hang-dog air he trudges round, wondering what will be his lot, though a sad one it is already. at last he is knocked down for so many score of dollars, and after a good deal of further bargaining he changes hands. the next brought forward are three little girls--a "job lot," maybe ten, thirteen, and sixteen years of age--two of them evidently sisters. they are declared to be already proficient in arabic, and ready for anything. their muscles are felt, their mouths examined, and their bodies scrutinized in general, while the little one begins to cry, and the others look as though they would like to keep her company. round and round again they are marched, but the bids do not rise high enough to effect a sale, and they are locked up again for a future occasion. it is indeed a sad, sad sight. the sources of supply for the slave-market are various, but the chief is direct from guinea and the sáhara, where the raids of the traders are too well understood to need description. usually some inter-tribal jealousy is fostered and fanned into a flame, and the one which loses is plundered of men and goods. able-bodied lads and young girls are in most demand, and fetch high prices when brought to the north. the unfortunate prisoners are marched with great hardship and privation to depôts over the atlas, where they pick up arabic and are initiated into mohammedanism. to a missionary who once asked one of the dealers how they found their way across the desert, the terribly significant reply was, "there are many bones along the way!" after a while the survivors are either exposed for sale in the markets of marrákesh or fez, or hawked round from door to door in the coast towns, where public auctions are prohibited. some have even found their way to egypt and constantinople, having been transported in british vessels, and landed at gibraltar as members of the dealer's family! another source of supply is the constant series of quarrels between the tribes of morocco itself, during which many children are carried off who are white or nearly so. in this case the victims are almost all girls, for whom good prices are to be obtained. this opens a door for illegal supplies, children born of slaves and others kidnapped being thus disposed of for hareems. for this purpose the demand for white girls is much in excess of that for black, so that great temptation is offered. i knew a man who had seventeen such in his house, and of nearly a dozen whom i saw there, none were too dark to have passed for english brunettes. though nothing whatever can be said in defence of this practice of tearing our fellow-men from their homes, and selling them as slaves, our natural feelings of horror abate considerably when we become acquainted with its results under the rule of islám. instead of the fearful state of things which occurred under english or american rule, it is a pleasure to find that, whatever may be the shortcomings of the moors, in this case, at any rate, they have set us a good example. even their barbarous treatment of christian slaves till within a century was certainly no worse than our treatment of black slaves. to begin with, mohammedans make no distinction in civil or religious rights between a black skin and a white. so long as a man avows belief in no god but god, and in mohammed as the prophet of god, complying with certain outward forms of his religion, he is held to be as good a muslim as anyone else; and as the whole social and civil fabrics are built upon religion and the teachings of the korán, the social position of every well-behaved mohammedan is practically equal. the possession of authority of any kind will naturally command a certain amount of respectful attention, and he who has any reason for seeking a favour from another is sure to adopt a more subservient mien; but beyond this, few such class distinctions are known as those common in europe. the slave who, away from home, can behave as a gentleman, will be received as such, irrespective of his colour, and when freed he may aspire to any position under the sultan. there are, indeed, many instances of black men having been ministers, governors, and even ambassadors to europe, and such appointments are too common to excite astonishment. they have even, in the past, assisted in giving rise to the misconception that the people of morocco were "black-a-moors." in many households the slave becomes the trusted steward of his owner, and receives a sufficient allowance to live in comfort. he will possess a paper giving him his freedom on his master's death, and altogether he will have a very good time of it. the liberation of slaves is enjoined upon those who follow mohammed as a most praiseworthy act, and as one which cannot fail to bring its own reward. but, like too many in our own land, they more often prefer to make use of what they possess till they start on that journey on which they can take nothing with them, and then affect generosity by bestowing upon others that over which they lose control. one poor fellow whom i knew very well, who had been liberated on the death of his master, having lost his papers, was re-kidnapped and sold again to a man who was subsequently imprisoned for fraud, when he got free and worked for some years as porter; but he was eventually denounced and put in irons in a dungeon as part of the property of his _soi-disant_ master. the ordinary place of the slave is much that of the average servant, but receiving only board, lodging, and scanty clothing, without pay, and being unable to change masters. sometimes, however, they are permitted to beg or work for money to buy their own freedom, when they become, as it were, their own masters. on the whole, a jollier, harder-working, or better-tempered lot than these negroes it would be hard to desire, and they are as light-hearted, fortunately, as true-hearted, even in the midst of cruel adversities. the condition of a woman slave--to which, also, most of what has been said refers--is as much behind that of a man-slave as is that of a free-woman behind that of her lord. if she becomes her master's wife, the mother of a child, she is thereby freed, though she must remain in his service until his death, and she is only treated as an animal, not as a human being. after all, there is a dark side--one sufficiently dark to need no intensifying. the fact of one man being the possessor of another, just as much as he could be of a horse or cow, places him in the same position with regard to his "chattel" as to such a four-footed animal. "the merciful man is merciful to his beast," but "the tender mercies of the wicked are cruel," and just as one man will ill-treat his beast, while another treats his well, so will one man persecute his slave. instances of this are quite common enough, and here and there cases could be brought forward of revolting brutality, as in the story which follows, but the great thing is that agricultural slavery is practically unknown, and that what exists is chiefly domestic. "know the slave," says an arab proverb, "and you know the master." [illustration: _freyonne, photo., gibraltar._ rabbah, narrator of the slave-girl's story.] xxii a slave-girl's story "after many adversities, joy." _moorish proverb._ outside the walls of mazagan an english traveller had pitched his camp. night had fallen when one of his men, returning from the town, besought admission to the tent. "well, how now?" "sir, i have a woman here, by thy leave, yes, a woman, a slave, whom i found at the door of thy consulate, where she had taken refuge, but the police guard drove her away, so i brought her to thee for justice. have pity on her, and god will reward thee! see, here! rabhah!" at this bidding there approached a truly pitiable object, a dark-skinned woman, not quite black, though of decidedly negroid appearance--whose tattered garments scarcely served to hide a half-starved form. throwing herself on the ground before the foreigner, she begged his pity, his assistance, for the sake of the pitiful god. "oh, bashador," she pleaded, addressing him as though a foreign envoy, "i take refuge with god and with thee! i have no one else. i have fled from my master, who has cruelly used me. see my back!" suiting action to word, she slipped aside the coverings from her shoulder and revealed the weals of many a stripe, tears streaming down her face the while. her tones were such as none but a heart of stone could ignore. "i bore it ten days, sir, till i could do so no longer, and then i escaped. it was all to make me give false witness--from which god deliver me--for that i will never do. my present master is the sheïkh bin záharah, lieutenant kaïd of the boo azeezi, but i was once the slave-wife of the english agent, who sold me again, though they said that he dare not, because of his english protection. that was why i fled for justice to the english consul, and now come to thee. for god's sake, succour me!" with a sob her head fell forward on her breast, as again she crouched at the foreigner's feet, till made to rise and told to relate her whole story quietly. when she was calmer, aided by questions, she unfolded a tale which could, alas! be often paralleled in morocco. "my home? how can i tell thee where that was, when i was brought away so early? all i know is that it was in the sûdán" (_i.e._ land of the blacks), "and that i came to mogador on my mother's back. in my country the slave-dealers lie in wait outside the villages to catch the children when they play. they put them in bags like those used for grain, with their heads left outside the necks for air. so they are carried off, and travel all the way to this country slung on mules, being set down from time to time to be fed. but i, though born free, was brought by my mother, who had been carried off as a slave. the lines cut on my cheek show that, for every free-born child in our country is marked so by its mother. that is our sultan's order. in mogador my mother's master sold me to a man who took me from her, and brought me to dár el baïda. they took away my mother first; they dragged her off crying, and i never saw or heard of her again. when she was gone i cried for her, and could not eat till they gave me sugar and sweet dates. at dár el baïda i was sold in the market auction to a shareefa named lálla moïna, wife of the mountain scribe who taught the kádi's children. with her i was very happy, for she treated me well, and when she went to mekka on the pilgrimage she let me go out to work on my own account, promising to make me free if god brought her back safely. she was good to me, bashador, but though she returned safely she always put off making me free; but i had laid by fifteen dollars, and had bought a boxful of clothes as well. and that was where my trouble began. for god's sake succour me! "one day the agent saw me in the street, and eyed me so that i was frightened of him. he followed me home, and then sent a letter offering to buy me, but my mistress refused. then the agent often came to the house, and i had to wait upon him. he told me that he wanted to buy me, and that if he did i should be better off than if i were free, but i refused to listen. when the agent was away his man sarghîni used to come and try to buy me, but in vain; and when the agent returned he threatened to bring my mistress into trouble if she refused. at last she had to yield, and i cried when i had to go. 'thou art sold to that man,' she said; 'but as thou art a daughter to me, he has promised to take care of thee and bring thee back whenever i wish.' "sarghîni took me out by one gate with the servants of the agent, who took care to go out with a big fat jew by another, that the english consul should not see him go out with a woman. we rode on mules, and i wore a white cloak; i had not then begun to fast" (_i.e._ was not yet twelve years of age). "after two days on the road the agent asked for the key of my box, in which he found my fifteen dollars, tied up in a rag, and took them, but gave me back my clothes. we were five days travelling to marrákesh, staying each night with a kaïd who treated us very well. so i came to the agent's house. "there i found many other slave girls, besides men slaves in the garden. these were ruby, bought in saffi, by whom the agent had a daughter; and star, a white girl stolen from her home in sûs, who had no children; jessamine the less, another white girl bought in marrákesh, mother of one daughter; jessamine the greater, whose daughter was her father's favourite, loaded with jewels; and others who cooked or served, not having children, though one had a son who died. there were thirteen of us under an older slave who clothed and fed us. "when the bashador came to the house the agent shut all but five or six of us in a room, the others waiting on him. i used to have to cook for the bashador, for whom they had great receptions with music and dancing-women. next door there was a larger house, a fandak, where the agent kept public women and boys, and men at the door took money from the muslims and nazarenes who went there. the missionaries who lived close by know the truth of what i say. "a few days after i arrived i was bathed and dressed in fresh clothes, and taken to my master's room, as he used to call for one or another according to fancy. but i had no child, because he struck me, and i was sick. when one girl, named amber, refused to go to him because she was ill, he dragged her off to another part of the house. presently we heard the report of a pistol, and he came back to say she was dead. he had a pistol in his hand as long as my forearm. we found the girl in a pool of blood in agonies, and tried to flee, but had nowhere to go. so when she was quite dead he made us wash her. then he brought in four men to dig a pit, in which he said he would bury butter. when they had gone we buried her there, and i can show you the spot. "one day he took two men slaves and me on a journey. one of them ran away, the other was sold by the way. i was sold at the tuesday market of sîdi bin nûr to a dealer in slaves, whom i heard promise my master to keep me close for three months, and not to sell me in that place lest the nazarenes should get word of it. some time after i was bought by a tax-collector, with whom i remained till he died, and then lived in the house of his son. this man sold me to my present master, who has ill-treated me as i told thee. oh, bashador, when i fled from him, i came to the english consul because i was told that the agent had had no right to hold or sell me, since he had english protection. thou knowest what has happened since. here i am, at thy feet, imploring assistance. i beseech thee, turn me not away. i speak truth before god." no one could hear such a tale unmoved, and after due inquiry the englishman thus appealed to secured her liberty on depositing at the british consulate the $ paid for her by her owner, who claimed her or the money. rabhah's story, taken down by independent persons at different times, was afterwards told by her without variation in a british court of law. subsequently a pronouncement as to her freedom having been made by the british legation at tangier, the $ was refunded, and she lives free to-day. the last time the writer saw her, in the service of a european in morocco, he was somewhat taken aback to find her arms about his neck, and to have kisses showered on his shoulders for the unimportant part that he had played in securing her freedom. xxiii the pilgrim camp "work for the children is better than pilgrimage or holy war." _moorish proverb._ year by year the month succeeding the fast of ramadán sees a motley assemblage of pilgrims bound for mekka, gathered at most of the north african ports from all parts of barbary and even beyond, awaiting vessels bound for alexandria or jedda. this comparatively easy means of covering the distance, which includes the whole length of the mediterranean when the pilgrims from morocco are concerned--not to mention some two-thirds of the red sea,--has almost entirely superseded the original method of travelling all the way by land, in the once imposing caravans. these historic institutions owed their importance no less to the facilities they offered for trade, than to the opportunity they afforded for accomplishing the pilgrimage which is enjoined on every follower of mohammed. although caravans still cross the deserts of north africa in considerable force from west to east, as well as from south to north, to carry on the trade of the countries to the south of the barbary states, the former are steadily dwindling down to mere local affairs, and the number of travellers who select the modern route by steamer is yearly increasing, as its advantages become better known. for the accommodation of the large number of passengers special vessels are chartered by speculators, and are fitted up for the occasion. only some £ are charged for the whole journey from tangier, a thousand pilgrims being crowded on a medium-sized merchant vessel, making the horrors of the voyage indescribable. but the troubles of the pilgrims do not begin here. before they could even reach the sea some of them will have travelled on foot for a month from remote parts of the interior, and at the coast they may have to endure a wearisome time of waiting for a steamer. it is while they are thus learning a lesson of patience at one of the moorish ports that i will invite you for a stroll round their encampment on the market-place. this consists of scores of low, makeshift tents, with here and there a better-class round one dotted amongst them. the prevailing shape of the majority is a modified edition of the dwelling of the nomad arab, to which class doubtless belongs a fair proportion of their occupants. across the top of two poles about five feet high, before and behind, a ridge-piece is placed, and over this is stretched to the ground on either side a long piece of palmetto or goat-hair cloth, or perhaps one of the long woollen blankets worn by men and women alike, called haïks, which will again be used for its original purpose on board the vessel. the back is formed of another piece of some sort of cloth stretched out at the bottom to form a semi-circle, and so give more room inside. those who have a bit of rug or a light mattress, spread it on the floor, and pile their various other belongings around its edge. the straits to which many of these poor people are put to get a covering of any kind to shelter them from sun, rain, and wind, are often very severe, to judge from some of the specimens of tents--if they deserve the name--constructed of all sorts of odds and ends, almost anything, it would seem, that will cover a few square inches. there is one such to be seen on this busy market which deserves special attention as a remarkable example of this style of architecture. let us examine it. the materials of which it is composed include hair-cloth, woollen-cloth, a cotton shirt, a woollen cloak, and some sacking; goat skin, sheep's fleece, straw, and palmetto cord; rush mats, a palmetto mat, split-cane baskets and wicker baskets; bits of wood, a piece of cork, bark and sticks; petroleum tins flattened out, sheet iron, zinc, and jam and other tins; an earthenware dish and a stone bottle, with bits of crockery, stones, and a cow's horn to weight some of the other items down. now, if any one can make anything of this, which is an exact inventory of such of the materials as are visible on the outside, he must be a born architect. yet here this extraordinary construction stands, as it has stood for several months, and its occupant looks the jolliest fellow out. let us pay him a visit. stooping down to look under the flap which serves as a door, and raising it with my stick, i greet him with the customary salutation of "peace be with you." "with you be peace," is the cheery reply, to which is added, "welcome to thee; make thyself at home." although invited to enter, i feel quite enough at home on the outside of his dwelling, so reply that i have no time to stay, as i only "looked in" to have the pleasure of making his acquaintance and examining his "palace." at the last word one or two bystanders who have gathered round indulge in a little chuckle to themselves, overhearing which i turn round and make the most flattering remarks i can think of as to its beauty, elegance, comfort, and admirable system of ventilation, which sets the whole company, tenant included, into a roar of laughter. mine host is busy cleaning fish, and now presses us to stay and share his evening meal with him, but our appetites are not quite equal to _that_ yet, though it is beyond doubt that the morsel he would offer us would be as savoury and well cooked as could be supplied by any restaurant in piccadilly. inquiries elicit the fact that our friend is hoping to leave for mekka by the first steamer, and that meanwhile he supports himself as a water-carrier, proudly showing us his goat-skin "bottle" lying on the floor, with the leather flap he wears between it and his side to protect him from the damp. here, too, are his chain and bell, with the bright brass and tin cups. in fact, he is quite a "swell" in his way, and, in spite of his uncouth-looking surroundings, manages to enjoy life by looking on the bright side of things. "what will you do with your palace when you leave it?" we ask, seeing that it could not be moved unless the whole were jumbled up in a sack, when it would be impossible to reconstruct it. "oh, i'd let it to some one else." "for how much?" "well, that i'd leave to god." a glance round the interior of this strange abode shows that there are still many materials employed in its construction which might have been enumerated. one or two bundles, a box and a basket round the sides, serve to support the roof, and from the ridge-pole hangs a bundle which we are informed contains semolina. i once saw such a bundle suspended from a beam in a village mosque in which i had passed the night in the guise of a pious muslim, and, observing its dusty condition, inquired how it came there. "a traveller left it there about a year and a half ago, and has not yet come for it," was the reply; to judge from which it might remain till doomsday--a fact which spoke well for the honesty of the country folk in that respect at least, although i learned that they were notorious highwaymen. though the roof admits daylight every few inches, the occupier remarks that it keeps the sun and rain off fairly well, and seems to think none the worse of it for its transparent faults. a sick woman lying in a native hut with a thatched roof hardly in better condition than this one, remarked when a visitor observed a big hole just above her pallet bed-- "oh, it's so nice in the summer time; it lets the breeze in so delightfully!" it was then the depth of winter, and she had had to shift her position once or twice to avoid the rain which came through that hole. what a lesson in making the best of things did not that ignorant invalid teach! having bid the amiable water-carrier "à dieu,"--literally as well as figuratively--we turn towards a group of tents further up, whence a white-robed form has been beckoning us. after the usual salutations have been exchanged, the eager inquiry is made, "is there a steamer yet?" "no; i've nothing to do with steamers--but there's sure to be one soon." a man who evidently disbelieves me calls out, "i've got my money for the passage, and i'll hire a place with you, only bring the ship quickly." since their arrival in tangier they have learnt to call a steamer, which they have never seen before,--or even the sea,--a "bábor," a corruption of the spanish "vapor," for arabic knows neither "v" nor "p." another now comes forward to know if there is an eye-doctor in the place, for there is a mist before his eyes, as he is well-advanced in the decline of life. the sound of the word "doctor" brings up a few more of the bystanders, who ask if i am one, and as i reply in the negative, they ask who can cure their ears, legs, stomachs, and what not. i explain where they may find an excellent doctor, who will be glad to do all he can for them gratis--whereat they open their eyes incredulously,--and that for god's sake, in the name of seyïdná aïsa ("our lord jesus"), which they appreciate at once with murmurs of satisfaction, though they are not quite satisfied until they have ascertained by further questioning that he receives no support from his own or any other government. hearing the name of seyïdná aïsa, one of the group breaks out into "el hamdu l'illah, el hamdu l'illah" ("praise be to god"), a snatch of a missionary hymn to a "moody and sankey" tune, barely recognizable as he renders it. he has only been here a fortnight, and disclaims all further knowledge of the hymn or where he heard it. before another tent hard by sits a native barber, bleeding a youth from a vein in the arm, for which the fee is about five farthings. as one or two come round to look on, he remarks, in an off-hand way--probably with a view to increasing his practice--that "all the pilgrims are having this done; it's good for the internals." as we turn round to pass between two of the tents to the row beyond, our progress is stayed by a cord from the ridge of one to that of another, on which are strung strips of what appear at first sight to be leather, but on a closer inspection are found to be pieces of meat, tripe, and apparently chitterlings, hung out to dry in a sun temperature of from ° to ° fahrenheit. thus is prepared a staple article of diet for winter consumption when fresh meat is dear, or for use on journeys, and this is all the meat these pilgrims will taste till they reach mekka, or perhaps till they return. big jars of it, with the interstices filled up with butter, are stowed away in the tents "among the stuff." it is called "khalia," and is much esteemed for its tasty and reputed aphrodisiac qualities--two ideals in morocco cookery,--so that it commands a relatively good price in the market. the inmates of the next tent we look into are a woman and two men, lying down curled up asleep in their blankets, while a couple more of the latter squat at the door. having noticed our curious glances at their khalia, they, with the expressive motion of the closed fist which in native gesture-parlance signifies first-rate, endeavour to impress us with a sense of its excellence, which we do not feel inclined to dispute after all we have eaten on former occasions. this brings us to inquire what else these wanderers provide for the journey of thirteen or fourteen days one way. as bread is not to be obtained on board, at the door of the tent a tray-full of pieces are being converted into sun-dried rusks. others are provided with a kind of very hard doughnut called "fikáks." these are flavoured with anise and carraway seeds, and are very acceptable to a hungry traveller when bread is scarce, though fearfully searching to hollow teeth. then there is a goodly supply of the national food, kesk'soo or siksoo, better known by its spanish name of couscoussoo. this forms an appetizing and lordly dish, provocative of abundant eructations--a sign of good breeding in these parts, wound up with a long-drawn "praise be to god"--at the close of a regular "tuck in" with nature's spoon, the fist. a similar preparation is hand-rolled vermicelli, cooked in broth or milk, if obtainable. a bag of semolina and another of zummeetah--parched flour--which only needs enough moisture to form it into a paste to prepare it for consumption, are two other well-patronized items. a quaint story comes to mind _à propos_ of the latter, which formed part of our stock of provisions during a journey through the province of dukkála when the incident in question occurred. a tin of insect powder was also among our goods, and by an odd coincidence both were relegated to the pail hanging from one of our packs. under a spreading fig-tree near the village of smeerah, at lunch, some travelling companions offered us a cup of tea, and among other dainties placed at their disposal in return was the bag of zummeetah, of which one of them made a good meal. later on in the day, as we rested again, he complained of fearful internal gripings, which were easily explained by the discovery of the fact that the lid of the "flea's zummeetah," as one of our men styled it, had been left open, and a hole in the sack of "man's zummeetah" had allowed the two to mix in the bottom of the pail in nearly equal proportions. when this had been explained, no one entered more heartily into the joke than its victim, which spoke very well for his good temper, considering how seriously he had been affected. but this is rather a digression from our catalogue of the pilgrim's stock of provisions. rancid butter melted down in pots, honey, dates, figs, raisins, and one or two similar items form the remainder. water is carried in goat-skins or in pots made of the dried rind of a gourd, by far the most convenient for a journey, owing to their light weight and the absence of the prevailing taste of pitch imparted by the leather contrivances. several of these latter are to be seen before the tents hanging on tripods. one of the moors informs us that for the first day on board they have to provide their own water, after which it is found for them, but everything else they take with them. an ebony-hued son of ham, seated by a neighbouring tent, replies to our query as to what he is providing, "i take nothing," pointing heavenward to indicate his reliance on divine providence. and so they travel. the group before us has come from the sáhara, a month's long journey overland, on foot! yet their travels have only commenced. can they have realized what it all means? [illustration: _cavilla, photo., tangier._ waiting for the steamer.] xxiv returning home "he lengthened absence, and returned unwelcomed." _moorish proverb._ evening is about to fall--for fall it does in these south latitudes, with hardly any twilight--and the setting sun has lit the sky with a refulgent glow that must be gazed at to be understood--the arc of heaven overspread with glorious colour, in its turn reflected by the heaving sea. one sound alone is heard as i wend my way along the sandy shore; it is the heavy thud and aftersplash of each gigantic wave, as it breaks on the beach, and hurls itself on its retreating predecessor, each climbing one step higher than the last. there, in the distance, stands a motley group--men, women, children--straining wearied eyes to recognize the forms which crowd a cargo lighter slowly nearing land. away in the direction of their looks i dimly see the outline of the pilgrim ship, a cardiff coaler, which has brought close on a thousand hájes from port saïd or alexandria--men chiefly, but among them wives and children--who have paid that toilsome pilgrimage to mekka. the last rays of the sun alone remain as the boat strikes the shore, and as the darkness falls apace a score of dusky forms make a wild rush into the surging waters, while an equal number rise up eager in the boat to greet their friends. so soon as they are near enough to be distinguished one from another, each watcher on the beach shouts the name of the friend he is awaiting, proud to affix, for the first time, the title háj--pilgrim--to his name. as only some twenty or thirty have yet landed from among so many hundreds, the number of disappointed ones who have to turn back and bide their time is proportionately large. "háj mohammed! háj abd es-slám! háj el arbi! háj boo sháïb! ah, háj drees!" and many such ejaculations burst from their lips, together with inquiries as to whether so-and-so may be on board. one by one the weary travellers once more step upon the land which is their home, and with assistance from their friends unload their luggage. now a touching scene ensues. strong men fall on one another's necks like girls, kissing and embracing with true joy, each uttering a perfect volley of inquiries, compliments, congratulations, or condolence. then, with child-like simplicity, the stayer-at-home leads his welcome relative or friend by the hand to the spot where his luggage has been deposited, and seating themselves thereon they soon get deep into a conversation which renders them oblivious to all around, as the one relates the wonders of his journeyings, the other the news of home. poor creatures! some months ago they started, full of hope, on an especially trying voyage of several weeks, cramped more closely than emigrants, exposed both to sun and rain, with hardly a change of clothing, and only the food they had brought with them. arrived at their destination, a weary march across country began, and was repeated after they had visited the various points, and performed the various rites prescribed by the korán or custom, finally returning as they went, but not all, as the sorrow-stricken faces of some among the waiters on the beach had told, and the muttered exclamation, "it is written--_mektoob_." meanwhile the night has come. the creator's loving hand has caused a myriad stars to shine forth from the darkness, in some measure to replace the light of day, while as each new boat-load is set down the same scenes are enacted, and the crowd grows greater and greater, the din of voices keeping pace therewith. donkey-men having appeared on the scene with their patient beasts, they clamour for employment, and those who can afford it avail themselves of their services to get their goods transported to the city. what goods they are, too! all sorts of products of the east done up in boxes of the most varied forms and colours, bundles, rolls, and bales. the owners are apparently mere bundles of rags themselves, but they seem no less happy for that. seated on an eminence at one side are several customs officers who have been delegated to inspect these goods; their flowing garments and generally superior attire afford a striking contrast to the state of the returning pilgrims, or even to that of the friends come to meet them. these officials have their guards marching up and down between and round about the groups, to see that nothing is carried off without inspection. little by little the crowd disperses; those whose friends have landed escort them to their homes, leaving those who will have to continue their journey overland alone, making hasty preparations for their evening meal. the better class speedily have tents erected, but the majority will have to spend the night in the open air, probably in the rain, for it is beginning to spatter already. fires are lit in all directions, throwing a lurid light upon the interesting picture, and i turn my horse's head towards home with a feeling of sadness, but at the same time one of thankfulness that my lot was not cast where theirs is. part ii xxv diplomacy in morocco "the beheaded was abusing the flayed: one with her throat cut passed by, and exclaimed, 'god deliver us from such folk!'" _moorish proverb._ instead of residing at the court of the sultan, as might be expected, the ministers accredited to the ruler of morocco take up their abode in tangier, where they are more in touch with europe, and where there is greater freedom for pig-sticking. the reason for this is that the court is not permanently settled anywhere, wintering successively at one of the three capitals, fez, marrákesh, or mequinez. every few years, when anything of note arises; when there is an accumulation of matters to be discussed with the emperor, or when a new representative has been appointed, an embassy to court is undertaken, usually in spring or autumn, the best times to travel in this roadless land. what happens on these embassies has often enough been related from the point of view of the performers, but seldom from that of residents in the country who know what happens, and the following peep behind the scenes, though fortunately not typical of all, is not exaggerated. even more might have been told under some heads. as strictly applicable to no power at present represented in morocco, the record is that of an imaginary embassy from greece some sixty or more years ago. to prevent misconception, it may be as well to add that it was written previous to the failure of the mission of sir charles euan smith. i. the reception in a sloop-of-war sent all the way from the Ægean, the ambassador and his suite sailed from tangier to saffi, where his excellency was received on landing by a royal salute from the crumbling batteries. the local governor and the greek vice-consul awaited him on leaving the surf boat, with an escort which sadly upset the operations of women washing wool by the water-port. outside the land-gate, beside the ancient palace, was pitched a moorish camp awaiting his arrival, and european additions were soon erected beside it. at daybreak next morning a luncheon-party rode forward, whose duty it was to prepare the midday meal for the embassy, and to pitch the awning under which they should partake of it. arrived at the spot selected, drees, the "native agent," found the village sheïkh awaiting him with ample supplies, enough for every one for a couple of days. this he carefully packed on his mules, and by the time the embassy came up, having started some time later than he, after a good breakfast, he was ready to go on again with the remainder of the muleteers and the camel-drivers to prepare the evening meal and pitch for the night a camp over which waved the flag of greece. here the offerings of provisions or money were made with equal profusion. there were bushels of kesk'soo; there were several live sheep, which were speedily despatched and put into pots to cook; there were jars of honey, of oil, and of butter; there were camel-loads of barley for the beasts of burden, and trusses of hay for their dessert; there were packets of candles by the dozen, and loaves of sugar and pounds of tea; not to speak of fowls, of charcoal, of sweet herbs, of fruits, and of minor odds and ends. by the time the europeans arrived, their french _chef_ had prepared an excellent dinner, the native escort and servants squatting in groups round steaming dishes provided ready cooked by half-starved villagers. when the feasting was over, and all seemed quiet, a busy scene was in reality being enacted in the background. at a little distance from the camp, háj marti, the right-hand man of the agent, was holding a veritable market with the surplus mona of the day, re-selling to the miserable country folk what had been wrung from them by the authorities. the moorish government declared that what they paid thus in kind would be deducted from their taxes, and this was what the minister assured his questioning wife, for though he knew better, he found it best to wink at the proceedings of his unpaid henchman. as they proceeded inland, on the border of each local jurisdiction the escort was changed with an exhibition of "powder-play," the old one retiring as the new one advanced with the governor at its head. thus they journeyed for about a week, till they reached the crumbling walls of palm-begirt marrákesh. the official _personnel_ of the embassy consisted of the minister and his secretary nikolaki glymenopoulos, with ayush ben lezrá, the interpreter. the secretary was a self-confident dandy with a head like a pumpkin and a scrawl like the footprints of a wandering hen; reputed a judge of ladies and horse-flesh; supercilious, condescending to inferiors, and the plague of his tailor. the consul, paolo komnenos, a man of middle age with a kindly heart, yet without force of character to withstand the evils around him, had been left in tangier as _chargé d'affaires_, to the great satisfaction of his wife and family, who considered themselves of the _crême de la crême_ of tangier society, such as it was, because, however much the wife of the minister despised the bumptiousness of madame komnenos, she could not omit her from her invitations, unless of the most private nature, on account of her husband's official position. now, as madame mavrogordato accompanied her husband with her little son and a lady friend, the consul's wife reigned supreme. then there were the official _attachés_ for the occasion, the representative of the army, a colonel of roman nose, and eyes which required but one glass between them, a man to whom death would have been preferable to going one morning unshaved, or to failing one jot in military etiquette; and the representative of the navy, in cocked hat and gold-striped pantaloons, who found it more difficult to avoid tripping over his sword than most landsmen do to keep from stumbling over coils of rope on ship-board; beyond his costume there was little of note about him; his genial character made it easy to say "ay, ay," to any one, but the yarns he could spin round the camp-fire made him a general favourite. the least consequential of the party was the doctor, an army man of honest parts, who wished well to all the world. undoubtedly he was the hardest worked of the lot, for no one else did anything but enjoy himself. finally there were the "officious" _attachés_. every dabbler in politics abroad knows the fine distinctions between "official" and "officious" action, and how subtle are the changes which can be rung upon the two, but there was nothing of that description here. the officious _attachés_ were simply a party of the minister's personal friends, and two or three strangers whose influence might in after times be useful to him. one was of course a journalist, to supply the special correspondence of the _acropolis_ and the _hellenike salpinx_. these would afterwards be worked up into a handy illustrated volume of experiences and impressions calculated to further deceive the public with regard to morocco and the moors, and to secure for the minister his patron, the longed-for promotion to a european court. another was necessarily the artist of the party, while the remainder engaged in sport of one kind or another. si drees, the "native agent," was employed as master of horse, and superintended the native arrangements generally. with him rested every detail of camping out, and the supply of food and labour. right and left he was the indispensable factotum, shouting himself hoarse from before dawn till after sunset, when he joined the gay blades of the embassy in private pulls at forbidden liquors. no one worked as hard as he, and he seemed omnipresent. the foreigners were justly thankful to have such a man, for without him all felt at sea. he appeared to know everything and to be available for every one's assistance. the only draw-back was his ignorance of greek, or of any language but his own, yet being sharp-witted he made himself wonderfully understood by signs and a few words of the strange coast jargon, a mixture of half a dozen tongues. the early morning was fixed for the solemn entry of the embassy into the city, yet the road had to be lined on both sides with soldiers to keep back the thronging crowds. amid the din of multitudes, the clashing of barbarous music, and shrill ululations of delight from native women; surrounded by an eastern blaze of sun and blended colours, rode incongruous the envoy from greece. his stiff, grim figure, the embodiment of officialism, in full court dress, was supported on either hand by his secretary and interpreter, almost as resplendent as himself. behind his excellency rode the _attachés_ and other officials, then the ladies; newspaper correspondents, artists, and other non-official guests, bringing up the rear. in this order the party crossed the red-flowing tansift by its low bridge of many arches, and drew near to the gate of marrákesh called that of the thursday [market], báb el khamees. [illustration: _molinari, photo., tangier._ a city gateway in morocco.] at last they commenced to thread the narrow winding streets, their bordering roofs close packed with shrouded figures only showing an eye, who greeted them after their fashion with a piercing, long-drawn, "yoo-yoo, yoo-yoo; yoo-yoo, yoo-yoo; yoo-yoo, yoo-yoo--oo," so novel to the strangers, and so typical. then they crossed the wide-open space before the kûtûbîyah on their way to the garden which had been prepared for them, the mamûnîyah, with its handsome residence and shady walks. three days had to elapse from the time of their arrival before they could see the sultan, for they were now under native etiquette, but they had much to occupy them, much to see and think about, though supposed to remain at home and rest till the audience. on the morning of the fourth day all was bustle. each had to array himself in such official garb as he could muster, with every decoration he could borrow, for the imposing ceremony of the presentation to the emperor. what a business it was! what a coming and going; what noise and what excitement! it was like living in the thick of a whirling pantomime. at length they were under way, and making towards the kasbah gate in a style surpassing that of their entry, the populace still more excited at the sight of the gold lace and cocked hats which showed what great men had come to pay their homage to their lord the sultan. on arrival at the inmost courtyard with whitewashed, battlemented walls, and green-tiled roofs beyond, they found it thickly lined with soldiers, a clear space being left for them in the centre. here they were all ranged on foot, the presents from king otho placed on one side, and covered with rich silk cloths. presently a blast of trumpets silenced the hum of voices, and the soldiers made a show of "attention" in their undrilled way, for the sultan approached. in a moment the great doors on the other side flew open, and a number of gaily dressed natives in peaked red caps--the royal body-guard--emerged, followed by five prancing steeds, magnificent barbs of different colours, richly caparisoned, led by gold-worked bridles. then came the master of the ceremonies in his flowing robes and monster turban, a giant in becoming dress, and--as they soon discovered--of stentorian voice. behind him rode the emperor himself in stately majesty, clothed in pure white, wool-white, distinct amid the mass of colours worn by those surrounding him, his ministers. the gorgeous trappings of his white steed glittered as the proud beast arched his neck and champed his gilded bit, or tried in vain to prance. over his head was held by a slave at his side the only sign of royalty, a huge red-silk umbrella with a fringe to match, and a golden knob on the point, while others of the household servants flicked the flies away, or held the spurs, the cushion, the carpet, and other things which might be called for by their lord. on his appearance deafening shouts broke forth, "god bless our lord, and give him victory!" the rows of soldiers bowed their heads and repeated the cry with still an increase of vigour, "god bless our lord, and give him victory!" at a motion from the master of the ceremonies the members of the embassy took off their hats or helmets, and the representative of modern greece stood there bareheaded in a broiling sun before the figure-head of ancient barbary. as the sultan approached the place where he stood, he drew near and offered a few stereotyped words in explanation of his errand, learned by heart, to which the emperor replied by bidding him welcome. the minister then handed to him an engrossed address in a silk embroided case, which an attendant was motioned to take, the sultan acknowledging it graciously. one by one the minister next introduced the members of his suite, their names and qualities being shouted in awful tones by the master of the ceremonies, and after once more bidding them welcome, but with a scowl at the sight of drees, his majesty turned his horse's head, leaving them to re-mount as their steeds were brought to them. again the music struck up with a deafening din, and the state reception was over. but this was not to be the only interview between the ambassador and the sultan, for several so-called private conferences followed, at which an attendant or two and the interpreter ayush were present. kyrios mavrogordato's stock of polite workable arabic had been exhausted at the public function, and for business matters he had to rely implicitly on the services of his handy jew. such other notions of the language as he boasted could only be addressed to inferiors, and that but to convey the most simple of crude instructions or curses. at the first private audience there were many matters of importance to be brought before the sultan's notice, afterwards to be relegated to the consideration of his wazeers. this time no fuss was made, and the affair again came off in the early morning, for his majesty rose at three, and after devotions and study transacted official business from five to nine, then breakfasting and reserving the rest of the day for recreation and further religious study. ii. the interview at the appointed time an escort waited on the ambassador[ ] to convey him to the palace, arrived at which he was led into one of the many gardens in the interior, full of luxuriant semi-wild vegetation. in a room opening on to one side of the garden sat the emperor, tailor-fashion, on a european sofa, elevated by a sort of daïs opposite the door. with the exception of an armchair on the lower level, to which the ambassador was motioned after the usual formal obeisances and expressions of respect, the chamber was absolutely bare of furniture, though not lacking in beauty of decoration. the floor was of plain cut but elegant tiles, and the dado was a more intricate pattern of the same in shades of blue, green, and yellow, interspersed with black, but relieved by an abundance of greeny white. above this, to the stalactite cornice, the walls were decorated with intricate mauresque designs in carved white plaster, while the rich stalactite roofing of deep-red tone, just tipped with purple and gilt, made a perfect whole, and gave a feeling of repose to the design. through the huge open horse-shoe arch of the door the light streamed between the branches of graceful creepers waving in the breeze, adding to the impression of coolness caused by the bubbling fountain outside. [ : strictly speaking, only "minister plenipotentiary and envoy extraordinary."] "may god bless our lord, and prolong his days!" said ayush, bowing profoundly towards the sultan, as the minister concluded the repetition of his stock phrases, and seated himself. "may it please your majesty," began the minister, in greek, "i cannot express the honour i feel in again being commissioned to approach your majesty in the capacity of ambassador from my sovereign, king otho of greece." this little speech was rendered into arabic by ayush to this effect-- "may god pour blessings on our lord. the ambassador rejoices greatly, and is honoured above measure in being sent once more by his king to approach the presence of our lord, the high and mighty sovereign: yes, my lord." "he is welcome," answered the sultan, graciously; "we love no nation better than the greeks. they have always been our friends." _interpreter._ "his majesty is delighted to see your excellency, whom he loves from his heart, as also your mighty nation, than which none is more dear to him, and whose friendship he is ready to maintain at any cost." _minister._ "it pleases me greatly to hear your majesty's noble sentiments, which i, and i am sure my government, reciprocate." _interpreter._ "the minister is highly complimented by the gracious words of our lord, and declares that the greeks love no other nation on earth beside the moors: yes, my lord." _sultan._ "is there anything i can do for such good friends?" _interpreter._ "his majesty says he is ready to do anything for so good a friend as your excellency." _minister._ "i am deeply grateful to his majesty. yes, there are one or two matters which my government would like to have settled." _interpreter._ "the minister is simply overwhelmed at the thought of the consideration of our lord, and he has some trifling matters for which perhaps he may beg our lord's attention: yes, my lord." _sultan._ "he has only to make them known." _interpreter._ "his majesty will do all your excellency desires." _minister._ "first then, your majesty, there is the little affair of the greek who was murdered last year at azîla. i am sure that i can rely on an indemnity for his widow." _interpreter._ "the minister speaks of the greek who was murdered--by your leave, yes, my lord--at azîla last year: yes, my lord. the ambassador wishes him to be paid for." _sultan._ "how much does he ask?" this being duly interpreted, the minister replied-- "thirty thousand dollars." _sultan._ "half that sum would do, but we will see. what next?" _interpreter._ "his majesty thinks that too much, but as your excellency says, so be it." _minister._ "i thank his majesty, and beg to bring to his notice the imprisonment of a greek _protégé_, mesaûd bin aûdah, at mazagan some months ago, and to ask for his liberation and for damages. this is a most important case." _interpreter._ "the minister wants that thief mesaûd bin aûdah, whom the báshá of mazagan has in gaol, to be let out, and he asks also for damages: yes, my lord." _sultan._ "the man was no lawful _protégé_. i can do nothing in the case. bin aûdah is a criminal, and cannot be protected." _interpreter._ "his majesty fears that this is a matter in which he cannot oblige your excellency, much as he would like to, since the man in question is a thief. it is no use saying anything further about this." _minister._ "then ask about that jew botbol, who was thrashed. though not a _protégé_, his majesty might be able to do something." _interpreter._ "his excellency brings before our lord a most serious matter indeed; yes, my lord. it is absolutely necessary that redress should be granted to maimon botbol, the eminent merchant of mogador whom the kaïd of that place most brutally treated last year: yes, my lord. and this is most important, for botbol is a great friend of his excellency, who has taken the treatment that the poor man received very much to heart. he is sure that our lord will not hesitate to order the payment of the damages demanded, only fifty thousand dollars." _sultan._ "in consideration of the stress the minister lays upon this case, he shall have ten thousand dollars." _interpreter._ "his majesty will pay your excellency ten thousand dollars damages." _minister._ "as that is more than i had even hoped to ask, you will duly thank his majesty most heartily for this spontaneous generosity." _interpreter._ "the minister says that is not sufficient from our lord, but he will not oppose his will: yes, my lord." _sultan._ "i cannot do more." _interpreter._ "his majesty says it gives him great pleasure to pay it." _minister._ "now there is the question of slavery. i have here a petition from a great society at athens requesting his majesty to consider whether he cannot abolish the system throughout his realm," handing the sultan an elaborate arabic scroll in syrian characters hard to be deciphered even by the secretary to whom it is consigned for perusal; the sultan, though an arabic scholar, not taking sufficient interest in the matter to think of it again. _interpreter._ "there are some fanatics in the land of greece, yes, my lord, who want to see slavery abolished here, by thy leave, yes, my lord, but i will explain to the bashador that this is impossible." _sultan._ "certainly. it is an unalterable institution. those who think otherwise are fools. besides, your agent drees deals in slaves!" _interpreter._ "his majesty will give the petition his best attention, and if possible grant it with pleasure." _minister._ "you will thank his majesty very much. it will rejoice my fellow-countrymen to hear it. next, a greek firm has offered to construct the much-needed port at tangier, if his majesty will grant us the concession till the work be paid for by the tolls. such a measure would tend to greatly increase the moorish revenues." _interpreter._ "the minister wishes to build a port at tangier, yes, my lord, and to hold it till the tolls have paid for it." _sultan._ "which may not be till doomsday. nevertheless, i will consent to any one making the port whom all the european representatives shall agree to appoint"--a very safe promise to make, since the emperor knew that this agreement was not likely to be brought about till the said domesday. _interpreter._ "your excellency's request is granted. you have only to obtain the approval of your colleagues." _minister._ "his majesty is exceedingly gracious, and i am correspondingly obliged to him. inform his majesty that the same firm is willing to build him bridges over his rivers, and to make roads between the provinces, which would increase friendly communications, and consequently tend to reduce inter-tribal feuds." _interpreter._ "the minister thanks our lord, and wants also to build bridges and roads in the interior to make the tribes friendly by intercourse." _sultan._ "that would never do. the more i keep the tribes apart the better for me. if i did not shake up my rats in the sack pretty often, they would gnaw their way out. besides, where my people could travel more easily, so could foreign invaders. no, i cannot think of such a thing. god created the world without bridges." _interpreter._ "his majesty is full of regret that in this matter he is unable to please your excellency, but he thinks his country better as it is." _minister._ "although i beg to differ from his majesty, so be it. next there is the question of our commerce with morocco. this is greatly hampered by the present lack of a fixed customs tariff. there are several articles of which the exportation is now prohibited, which it would be really very much in the interest of his people to allow us to purchase." _interpreter._ "the minister requests of our lord a new customs tariff, and the right to export wheat and barley." _sultan._ "the tariff he may discuss with the wazeer of the interior; i will give instructions. as for the cereals, the bread of the faithful cannot be given to infidels." _interpreter._ "his majesty accedes to your excellency's request. you have only to make known the details to the minister for internal affairs." _minister._ "again i humbly render thanks to his majesty. since he is so particularly good to me, perhaps he would add one kindness more, in abandoning to me the old house and garden on the marshan at tangier, in which the foreign minister used to live. it is good for nothing, and would be useful to me." _interpreter._ "the minister asks our lord for a couple of houses in tangier. yes, my lord, the one formerly occupied by the foreign minister on the marshan at tangier for himself; and the other adjoining the new mosque in town, just an old tumble-down place for stores, to be bestowed upon me; yes, my lord." _sultan._ "what sort of place is that on the marshan?" _interpreter._ "i will not lie unto my lord. it is a fine big house in a large garden, with wells and fruit trees: yes, my lord. but the other is a mere nothing: yes, my lord." _sultan._ "i will do as he wishes--if it please god." (the latter expression showing the reverse of an intention to carry out the former.) _interpreter._ "his majesty gives you the house." _minister._ "his majesty is indeed too kind to me. i therefore regret exceedingly having to bring forward a number of claims which have been pending for a long time, but with the details of which i will not of course trouble his majesty personally. i merely desire his instructions to the treasury to discharge them on their being admitted by the competent authorities." _interpreter._ "the minister brings before our lord a number of claims, on the settlement of which he insists: yes, my lord. he feels it a disgrace that they should have remained unpaid so long: yes, my lord. and he asks for orders to be given to discharge them at once." _sultan._ "there is neither force nor power save in god, the high, the mighty. glory to him! there is no telling what these nazarenes won't demand next. i will pay all just claims, of course, but many of these are usurers' frauds, with which i will have nothing to do." _interpreter._ "his majesty will give the necessary instructions; but the claims will have to be examined, as your excellency has already suggested. his majesty makes the sign of the conclusion of our interview." _minister._ "assure his majesty how deeply indebted i am to him for these favours he has shown me, but allow me to in some measure acknowledge them by giving information of importance. i am entirely _au courant_, through private channels, with the unworthy tactics of the british minister, as also those of his two-faced colleagues, the representatives of france and spain, and can disclose them to his majesty whenever he desires." _interpreter._ "his excellency does not know how to express his gratitude to our lord for his undeserved and unprecedented condescension, and feels himself bound the slave of our lord, willing to do all our lord requires of his hands; yes, my lord. but he trusts that our lord will not forget the houses--and the one in town is only a little one,--or the payment of the indemnity to maimon botbol, yes, my lord, or the discharging of the claims. god bless our lord, and give him victory! and also, pardon me, my lord, the minister says that all the other ministers are rogues, and he knows all about them that our lord may wish to learn: yes, my lord." "god is omniscient. he can talk of those matters to the foreign minister to-morrow. in peace!" once more a few of his stock phrases were man[oe]uvred by kyrios mavrogordato, as with the most profound of rear-steering bows the representatives of civilization retreated, and the potentate of barbary turned with an air of relief to give instructions to his secretary. iii. the result a few weeks after this interview the _hellenike salpinx_, a leading journal of athens, contained an article of which the following is a translation:-- "our interests in morocco "(_from our special correspondent_) "marrákesh, october . "the success of our embassy to morocco is already assured, and that in a remarkable degree. the sultan has once more shown most unequivocally his strong partiality for the greek nation, and especially for their distinguished representative, kyrios dimitri mavrogordato, whose personal tact and influence have so largely contributed to this most thankworthy result. it is very many years since such a number of requests have been granted by the emperor of morocco to one ambassador, and it is probable that under the most favourable circumstances no other power could have hoped for such an exhibition of favour. "the importance of the concessions is sufficient to mark this embassy in the history of european relations with morocco, independently of the amount of ordinary business transacted, and the way in which the sultan has promised to satisfy our outstanding claims. among other favours, permission has been granted to a greek firm to construct a port at tangier, the chief seat of foreign trade in the empire, which is a matter of national importance, and there is every likelihood of equally valuable concessions for the building of roads and bridges being made to the same company. "our merchants will be rejoiced to learn that at last the vexatious customs regulations, or rather the absence of them, will be replaced by a regular tariff, which our minister has practically only to draw up for it to be sanctioned by the moorish government. the question of slavery, too, is under the consideration of the sultan with a view to its restriction, if not to its abolition, a distinct and unexpected triumph for the friends of universal freedom. there can be no question that, under its present enlightened ruler, morocco is at last on the high-road to civilization. "only those who have had experience in dealing with procrastinating politicians of the eastern school can appreciate in any degree the consummate skill and patience which is requisite to overcome the sinuosities of oriental minds, and it is only such a signal victory as has just been won for greece and for progress in morocco, as can enable us to realize the value to the state of such diplomatists as his excellency, kyrios mavrogordato." this article had not appeared in print before affairs on the spot wore a very different complexion. at the interview with the minister for the interior a most elaborate customs tariff had been presented and discussed, some trifling alterations being made, and the whole being left to be submitted to the sultan for his final approval, with the assurance that this was only a matter of form. the minister of finance had promised most blandly the payment of the damages demanded for the murder of the greek and for the thrashing of the jew. it was true that as yet no written document had been handed to the greek ambassador, but then he had the word of the ministers themselves, and promises from the sultan's lips as well. the only _fait accompli_ was the despatch of a courier to tangier with orders to deliver up the keys of two specified properties to the ambassador and his interpreter respectively, a matter which, strange to say, found no place in the messages to the press, and in which the spontaneous present to the interpreter struck his excellency as a most generous act on the part of the sultan. quite a number of state banquets had been given, in which the members of the embassy had obtained an insight into stylish native cooking, writing home that half the dishes were prepared with pomatum and the other half with rancid oil and butter. the _littérateur_ of the party had nearly completed his work on morocco, and was seriously thinking of a second volume. the young _attachés_ could swear right roundly in arabic, and were becoming perfect connoisseurs of native beauty. in the palatial residence of drees, as well as in a private residence which that worthy had placed at their disposal, they had enjoyed a selection of native female society, and had such good times under the wing of that "rare old cock," as they dubbed him, that one or two began to feel as though they had lighted among the lotus eaters, and had little desire to return. but to kyrios mavrogordato and glymenopoulos his secretary, the delay at court began to grow irksome, and they heartily wished themselves back in tangier. notwithstanding the useful "tips" which he had given to the foreign minister regarding the base designs of his various colleagues accredited to that court, his own affairs seemed to hang fire. he had shown how france was determined to make war upon morocco sooner or later, with a view to adding its fair plains to those it was acquiring in algeria, and had warned him that if the sultan lent assistance to the ameer abd el káder he would certainly bring this trouble upon himself. he had also shown how england pretended friendship because at any cost she must maintain at least the neutrality of that part of his country bordering on the straits of gibraltar, and that with all her professions of esteem, she really cared not a straw for the moors. he had shown too that puny spain held it as an article of faith that morocco should one day become hers in return for the rule of the moors upon her own soil. he had, in fact, shown that greece alone cared for the real interests of the sultan. iv. diamond cut diamond yet things did not move. the treaty of commerce remained unsigned, and slaves were still bought and sold. the numerous claims which he had to enforce had only been passed in part, and the moorish authorities seemed inclined to dispute the others stoutly. at last, at a private conference with the wazeer el kiddáb, the ambassador broached a proposal to cut the gordian knot. he would abandon all disputed claims for a lump sum paid privately to himself, and asked what the moorish government might feel inclined to offer. the wazeer el kiddáb received this proposal with great complacency. he was accustomed to such overtures. every day of his life that style of bargain was part of his business. but this was the first time that a european ambassador had made such a suggestion in its nakedness, and he was somewhat taken aback, though his studied indifference of manner did not allow the foreigner to suspect such a thing for a moment. the usual style had been for him to offer present after present to the ambassadors till he had reached their price, and then, when his master had overloaded them with personal favours--many of which existed but in promise--they had been unable to press too hard the claims they had come to enforce, for fear of possible disclosures. so this was a novel proceeding, though quite comprehensible on the part of a man who had been bribed on a less extensive scale on each previous visit to court. once, however, such a proposition had been made, it was evident that his government could not be much in earnest regarding demands which he could so easily afford to set aside. as soon, therefore, as kyrios mavrogordato had left, the wazeer ordered his mule, that he might wait upon his majesty before the hours of business were over. his errand being stated as urgent and private, he was admitted without delay to his sovereign's presence. "may god prolong the days of our lord! i come to say that the way to rid ourselves of the importunity of this ambassador from greece is plain. he has made it so himself by offering to abandon all disputed claims for a round sum down for his own use. what is the pleasure of my lord?" "god is great!" exclaimed the sultan, "that is well. you may inform the minister from me that a positive refusal is given to every demand not already allowed in writing. what _he_ can afford to abandon, _i_ can't afford to pay." "the will of our lord shall be done." "but stay! i have had my eye upon that greek ambassador this long while, and am getting tired of him. the abuses he commits are atrocious, and his man drees is a devil. háj taïb el ghassál writes that the number of his _protégés_ is legion, and that by far the greater number of them are illegal. inform him when you see him that henceforth the provisions of our treaties shall be strictly adhered to, and moreover that no protection certificates shall be valid unless countersigned by our foreign commissioner el ghassál. if i rule here, i will put an end to this man's doings." "on my head and eyes be the words of my lord." "and remind him further that the permits for the free passage of goods at the customs are granted only for his personal use, for the necessities of his household, and that the way háj taïb writes he has been selling them is a disgrace. the man is a regular swindler, and the less we have to do with him the better. as for his pretended information about his colleagues, there may be a good deal of truth in it, but i have the word of the english minister, who is about as honest as any of them, that this mavrogordato is a born villain, and that if his government is not greedy for my country on its own account, it wants to sell me to some more powerful neighbour in exchange for its protection. greece is only a miserable fag-end of europe." "our lord knows: may god give him victory," and the wazeer bowed himself out to consider how best he might obey his instructions, not exactly liking the task. on returning home he despatched a messenger to the quarters of the embassy, appointing an hour on the morrow for a conference, and when this came the ambassador found himself in for a stormy interview. the wazeer, with his snuff-box in constant use, sat cool and collected on his mattress on the floor, the ambassador sitting uneasily on a chair before him. though the language used was considerably modified in filtering through the brain of the interpreter, the increasing violence of tone and gesture could not be concealed, and were all but sufficiently comprehensible in themselves. the ambassador protested that if the remainder of the demands were to be refused, he was entitled to at least as much as the french representative had had to shut his mouth last time he came to court, and affected overwhelming indignation at the treatment he had received. "besides," he added, "i have the promise of his majesty the sultan himself that certain of them should be paid in full, and i cannot abandon those. i have informed my government of the sultan's words." "dost suppose that my master is a dog of a nazarene, that he should keep his word to thee? nothing thou may'st say can alter his decision. the claims that have been allowed in writing shall be paid by the customs administrators on thy return to tangier. here are orders for the money." "i absolutely refuse to accept a portion of what my government demands. i will either receive the whole, or i will return empty-handed, and report on the treacherous way in which i have been treated. i am thoroughly sick of the procrastinating and prevaricating ways of this country--a disgrace to the age." "and we are infinitely more sick of thy behaviour and thine abuse of the favours we have granted thee. our lord has expressly instructed me to tell thee that in future no excess of the rights guaranteed to foreigners by treaty will be permitted on any account. thy protection certificates to be valid must be endorsed by our foreign commissioner, and the nature of the goods thou importest free of duty as for thyself shall be strictly examined, as we have the right to do, that no more defrauding of our revenue be permitted." "your words are an insult to my nation," exclaimed the ambassador, rising, "and shall be duly reported to my government. i cannot sit here and listen to vile impeachments like these; you know them to be false!" "that is no affair of mine; i have delivered the decision of our lord, and have no more to say. the claims we refuse are all of them unjust, the demands of usurers, on whom be the curse of god; and demands for money which has never been stolen, or has already been paid; every one of them is a shameful fraud, god knows. leeches are only fit to be trodden on when they have done their work; we want none of them." "your language is disgraceful, such as was never addressed to me in my life before; if i do not receive an apology by noon to-morrow, i will at once set out for tangier, if not for greece, and warn you of the possible consequences." * * * * * the excitement in certain circles in athens on the receipt of the intelligence that the embassy to morocco had failed, after all the flourish of trumpets with which its presumed successes had been hailed, was great indeed. one might have thought that once more the brave hellenes were thirsting for the conquest of another sicily, to read the columns of the _palingenesia_, some of the milder paragraphs of which, translated, ran thus:-- "a solemn duty has been imposed upon our nation by the studied indignities heaped upon our representative at the court of morocco. greece has been challenged, europe defied, and the whole civilized world insulted. the duty now before us is none other than to wipe from the earth that nest of erstwhile pirates flattered by the name of the moorish government.... "as though it were insufficient to have refused the just demands presented by kyrios mavrogordato for the payment of business debts due to greek merchants, and for damages acknowledged to be due to others for property stolen by lawless bandits, his excellency has been practically dismissed from the court in a manner which has disgraced our flag in the eyes of all morocco. "here are two counts which need no exaggeration. unless the payment of just business debts is duly enforced by the moorish government, as it would be in any other country, and unless the native agents of our merchants are protected fully by the local authorities, it is hopeless to think of maintaining commercial relations with such a nation, so that insistence on these demands is of vital necessity to our trade, and a duty to our growing manufactories. "the second count is of the simplest: such treatment as has been meted out to our minister plenipotentiary in morocco, especially after the bland way in which he was met at first with empty promises and smiles, is worthy only of savages or of a people intent on war." the _hellenike salpinx_ was hardly less vehement in the language in which it chronicled the course of events in morocco:-- "notwithstanding the unprecedented manner in which the requests of his excellency, kyrios dimitri mavrogordato, our minister plenipotentiary and envoy extraordinary at the court of morocco, were acceded to on the recent embassy to mulai abd er-rahmán, the moors have shown their true colours at last by equally marked, but less astonishing, insults. "the unrivalled diplomatic talents of our ambassador proved, in fact, too much for the moorish government, and though the discovery of the way in which a nazarene was obtaining his desires from the sultan may have aroused the inherent obstinacy of the wazeers, and thus produced the recoil which we have described, it is far more likely that this was brought about by the officious interference of one or two other foreign representatives at tangier. it has been for some time notorious that the sardinian consul-general--who at the same time represents portugal--loses no opportunity of undermining grecian influence in morocco, and in this certain of his colleagues have undoubtedly not been far behind him. "nevertheless, whatever causes may have been at work in bringing about this crisis, it is one which cannot be tided over, but which must be fairly faced. greece has but one course before her." xxvi prisoners and captives "misfortune is misfortune's heir." _moorish proverb._ externally the gaol of tangier does not differ greatly in appearance from an ordinary moorish house, and even internally it is of the plan which prevails throughout the native buildings from fandaks to palaces. a door-way in a blank wall, once whitewashed, gives access to a kind of lobby, such as might precede the entrance to some grandee's house, but instead of being neat and clean, it is filthy and dank, and an unwholesome odour pervades the air. on a low bench at the far end lie a guard or two in dirty garments, fitting ornaments for such a place. by them is the low-barred entrance to the prison, with a hole in the centre the size of such a face as often fills it, wan and hopeless. a clanking of chains, a confused din of voices, and an occasional moan are borne through the opening on the stench-laden atmosphere. "all hope abandon, ye who enter here!" could never have been written on portal more appropriate than this, unless he who entered had friends and money. here are forgotten good and bad, the tried and the untried, just and unjust together, sunk in a night of blank despair, a living grave. around an open courtyard, protected by an iron grating at the top, is a row of dirty columns, and behind them a kind of arcade, on to which open a number of doorless chambers. filth is apparent everywhere, and to the stifling odour of that unwashed horde is added that caused by insanitary drainage. to some of the pillars are chained poor wretches little more than skeletons, while a cable of considerable length secures others. it is locked at one end to a staple outside the door under which it passes, and is threaded through rings on the iron collars of half a dozen prisoners who have been brought in as rebels from a distant province. for thirteen days they have tramped thus, carrying that chain, holding it up by their hands to save their shoulders, and two empty rings still threaded on show that when they started they numbered eight. since the end rings are riveted to the chain, it has been impossible to remove them, so when two fell sick by the way the drivers cut off their heads to effect the release of their bodies, and to prove, by presenting those ghastly trophies at their journey's end, that none had escaped. many of the prisoners are busy about the floor, where they squat in groups, plaiting baskets and satchels of palmetto leaves, while many appear too weak and disheartened even to earn a subsistence in this way. one poor fellow, who has been a courier, was employed one day twenty-five years since to carry a despatch to court, complaining of the misdeeds of a governor. that official himself intercepted the letter, and promptly despatched the bearer to tangier as a sultan's prisoner. he then arrested the writer of the letter, who, on paying a heavy fine, regained his liberty, but the courier remained unasked for. in course of time the kaïd was called to his account, and his son, who succeeded him in office, having died too, a stranger ruled in their stead. the forgotten courier had by this time lost his reason, fancying himself once more in his goat-hair tent on the southern plains, and with unconscious irony he still gives every new arrival the arab greeting, "welcome to thee, a thousand welcomes! make thyself at home and comfortable. all before thee is thine, and what thou seest not, be sure we don't possess." some few, in better garments, hold themselves aloof from the others, and converse together with all the nonchalance of gossip in the streets, for they are well-to-do, arrested on some trivial charge which a few dollars apiece will soon dispose of, but they are exceptions. a quieter group occupies one corner, members of a party of no less than sixty-two brought in together from fez, on claims made against them by a european power. a sympathetic inquiry soon elicits their histories.[ ] the first man to speak is hoary and bent with years; he was arrested several years ago, on the death of a brother who had owed some $ to a european. the second had borrowed $ in exchange for a bond for twice that amount; he had paid off half of this, and having been unable to do more, had been arrested eighteen months before. the third had similarly received $ for a promise to pay $ ; he had been in prison five years and three months. another had borrowed $ , and knew not the sum which stood yet against him. another had been in prison five years for a debt alleged to have been contracted by an uncle long dead. another had borrowed $ on a bond for $ . another had languished eighteen months in gaol on a claim for $ ; the amount originally advanced to him was about $ , but the acknowledgment was for $ , which had been renewed for $ on its falling due and being dishonoured. another had borrowed $ on agreeing to refund $ , which was afterwards increased to $ and then to $ . he has been imprisoned three years. the debt of another, originally $ for a loan of half that amount, has since been doubled twice, and now stands at $ , less $ paid on account, while for forty-two measures of wheat delivered on account he can get no allowance, though that was three years ago, and four months afterwards he was sent to prison. another had paid off the $ he owed for an advance of $ , but on some claim for expenses the creditor had withheld the bond, and is now suing for the whole amount again. he has been in prison two years and six months. another has paid twenty measures of barley on account of a bond for $ , for which he has received $ , and he was imprisoned at the same time as the last speaker, his debt being due to the same man. another had borrowed $ on the usual terms, and has paid the whole in cash or wheat, but cannot get back the bond. he has previously been imprisoned for a year, but two years after his release he was re-arrested, fourteen months ago. another has been two months in gaol on a claim for $ for a loan of $ . the last one has a bitter tale to tell, if any could be worse than the wearisome similarity of those who have preceded him. [ : all these statements were taken down from the lips of the victims at the prison door, and most, if not all of them, were supported by documentary evidence.] "some years ago," he says, "i and my two brothers, drees and ali, borrowed $ from a jew of mequinez, for which we gave him a notarial bond for $ . we paid him a small sum on account every month, as we could get it--a few dollars at a time--besides presents of butter, fowls, and eggs. at the end of the first year he threatened to imprison us, and made us change the bond for one for $ , and year by year he raised the debt this way till it reached $ , even after allowing for what we had paid off. i saw no hope of ever meeting his claim, so i ran away, and my brother drees was imprisoned for six years. he died last winter, leaving a wife and three children, the youngest, a daughter, being born a few months after her father was taken away. he never saw her. by strenuous efforts our family paid off the $ , selling all their land, and borrowing small sums. but the jew would not give up the bond. he died about two years ago, and we do not know who is claiming now, but we are told that the sum demanded is $ . we have nothing now left to sell, and, being in prison, we cannot work. when my brother drees died, i and my brother ali were seized to take his place. my kaïd was very sorry for me, and became surety that i would not escape, so that my irons were removed; but my brother remains still in fetters, as poor drees did all through the six years. we have no hope of our friends raising any money, so we must wait for death to release us." here he covers his face with his hands, and several of his companions, in spite of their own dire troubles, have to draw their shrivelled arms across their eyes, as silence falls upon the group. as we turn away heartsick a more horrible sight than any confronts us before the lieutenant-governor's court. a man is suspended by the arms and legs, face downwards, by a party of police, who grasp his writhing limbs. with leather thongs a stalwart policeman on either side is striking his bare back in turn. already blood is flowing freely, but the victim does not shriek. he only winces and groans, or gives an almost involuntary cry as the cruel blows fall on some previously harrowed spot. he is already unable to move his limbs, but the blows fall thick and fast. will they never cease? by the side stands a young european counting them one by one, and when the strikers slow down from exhaustion he orders them to stop, that others may relieve them. the victim is by this time swooning, so the european directs that he shall be put on the ground and deluged with water till he revives. when sufficiently restored the count begins again. presently the european stays them a second time; the man is once again insensible, yet he has only received six hundred lashes of the thousand which have been ordered. "well," he exclaims, "it's no use going on with him to-day. put him in the gaol now, and i'll come and see him have the rest to-morrow." "god bless thee, but surely he has had enough!" exclaims the lieutenant-governor, in sympathetic tones. "enough? he deserves double! the consul has only ordered a thousand, and i am here to see that he has every one. we'll teach these villains to rob our houses!" "there is neither force nor power save in god, the high, the mighty! as thou sayest; it is written," and the powerless official turns away disgusted. "god burn these nazarenes, their wives and families, and all their ancestors! they were never fit for aught but hell!" he may be heard muttering as he enters his house, and well may he feel as he does. the policemen carry the victim off to the gaol hard by, depositing him on the ground, after once more restoring him with cold water. "god burn their fathers and their grandfathers, and the whole cursed race of them!" they murmur, for their thoughts still run upon the consul and the clerk. leaving him sorrowfully, they return to the yard, where we still wait to obtain some information as to the cause of such treatment. "why, that dog of a nazarene, the greek consul, says that his house was robbed a month ago, though we don't believe him, for it wasn't worth it. the sinner says that a thousand dollars were stolen, and he has sent in a claim for it to the sultan. the minister's now at court for the money, the satan! god rid our country of them all!" "but how does this poor fellow come in for it?" "he! he never touched the money! only he had some quarrel with the clerk, so they accused him of the theft, as he was the native living nearest to the house, just over the fence. he's nothing but a poor donkey-man, and an honest one at that. the consul sent his clerk up here to say he was the thief, and that he must receive a thousand lashes. the governor refused till the man should be tried and convicted, but the greek wouldn't hear of it, and said that if he wasn't punished at once he would send a courier to his minister at marrákesh, and have a complaint made to the sultan. the governor knew that if he escaped it would most likely cost him his post to fight the consul, so he gave instructions for the order to be carried out, and went indoors so as not to be present." "god is supreme!" ejaculates a bystander. "but these infidels of nazarenes know nothing of him. his curse be on them!" answers the policeman. "they made us ride the poor man round the town on a bare-backed donkey, with his face to the tail, and all the way two of us had to thrash him, crying, 'thus shall be done to the man who robs a consul!' he was ready to faint before we got him up here. god knows _we_ don't want to lash him again!" * * * * * next day as we pass the gaol we stop to inquire after the prisoner, but the poor fellow is still too weak to receive the balance due, and so it is for several days. then they tell us that he has been freed from them by god, who has summoned his spirit, though meanwhile the kindly attentions of a doctor have been secured, and everything possible under the circumstances has been done to relieve his sufferings. after all, he was "only a moor!" * * * * * the greek consul reported that the condition of the moorish prisons was a disgrace to the age, and that he had himself known prisoners who had succumbed to their evil state after receiving a few strokes from the lash. a statement of claim for a thousand dollars, alleged to have been robbed from his house, was forwarded by courier to his chief, then at court, and was promptly added to the demands that it was part of his excellency's errand to enforce. xxvii the protection system "my heart burns, but my lips will not give utterance." _moorish proverb._ i. the need crouched at the foreigner's feet lay what appeared but a bundle of rags, in reality a suppliant moor, once a man of wealth and position. hugging a pot of butter brought as an offering, clutching convulsively at the leg of the chair, his furrowed face bespoke past suffering and present earnestness. "god bless thee, bashador, and all the christians, and give me grace in thy sight!" "oh, indeed, so you like the christians?" "yes, bashador, i must love the christians; they have justice, we have none. i wish they had rule over the country." "then you are not a good muslim!" "oh yes, i am, i am a háj (pilgrim to mekka), and i love my own religion, certainly i do, but none of our officials follow our religion nowadays: they have no religion. they forget god and worship money; their delight is in plunder and oppression." "you appear to have known better days. what is your trouble?" "trouble enough," replies the moor, with a sigh. "i am hamed zirári. i was rich once, and powerful in my tribe, but now i have only this sheep and two goats. i and my wife live alone with our children in a nuállah (hut), but after all we are happier now when they leave us alone, than when we were rich. i have plenty of land left, it is true, but we dare not for our lives cultivate more than a small patch around our nuállah, lest we should be pounced upon again." [illustration: _photograph by dr. rudduck._ a central morocco homestead (nuÁllas).] "how did you lose your property?" "i will tell you, bashador, and then you will see whether i am justified in speaking of our government as i do. it is a sad story, but i will tell you all.[ ] a few years ago i possessed more than six hundred cows and bullocks, more than twelve hundred sheep, a hundred good camels, fifty mules, twenty horses, and twenty-four mares. i had also four wives and many slaves. i had plenty of guns and abundance of grain in my stores; in fact, i was rich and powerful among my people, by whom i was held in great honour; but alas! alas! our new kaïd is worse than the old one; he is insatiable, a pit without a bottom! there is no possibility of satisfying his greed! [ : this story is reproduced from notes taken of the man's narrative by my father.--b. m.] "i felt that although by continually making him valuable presents i succeeded in keeping on friendly terms with him, he was always coveting my wealth. we have in our district two markets a week, and at last i had to present him with from $ to $ every market-day. i was nevertheless in constant dread of his eyes--they are such greedy eyes--and i saw that it would be necessary to look out for protection. i was too loyal a subject of the sultan then, and too good a muslim, to think of nazarene protection, so i applied for help to si mohammed boo aálam, commander-in-chief of our lord (whom may god send victorious), and to enter the sultan's service. "we prepared a grand present with which to approach him, and when it was ready i started with it, accompanied by two of my cousins. we took four splendid horses, four mares with their foals, four she-camels with their young, four picked cows, two pairs of our best bullocks, four fine young male slaves, each with a silver-mounted gun, and four well-dressed female slaves, each carrying a new bucket in her hand, many jars containing fresh and salted butter and honey, beside other things, and a thousand dollars in cash. it was a fine present, was it not, bashador? "well, on arrival at si mohammed's place, we slaughtered two bullocks at his door, and humbly begged his gracious acceptance of our offering, which we told him we regretted was not greater, but that as we were his brethren, we trusted to find favour in his sight. we said we wished to honour him, and to become his fortunate slaves, whose chief delight it would be to do his bidding. we reminded him that although he was so rich and powerful he was still our brother, and that we desired nothing better than to live in continual friendship with him. "he received and feasted us very kindly, and gave us appointments as mounted guards to the marshal of the sultan, as which we served happily for seven months. we were already thinking about sending for some of our family to come and relieve us, that we might return home ourselves, when one day si mohammed sent for us to say that he was going away for a time, having received commands from the sultan to visit a distant tribe with the effects of royal displeasure. after mutual compliments and blessings he set off with his soldiers. "five days later a party of soldiers came to our house. to our utter astonishment and dismay, without a word of explanation, they put chains on our necks and wrists, and placing us on mules, bore us away. remonstrance and resistance were equally vain. we were in mequinez. it was already night, and though the gates were shut, and are never opened again except in obedience to high authority, they were silently opened for us to pass through. once outside, our eyes were bandaged, and we were lashed to our uncomfortable seats. thus we travelled on as rapidly as possible, in silence all night long. it was a long night, that, indeed, bashador, a weary night, but we felt sure some worse fate awaited us; what, we could not imagine, for we had committed no crime. finally, after three days we halted, and the bandages were removed from our eyes. we found ourselves in a market-place in rahámna, within the jurisdiction of our cursëd kaïd. all around us were our flocks and herds, camels, and horses, all our movable property, which we soon learnt had been brought there for public sale. a great gathering was there to purchase. "the kaïd was there, and when he saw us he exclaimed, 'there you are, are you? you can't escape from me now, you children of dogs!' then he turned to a brutal policeman, crying, 'put the bastards on the ground, and give them a thousand lashes.' those words ring in my ears still. i felt as in a dream. i was too utterly in his power to think of answering, and after a very few strokes the power of doing so was taken from me, for i lost consciousness. how many blows we received i know not, but we must have been very nearly killed. when i revived we were in a filthy matmorah, where we existed for seven months in misery, being kept alive on a scanty supply of barley loaves and water. at last i pretended to have lost my reason, as i should have done in truth had i stayed there much longer. when they told the kaïd this, he gave permission for me to be let out. i found my wife and children still living, thank god, though they had had very hard times. what has become of my cousins i do not know, and do not dare to ask, but thou couldst, o bashador, if once i were under thy protection. "all i know is that, after receiving our present, si mohammed sold us to the kaïd for twelve hundred dollars. he was a fool, bashador, a great fool; had he demanded of us we would have given him twelve hundred dollars to save ourselves what we have had to suffer. "wonderest thou still, o bashador, that i prefer the nazarenes, and wish there were more of them in the country? i respect the dust off their shoes more than a whole nation of miscalled muslims who could treat me as i have been treated; but god is just, and 'there is neither force nor power save in god,' yes, 'all is written.' he gives to men according to their hearts. we had bad hearts, and he gave us a government like them." ii. the search the day was already far spent when at last abd allah led his animal into one of the caravansarais outside the gate of mazagan, so, after saying his evening prayers and eating his evening meal, he lay down to rest on a heap of straw in one of the little rooms of the fandak, undisturbed either by anxious dreams, or by the multitude of lively creatures about him. ere the sun had risen the voice of the muédhdhin awoke him with the call to early prayer. shrill and clear the notes rang out on the calm morning air in that perfect silence-- "g-o-d is gr-ea--t! g-o-d is gr-ea--t! g-o-d is grea--t! i witness that there is no god but god, and mohammed is the messenger of god. come to prayer! come to prayer! come to prayer! prayer is better than sleep! come to prayer!" quickly rising, abd allah repaired to the water-tap, and seating himself on the stone seat before it, rapidly performed the prescribed religious ablutions, this member three times, then the other as often, and so on, all in order, right first, left to follow as less honourable, finishing up with the pious ejaculation, "god greatest!" thence to the mosque was but a step, and in a few minutes he stood barefooted in those dimly-lighted, vaulted aisles, in which the glimmering oil lamps and the early streaks of daylight struggled for the mastery. his shoes were on the ground before him at the foot of the pillar behind which he had placed himself, and his hands were raised before his face in the attitude of prayer. then, at the long-drawn cry of the leader, in company with his fellow-worshippers, he bowed himself, and again with them rose once more, in a moment to kneel down and bow his forehead to the earth in humble adoration. having performed the usual series of prayers, he was ready for coffee and bread. this he took at the door of the fandak, seated on the ground by the coffee-stall, inquiring meanwhile the prospects of protection in mazagan. there was tájir[ ] pépé, always ready to appoint a new agent for a consideration, but then he bore almost as bad a name for tyrannizing over his _protégés_ as did the kaïds themselves. there was tájir yûsef the jew, but then he asked such tremendous prices, because he was a vice-consul. there was tájir juan, but then he was not on good enough terms with his consul to protect efficiently those whom he appointed, so he could not be thought of either. but there was tájir vecchio, a new man from gibraltar, fast friends with his minister, and who must therefore be strong, yet a man who did not name too high a figure. to him, therefore, abd allah determined to apply, and when his store was opened presented himself. [ : "merchant," used much as "mr." is with us.] under his cloak he carried three pots of butter in one hand, and as many of honey in the other, while a ragged urchin tramped behind with half a dozen fowls tied in a bunch by the legs, and a basket of eggs. the first thing was to get a word with the head-man at the store; so, slipping a few of the eggs into his hands, abd allah requested an interview with the tájir, with whom he had come to make friends. this being promised, he squatted on his heels by the door, where he was left to wait an hour or two, remarking to himself at intervals that god was great, till summoned by one of the servants to enter. the merchant was seated behind his desk, and abd allah, having deposited his burden on the floor, was making round the table to throw himself at his feet, when he was stopped and allowed but to kiss his hand. "well, what dost thou want?" "i have come to make friends, o merchant." "who art thou?" "i am abd allah bin boo shaïb es-sálih, o merchant, of aïn haloo in rahámna. i have a family there, and cattle, and very much land. i wish to place all in thy hands, and to become thy friend," again endeavouring to throw himself at the feet of the european. "all right, all right, that will do. i will see about it; come to me again to-morrow." "may god bless thee, o merchant, and fill thee with prosperity, and may he prolong thy days in peace!" as tájir vecchio went on with his writing, abd allah made off with a hopeful heart to spend the next twenty-four anxious hours in the fandak, while his offerings were carried away to the private house by a servant. next morning saw him there again, when much the same scene was repeated. this time, however, they got to business. "how can i befriend you?" asked the european, after yesterday's conversation had been practically repeated. "thou canst very greatly befriend me by making me thy agent in aïn haloo. i will work for thee, and bring thee of the produce of my land as others do, if i may only enjoy thy protection. may god have mercy on thee, o merchant. i take refuge with thee." "i can't be always appointing agents and protecting people for nothing. what can you give me?" "whatever is just, o merchant, but the lord knows that i am not rich, though he has bestowed sufficient on me to live, praise be to him." "well, i should want two hundred dollars down, and something when the certificate is renewed next year, besides which you would of course report yourself each quarter, and not come empty-handed. animals and corn i can do best with, but i don't want any of your poultry." "god bless thee, merchant, and make thee prosperous, but two hundred dollars is a heavy sum for me, and this last harvest has not been so plentiful as the one before, as thou knowest. grant me this protection for one hundred and fifty dollars, and i can manage it, but do not make it an impossibility." "i can't go any lower: there are scores of moors who would give me that price. do as you like. good morning." "thou knowest, o merchant, i could not give more than i have offered," replied abd allah as he rose and left the place. but as no one else could be found in the town to protect him on better terms, he had at last to return, and in exchange for the sum demanded received a paper inscribed on one side in arabic, and on the other in english, as follows:-- "vice-consulate for great britain, "mazagan, _oct. , _. "_this is to certify that abd allah bin boo shaïb es-sálih, resident at aïn haloo in the province of rahámna, has been duly appointed agent of edward vecchio, a british subject, residing in mazagan: all authorities will respect him according to existing treaties, not molesting him without proper notice to this vice-consulate._[ ] "_gratis_ seal. [signed] "john smith. "_h.b.m.'s vice-consul, mazagan._" [ : a genuine "patent of protection," as prescribed by treaty, supposed to be granted only to wholesale traders, whereas every beggar can obtain "certificates of partnership." the native in question has then only to appear before the notaries and state that he has in his possession so much grain, or so many oxen or cattle, belonging to a certain european, who takes them as his remuneration for presenting the notarial document at his legation, and obtaining the desired certificate. moreover, he receives half the produce of the property thus made over to him. this is popularly known as "farming in morocco."] xxviii justice for the jew "sleep on anger, and thou wilt not rise repentant." _moorish proverb._ the kaïd sat in his seat of office, or one might rather say reclined, for moorish officials have a habit of lying in two ways at once when they are supposed to be doing justice. strictly speaking, his position was a sort of halfway one, his back being raised by a pile of cushions, with his right leg drawn up before him, as he leant on his left elbow. his judgement seat was a veritable wool-sack, or rather mattress, placed across the left end of a long narrow room, some eight feet by twenty, with a big door in the centre of one side. the only other apertures in the whitewashed but dirty walls were a number of ventilating loop-holes, splayed on the inside, ten feet out of the twelve above the floor. this was of worn octagonal tiles, in parts covered with a yellow rush mat in an advanced state of consumption. notwithstanding the fact that the ceiling was of some dark colour, hard to be defined at its present age, the audience-chamber was amply lighted from the lofty horse-shoe archway of the entrance, for sunshine is reflection in morocco to a degree unknown in northern climes. on the wall above the head of the kaïd hung a couple of huge and antiquated horse-pistols, while on a small round table at his feet, some six inches high, lay a collection of cartridges and gunsmith's tools. behind him, on a rack, were half a dozen long flint-lock muskets, and on the wall by his feet a number of moorish daggers and swords. in his hand the governor fondled a european revolver, poking out and replacing the charges occasionally, just to show that it was loaded. his personal attire, though rich in quality, ill became his gawky figure, and there was that about his badly folded turban which bespoke the parvenu. like the muzzle of some wolf, his pock-marked visage glowered on a couple of prostrated litigants before him, as they fiercely strove to prove each other wrong. near his feet was squatted his private secretary, and at the door stood policemen awaiting instructions to imprison one or both of the contending parties. the dispute was over the straying of some cattle, a paltry claim for damages. the plaintiff having presented the kaïd with a loaf of sugar and a pound of candles, was in a fair way to win his case, when a suggestive sign on the part of the defendant, comprehended by the judge as a promise of a greater bribe, somewhat upset his calculations, for he was summarily fined a couple of dollars, and ordered to pay another half dollar costs for having allowed the gate of his garden to stand open, thereby inviting his neighbour's cattle to enter. without a word he was carried off to gaol pending payment, while the defendant settled with the judge and left the court. into the midst of this scene came another policeman, gripping by the arm a poor jewish seamstress named mesaôdah, who had had the temerity to use insulting language to her captor when that functionary was upbraiding her for not having completed some garment when ordered, though he insisted on paying only half-price, declaring that it was for the governor. the jewess had hardly spoken when she lay sprawling on the ground from a blow which she dare not, under any provocation, return, but her temper had so far gained the mastery over her, that as she rose she cursed her tormentor roundly. that was enough; without more ado the man had laid his powerful arm upon her, and was dragging her to his master's presence, knowing how welcome any such case would be, even though it was not one out of which he might hope to make money. reckless of the governor's well-known character, mesaôdah at once opened her mouth to complain against mahmood, pitching her voice in the terrible key of her kind. "my lord, may god bless thee and lengthen...." a fierce shake from her captor interrupted the sentence, but did not keep her quiet, for immediately she continued, in pleading tones, as best she could, struggling the while to keep her mouth free from the wretch's hand. "protect me, i pray thee, from this cruel man; he has struck me: yes, my lord." "strike her again if she doesn't stop that noise," cried the kaïd, and as the man raised his hand to threaten her she saw there was no hope, and her legs giving way beneath her, she sank to the ground in tears. "for god's sake, yes, my lord, have mercy on thine handmaid." it was pitiful to hear the altered tones, and it needed the heart of a brute to reply as did the governor, unmoved, by harshly asking what she had been up to. "she's a thief, my lord, a liar, like all her people; god burn their religion; i gave her a waistcoat to make a week ago, and i purposed it for a present to thee, my lord, but she has made away with the stuff, and when i went for it she abused me, and, by thy leave, thee also, my lord; here she is to be punished." "it's a lie, my lord; the stuff is in my hut, and the waistcoat's half done, but i knew i should never get paid for it, so had to get some other work done to keep my children from starving, for i am a widow. have mercy on me!" "god curse the liar! i have spoken the truth," broke in the policeman. "fetch a basket for her!" ordered the kaïd, and in another moment a second attendant was assisting mahmood to force the struggling woman to sit in a large and pliable basket of palmetto, the handles of which were quickly lashed across her stomach. she was then thrown shrieking on her back, her bare legs lifted high, and tied to a short piece of pole just in front of the ankles; one man seized each end of this, a third awaiting the governor's orders to strike the soles. in his hand he had a short-handled lash made of twisted thongs from tafilált, well soaked in water. the efforts of the victim to attack the men on either side becoming violent, a delay was caused by having to tie her hands together, her loud shrieks rending the air the while. "give her a hundred," said the kaïd, beginning to count as the blows descended, giving fresh edge to the piercing yells, interspersed with piteous cries for mercy, and ribbing the skin in long red lines, which were soon lost in one raw mass of bleeding flesh. as the arm of one wearied, another took his place, and a bucket of cold water was thrown over the victim's legs. at first her face had been ashy pale, it was now livid from the blood descending to it, as her legs grew white all but the soles, which were already turning purple under the cruel lash. then merciful unconsciousness stepped in, and silence supervened. "that will do," said the governor, having counted eighty-nine. "take her away; she'll know better next time!" and he proceeded with the cases before him, fining this one, imprisoning that, and bastinadoing a third, with as little concern as an english registrar would sign an order to pay a guinea fine. indeed, why should he do otherwise. this was his regular morning's work. it was a month before mesaôdah could touch the ground with her feet, and more than three before she could totter along with two sticks. her children were kept alive by her neighbours till she could sit up and "stitch, stitch, stitch," but there was no one to hear her bitter complaint, and no one to dry her tears. one day his faithful henchman dragged before the kaïd a jewish broker, whose crime of having bid against that functionary on the market, when purchasing supplies for his master, had to be expiated by a fine of twenty dollars, or a hundred lashes. the misguided wretch chose the latter, loving his coins too well; but after the first half-dozen had descended on his naked soles, he cried for mercy and agreed to pay. [illustration: _photograph by dr. rudduck._ jewesses of the atlas.] another day it was a more wealthy member of the community who was summoned on a serious charge. the kaïd produced a letter addressed to the prisoner, which he said had been intercepted, couched in the woefully corrupted arabic of the moorish jews, but in the cursive hebrew character. "canst read, o moses?" asked the kaïd, in a surly tone. "certainly, yes, my lord, may god protect thee, when the writing is in the sacred script." "read that aloud, then," handing him the missive. moses commenced by rapidly glancing his eye down the page, and as he did so his face grew pale, his hand shook, and he muttered something in the hebrew tongue as the kaïd sharply ordered him to proceed. "my lord, yes, my lord; it is false, it is a fraud," he stammered. "the devil take thee, thou son of a dog; read what is set before thee, and let us have none of thy impudence. the gaol is handy." with a trembling voice moses the usurer read the letter, purporting to have been written by an intimate friend in mogador, and implying by its contents that moses had, when in that town some years ago, embraced the faith of islám, from which he was therefore now a pervert, and consequently under pain of death. he was already crouched upon the ground, as is the custom before a great man, but as he spelled out slowly the damnatory words, he had to stretch forth his hands to keep from falling over. he knew that there was nothing to be gained by denial, by assurances that the letter was a forgery; the kaïd's manner indicated plainly enough that _he_ meant to be satisfied with it, and there was no appeal. "moses," said the kaïd, in a mock confidential tone, as he took back the letter, "thou'rt in my power. all that thou hast is mine. with such evidence against thee as this thy very head is in my hands. if thou art wise, and wilt share thy fortune with me, all shall go well; if not, thou knowest what to expect. i am to-day in need of a hundred dollars. now go!" an hour had not elapsed before, with a heart still heavier than the bag he carried, moses crossed the courtyard again, and deposited the sum required in the hands of the kaïd, with fresh assurances of his innocence, imploring the destruction of that fatal document, which was readily promised, though with no intention of complying with the request, notwithstanding that to procure another as that had been procured would cost but a trifle. these are only instances which could be multiplied of how the jews of morocco suffer at the hands of brutal officials. as metal which attracts the electricity from a thunder-cloud, so they invariably suffer first when a newly appointed, conscienceless governor comes to rule. with all his faults the previous kaïd had recognized how closely bound up with that of the moors under his jurisdiction was the welfare of jews similarly situated, so that, favoured by his wise administration, their numbers and their wealth had increased till, though in outward appearance beggarly, they formed an important section of the community. the new kaïd, however, saw in them but a possible mine, a goose that laid golden eggs, so, like the fool of the story, he set about destroying it when the supply of eggs fell off, for there was of necessity a limit to the repeated offerings which, on one pretext or another, he extorted from these luckless "tributaries," as they are described in moorish legal documents. when he found that ordinary means of persuasion failed, he had resort to more drastic measures. he could not imagine fresh feasts and public occasions, auspicious or otherwise, on which to collect "presents" from them, so he satisfied himself by bringing specious charges against the more wealthy jews and fining them, as well as by encouraging moors to accuse them in various ways. many of the payments to the governor being in small and mutilated coin, every friday he sent to the jews what he had received during the week, demanding a round sum in spanish dollars, far more than their fair value. then when he had forced upon them a considerable quantity of this depreciated stuff, he would send a crier round notifying the public that it was out of circulation and no longer legal tender, moreover giving warning that the "jew's money" was not to be trusted, as it was known that they had counterfeit coins in their possession. it was then time to offer them half price for it, which they had no option but to accept, though some while later he would re-issue it at its full value, and having permitted its circulation, would force it upon them again. the repairs which it was found necessary to effect in the kasbah, the equipment of troops, the contributions to the expenses of the sultan's expeditions, or the payment of indemnities to foreign nations, were constantly recurring pretexts for levying fresh sums from the jews as well as from the moors, and these were the legal ones. the illegal were too harrowing for description. young children and old men were brutally thrashed and then imprisoned till they or their friends paid heavy ransoms, and even the women occasionally suffered in this way. on sabbaths and fast days orders would be issued to the jews, irrespective of age or rank, to perform heavy work for the governor, perhaps to drag some heavy load or block of stone. those who could buy themselves off were fortunate: those who could not do so were harnessed and driven like cattle under the lashes of yard-long whips, being compelled when their work was done to pay their taskmasters. indeed, it was egypt over again, but there was no moses. men or women found with shoes on were bastinadoed and heavily fined, and on more than one occasion the sons of the best-off israelites were arrested in school on the charge of having used disrespectful language regarding the sultan, and thrown into prison chained head and feet, in such a manner that it was impossible to stretch their bodies. thus they were left for days without food, all but dead, in spite of the desire of their relatives to support them, till ransoms of two hundred dollars apiece could be raised to obtain their release, in some cases three months after their incarceration. xxix civil war in morocco "wound of speech is worse than wound of sword." _moorish proverb._ spies were already afield when the sun rose this morning, and while their return with the required information was eagerly expected, those of asni who would be warriors took a hasty breakfast and looked to their horses and guns. directly intelligence as to the whereabouts of the aït mîzán arrived, the cavalcade set forth, perforce in indian file, on account of the narrow single track, but wherever it was possible those behind pressed forward and passed their comrades in their eagerness to reach the scene of action. no idea of order or military display crossed their minds, and but for the skirmishers who scoured the country round as they advanced, it would have been easy for a concealed foe to have picked them off one by one. nevertheless they made a gallant show in the morning sun, which glinted on their ornamented stirrups and their flint-locks, held like lances, with the butts upon the pummels before them. the varied colours of their trappings, though old and worn, looked gay by the side of the red cloth-covered saddles and the gun-cases of similar material used by many as turbans. but for the serious expression on the faces of the majority, and the eager scanning of each knoll and shrub, the party might have been intent on powder-play instead of powder-business. for a mile or two no sign of human being was seen, and the ride was already growing wearisome when a sudden report on their right was followed by the heavy fall of one of their number, his well-trained horse standing still for him to re-mount, though he would never more do so. nothing but a puff of smoke showed whence the shot had come, some way up the face of a hill. the first impulse was to make a charge in that direction, and to fire a volley; but the experience of the leader reminded him that if there were only one man there it would not be worth while, and if there were more they might fall into an ambush. so their file passed on while the scouts rode towards the hill slope. a few moments later one of these had his horse shot under him, and then a volley was fired which took little effect on the advancing horsemen, still too far away for successful aim. they had been carefully skirting a wooded patch which might give shelter to their foes, whom they soon discovered to be lying in trenches behind the first hill-crests. unless they were dislodged, it would be almost impossible to proceed, so, making a rapid flank movement, the asni party spurred their horses and galloped round to gain the hills above the hidden enemy. as they did so random shots were discharged, and when they approached the level of the trenches, they commenced a series of rushes forward, till they came within range. in doing so they followed zig-zag routes to baffle aim, firing directly they made out the whereabouts of their assailants, and beating a hasty retreat. what success they were achieving they could not tell, but their own losses were not heavy. soon, as their firing increased, that from the trenches which they were gradually approaching grew less, and fresh shots from behind awoke them to the fact that the enemy was making a rear attack. by this time they were in great disorder, scattered over a wide area; the majority had gained the slight cover of the brushwood to their rear, and a wide space separated them from the new arrivals, who were performing towards them the same wild rushes that they themselves had made towards the trenches. they were therefore divided roughly into two divisions, the footmen in the shelter of the shrubs, the horsemen engaging the mounted enemy. among the brushwood hardly was the figure of friend or foe discernible, for all lay down behind any available shelter, crawling from point to point like so many caterpillars, but firing quickly enough when an enemy was sighted. this style of warfare has its advantages, for it greatly diminishes losses on either side. for the horsemen, deprived of such shelter, safety lay in rapid movements and unexpected evolutions, each man acting for himself, and keeping as far away from his comrades as possible. so easily were captures made that it almost seemed as if many preferred surrender and safety to the chances of war, for they knew that they were sure of honourable treatment on both sides. the prisoners were not even bound, but merely disarmed and marched to the rear, to be conveyed at night in a peaceful manner to their captors' tents and huts, there to be treated as guests till peace should result in exchange. by this time the combatants were scattered over a square mile or so, and though the horsemen of asni had driven the aït mîzán from the foremost trenches by the bold rushes described, and their footmen had engaged them, no further advantage seemed likely to accrue, while they were terribly harassed by those who still remained under cover. the signal was therefore given for a preconcerted retreat, which at once began. loud shouts of an expected victory now arose from the aït mîzán, who were gradually drawn from their hiding-places by their desire to secure nearer shots at the men of asni as they slowly descended the hill. at length the aït mîzán began to draw somewhat to one side, as they discovered that they were being led too far into the open, but this movement was outwitted by the asni horsemen, who were now pouring down on the scene. the wildest confusion supervened; many fell on every hand. victory was now assured to asni, which the enemy were quick to recognize, and as the sun was by this time at blazing noon, and energy grew slack on both sides, none was loth to call a conference. this resulted in an agreement by the vanquished to return the stolen cattle which had formed the _casus belli_, for indeed they were no longer able to protect them from their real owners. as many more were forfeited by way of damages, and messages were despatched to the women left in charge to hand them over to a party of the victors. prisoners were meantime exchanged, while through the medium of the local "holy man" a peace was formally ratified, after which each party returned to its dead, who were quickly consigned to their shallow graves. such of the asni men as were not mourners, now assembled in the open space of their village to be feasted by their women as victors. basins, some two feet across, were placed on the ground filled with steaming kesk'soo. round each of these portions sat cross-legged some eight or ten of the men, and a metal bowl of water was handed from one to the other to rinse the fingers of the right hand. they sat upon rude blankets spread on mats, the scene lit by roman-like olive-oil lamps, and a few french candles round the board of the sheïkh and allied leaders. a striking picture, indeed, they presented, there in the still night air, thousands of heaven-lights gleaming from the dark blue vault above, outrivalling the flicker of those simple earth-flames on their lined and sun-burnt faces. the women who waited on them, all of middle age, alone remained erect, as they glided about on their bare feet, carrying bowl and towel from man to man. from the huts and the tents around came many strange sounds of bird, beast, and baby, for the cocks were already crowing, as it was growing late,[ ] while the dogs bayed at the shadow of the cactus and the weird shriek of the night-bird. [ : a way they have in barbary.] "b'ism illah!" exclaimed the host at each basin ("in the name of god!")--as he would ask a blessing--when he finished breaking bread for his circle, and plunged his first sop in the gravy. "b'ism illah!" they all replied, and followed suit in a startlingly sudden silence wherein naught but the stowing away of food could be heard, till one of them burnt his fingers by an injudiciously deep dive into the centre after a toothsome morsel. in the midst of a sea of broth rose mountains of steamed and buttered kesk'soo, in the craters of which had been placed the contents of the stew-pot, the disjointed bones of chickens with onions and abundant broad beans. the gravy was eaten daintily with sops of bread, conveyed to the mouth in a masterly manner without spilling a drop, while the kesk'soo was moulded in the palm of the right hand into convenient sized balls and shot into the mouth by the thumb. the meat was divided with the thumb and fingers of the right hand alone, since the left may touch no food. at last one by one sat back, his greasy hand outstretched, and after taking a sip of cold water from the common jug with his left, and licking his right to prevent the waste of one precious grain, each washed his hands, rinsed his mouth thrice, polished his teeth with his right forefinger, and felt ready to begin again, all agreeing that "he who is not first at the powder, should not be last at the dish." xxx the political situation "a guess of the informed is better than the assurance of the ignorant." _moorish proverb._ ever since the accession of the present sultan, mulai abd el azîz iv., on his attaining the age of twenty in , morocco has been more than ever the focus of foreign designs, both public and private, which have brought about a much more disturbed condition than under his father, or even under the subsequent wazeer regent. the manifest friendlessness of the youth, his lack of training for so important a part, and the venality of his entourage, at once attracted birds of prey, and they have worked their will. since the death of el hasan iii., in , the administration had been controlled by the former lord high chamberlain, or "curtain" of the shareefian throne, whose rule was severe, though good, and it seemed doubtful whether he would relinquish the reins of authority. the other wazeers whom his former master had left in office had been imprisoned on various charges, and he stood supreme. he was, however, old and enfeebled by illness, so when in his end came instead of his resignation, few were surprised. what they were not quite prepared for, however, was the clearing of the board within a week or two by the death of his two brothers and a cousin, whom he had promoted to be respectively commander-in-chief, chamberlain, and master of the ceremonies--all of them, it was declared, by influenza. another brother had died but a short while before, and the commissioner sent to tangier to arrange matters with the french was found dead in his room--from asphyxia caused by burning charcoal. thus was the cabinet dissolved, and the only remaining member resigned. there then rose suddenly to power a hitherto unheard of arab of the south, el menébhi, who essayed too much in acting as ambassador to london while still minister of war, and returned to find his position undermined; he has since emigrated to egypt. it was freely asserted that the depletion of the moorish exchequer was due to his peculation, resulting in his shipping a large fortune to england in specie, with the assistance of british officials who were supposed to have received a handsome "consideration" in addition to an enormous price paid for british protection. thus, amid a typically moorish cloud, he left the scene. from that time the court has been the centre of kaleidoscopic intrigues, which have seriously hampered administration, but which were not in themselves sufficient to disturb the country. what was of infinitely greater moment was the eagerness with which the young ruler, urged by his circassian mother, sought advice and counsel from europe, and endeavoured to act up to it. one disinterested and trusted friend at that juncture would have meant the regeneration of the empire, provided that interference from outside were stayed. but this was not to be. the few impartial individuals who had access to the sultan were outnumbered by the horde of politicians, diplomats, adventurers, and schemers who surrounded him, the latter at least freely bribing wazeers to obtain their ends. in spite of an unquestionable desire to do what was best for his country, and to act upon the good among the proffered advice, wild extravagance resulted both in action and expenditure. thus mulai abd el azîz became the laughing-stock of europe, and the butt of his people's scorn. his heart was with the foreigners--with dancing women and photographers,--he had been seen in trousers, even on a bicycle! what might he not do next? a man so implicated with unbelievers could hardly be a faithful muslim, said the discontented. no more efficacious text could have been found to rouse fanaticism and create dissatisfaction throughout his dominions. black looks accompanied the mention of his name, and it was whispered that the leader of the faithful was selling himself and his empire, if not to the devil, at least to the nazarenes, which was just as bad. any other country would have been ripe for rebellion, as europe supposed that morocco was, but scattered and conflicting interests defeated all attempts to induce a general rising. one of the wisest measures of the new reign was the attempt to reorganize finances in accordance with english advice, by the systematic levy of taxes hitherto imposed in the arbitrary fashion described in chapter ii. this was hailed with delight, and had it been maintained by a strong government, would have worked wonders in restoring prosperity. but foreign _protégés_ refused to pay, and objections of all sorts were raised, till at last the "terteeb," as it was called, became impossible of collection without recourse to arms. fearing this, the money in hand to pay the tax was expended on guns and cartridges, which the increasing demand led foreigners to smuggle in by the thousand. it is estimated that some millions of fire-arms--a large proportion of them repeating rifles with a large supply of ammunition--are now in the hands of the people, while the government has never been worse supplied than at present. ship-load after ship-load has been landed on the coast in defiance of all authority, and large consignments have been introduced over the algerian frontier, the state of which has in consequence become more than ever unsettled. in short, the benign intentions of mulai abd el azîz have been interpreted as weakness, and once again the nazarenes are accused--to quote a recent remark of an atlas scribe--of having "spoiled the sultan," and of being about to "spoil the country." active among the promoters of dissatisfaction have been throughout the idreesi shareefs, representatives of the original muslim dynasty in morocco; venerated for their ancestry and adherence to all that is retrogressive or bigoted, and on principle opposed to the reigning dynasty. these leaders of discontent find able allies in the algerians in morocco, some of whom settled there years ago because sharing their feelings and determined not to submit to the french; but of whom others, while expressing equal devotion to the old order, can from personal experience recommend the advantages of french administration, to which even their exiled brethren or their descendants no longer feel equal objection. the summary punishment inflicted a few years ago on the murderer of an englishman in the streets of fez was, like everything else, persistently misinterpreted through the country. in the distant provinces the story--as reported by natives therefrom--ran that the nazarene had been shot by a saint while attempting to enter and desecrate the sacred shrine of mulai idrees, and that by executing him the sultan showed himself an unbeliever. when british engineers were employed to survey the route for a railway between fez and mequinez this was reported as indicating an absolute sale of the country, and the people were again stirred up, though not to actual strife. only in the semi-independent district of the ghaïáta berbers between fez and táza, which had never been entirely subjugated, did a flame break out. a successful writer of amulets, hitherto unknown, one jelálli zarhôni, who had acquired a great local reputation, began to denounce the sultan's behaviour with religious fervour. calling on the neighbouring tribesmen to refuse allegiance to so unworthy a monarch, he ultimately raised the standard of revolt in the name of the sultan's imprisoned elder brother, m'hammed. finally, the rumour ran that this prince had escaped and joined jelálli, who, from his habitual prophet's mount, is better known throughout the country as boo hamára--"father of the she-ass." according to the official statement, jelálli zarhôni was originally a policeman (makházni), whose bitterness and subsequent sedition arose from ill-treatment then received. although exalted in newspaper reports to the dignity of a "pretender," in morocco he is best known as the "rogi" or "common one." fez clamoured to see m'hammed, that the story might be disproved, and after much delay, during which he was supposed to be conveyed from mequinez, a veiled and guarded rider arrived, preceded by criers who proclaimed him to be the sultan's brother. but as no one could be sure if this were the case or not, each party believed what it wished, and jelálli's hands were strengthened. boldly announcing the presence with him of mulai m'hammed, in his name he sought and obtained the allegiance of tribe after tribe. although the sultan effected a reconciliation with his presumed brother--whose movements, however, still remain restricted--serious men believe him to be in the rebel camp, and few know the truth. at first success attended the rebellion, but it never spread beyond the unsettled eastern provinces, and after three years it ineffectually smoulders on, the leader cooped up by the sultan's forces near the coast, though the sultan is not strong enough to stamp it out. by those whose knowledge of the country is limited to newspaper news a much more serious state of affairs is supposed to exist, a "pretender" collecting his forces for a final coup, etc. something of truth there may be in this, but the situation is grossly exaggerated. the local rising of a few tribes in eastern morocco never affected the rest of the empire, save by that feeling of unrest which, in the absence of complete information, jumps at all tales. even the so-called "rout" of an "imperial army" three years ago was only a stampede without fighting, brought about by a clever ruse, and there has never been a serious conflict throughout the affair, though the "rogi" is well supplied with arms from algeria, and his "forces" are led by a frenchman, m. delbrel. meanwhile comparative order reigns in the disaffected district, though in the north, usually the most peaceful portion of the empire, all is disturbed. there a leader has arisen, raïsûli by name, who obtained redress for the wrongs of tribes south of tangier, and his own appointment as their kaïd, by the astute device of carrying off as hostages an american and an englishman, so that the pressure certain to be brought to bear by their governments would compel the sultan to grant his demands. all turned out as he had hoped, and the condign punishment which he deserves is yet far off, though a local struggle continues between him and a small imperial force, complicated by feuds between his sometime supporters, who, however, fight half-heartedly, for fear of killing relatives pressed into service on the other side. those who once looked to raïsûli as a champion have found his little finger thicker than the sultan's loins, and the country round tangier is ruined by taxation, so that every one is discontented, and the district is unsafe, a species of civil war raging. the full name of this redoubtable leader is mulai ahmad bin mohammed bin abd allah er-raïsûli, and he is a shareef of beni arôs, connected therefore with the wazzán shareefs; but his prestige as such is low, both on account of his past career, and because of his acceptance of a civil post. his mother belonged to anjera, near tangier, where he was born about thirty-six years ago at the village of zeenát, being well educated, as education goes in morocco, with the beni m'sawah. but falling into bad company, he first took to cattle-lifting, afterwards turning highwayman, as which he was eventually caught by the abd es-sadok family--various members of which were kaïds from ceuta to azîla--and consigned to prison in mogador. after three or four years his release was obtained by háj torres, the foreign commissioner in tangier, but when he found that the abd es-sadoks had sequestrated his property, he vowed not to cut his hair till he had secured their disgrace. hence, with locks that many a woman might envy, he has plotted and harassed till his present position has been achieved. but as this is only a means to an end, who can tell what that may be? raïsûli is allowed on all hands to be a peculiarly able and well-bred man, full of resource and determination. though his foes have succeeded in kidnapping even his mother, it will certainly be a miracle if he is taken alive. should all fail him, he is prepared to blow his brains out, or make use of a small phial of poison always to hand. it is interesting to remember that just such a character, abd allah ghaïlán, held a similar position in this district when tangier was occupied by the english, who knew him as "guyland," and paid him tribute. the more recent imitation of raïsûli's tactics by a native free-booter of the ceuta frontier, in arresting two english officers as hostages wherewith to secure the release of his brother and others from prison, has proved equally successful, but as matters stand at present, it is more than doubtful whether the moorish government is in a position to bring either of these offenders to book, and the outlook in the north is decidedly stormy. it is, indeed, quite in accordance with the traditions of moorish history, throughout which these periods of local disorganization have been of constant recurrence without danger to the state. [illustration: _photograph by dr. rudduck._ the kaÏd. a moorish kaÏd and attendants.] in the south things are quiet, though a spirit of unrest pervades the people, especially since it has been seen that the sultan no longer either collects the regular taxes or maintains the regular army. there the immediate result of the failure to collect the taxes for a year or two was that the people had more to spend on cattle and other stock, which rapidly rose in price, no one needing to sell unless he wished. within the last two years, however, the kaïds have recommenced their oppressive treatment, under the pretext of a levy to put down the rising in the eastern provinces. men and money were several times furnished, but though now more difficult to raise, the demands continue. the wonder is that the people remain so quiet, but they are of a more peaceable nature than the berbers of the north. three of the sultan's brothers have been for some time camped in as many centres, engaged in collecting funds, but tribe after tribe has refused to pay, declaring that they have been exempted by their lord, and until he returns they will submit to no kaïd and pay no dues. it is only in certain districts that some of the funds demanded have been forthcoming, and the kaïds have full authority, but these are officials of long standing and great repute, whose jurisdiction has been much extended in consequence. changes among the less important kaïds have been continual of late. one man would buy the office and struggle to establish himself, only to find a new man installed over his head before he was settled, which has frequently led to local disorders, fighting and plundering. in this way the government has quite lost prestige, and a strong hand is awaited. the moors would have preferred another ismáïl the bloodthirsty, who could compel his will, and awe all other rascals in his dominions, to the mild and well-intentioned youth now at the helm. some would even welcome any change that would put an end to present insecurity, but only the french _protégés_ desire to see that change effected by france, and only those under the german flag already would hail that with joy. the jews alone would welcome any, as they have good cause to do. such was already the condition of things when the long-threatening clouds burst, and the anglo-french agreement was published in april, . rumours of negotiations for the sale of british interests in morocco to france had for some time filled the air, but in face of official denials, and the great esteem in which england was held by the moors, few gave credence to them. mulai abd el azîz had relied especially on great britain, and had confidently looked to it for protection against the french; the announcement of the bargain between them broke him down. it may have been inevitable; and since an agreement among all the powers concerned was so remote a possibility, an understanding between the three most interested may have been the wisest course, in view of pending internal troubles which would certainly afford excuses for interference. it was undoubtedly good policy on their part to decide who should inherit the vineyard, and on what terms, that conflict between them might be avoided. but on the unconsulted victim it came a cruel blow, unexpected and indefensible. it is important not to forget this. but the one absorbing thought of all for nearly a year past has been the drought and consequent famine. between november, , and october, , there was practically no rainfall over a large portion of the country, and agriculture being interfered with, grain rose to five times its normal price. although relief has now come, it will be months before the cattle are in proper condition again, and not till after next year's harvest in may and june, should it prove a good one, will contentment be restored. under such conditions, though more ready than ever to grumble, the people have had no heart to fight, which has, to some degree, assisted in keeping them quiet. the famine has, however, tried them sore, and only increased their exasperation. added to this, the general feeling of dissatisfaction regarding the sultan's foreign predilections, and the slumbering fanaticism of the "learned" class, there is now a chronic lack of funds. the money which should have been raised by taxation has been borrowed abroad and ruthlessly scattered. fortunes have been made by foreigners and natives alike, but the sultan is all but bankrupt. yet never was his entourage so rich, though many who to-day hold houses and lands were a few years ago penniless. as for the future, for many years the only answer possible to tediously frequent inquiries as to what was going to happen in morocco has been that the future of the shareefian empire depended entirely on what might happen in europe, not to any degree on its own internal condition. the only way in which this could affect the issue was by affording an excuse for outside interference, as in the present case. corrupt as the native administration may be, it is but the expression of a corrupt population, and no native government, even in europe, is ever far in advance of those over whom it rules. in spite, too, of the pressure of injustice on the individual here and there, the victim of to-day becomes the oppressor of to-morrow, and such opportunities are not to be surrendered without a protest. the vast majority is, therefore, always in favour of present conditions, and would rather the chances of internecine strife than an exotic peace. no foreign ruler, however benign, would be welcome, and no "penetration," however "pacific," but will be endured and resented as a hostile wound. even the announcement of the anglo-french agreement was sufficient to gravely accentuate the disorders of the country, and threaten immediate complications with europe, by provoking attacks on europeans who had hitherto been safe from interference save under exceptional circumstances. a good deal of the present unrest is attributable to this cause alone. it is, therefore, a matter of deep regret that the one possible remedy--joint action of the powers in policing the moors, as it were, by demanding essential reforms in return for a united guarantee of territorial integrity--was rendered impossible by the rivalries between those powers, especially on the part of france. great britain's step aside has made possible the only alternative, the surrender of the coveted task to one of their number, in return for such _quid pro quo_ as each could obtain. had the second-class powers been bargained with first, not only would they have secured substantial terms, which now it is no use their asking, but the leading powers could have held out for terms yet undreamed of. france did well to begin with great britain, but it was an egregious diplomatic error to overlook germany, which was thereby promoted to the hitherto unhoped-for position of "next friend" and trusted adviser of morocco. up to that point germany had played a waiting game so patiently that france fell into the trap, and gave her all she wanted. it is inconceivable how the astute politicians of the quai d'orsay committed such a blunder, save on the assumption that they were so carried away by the ease with which they had settled with great britain, that they forgot all other precautions--unless it was that they feared to jeopardize the conclusion of the main bargain by delay in discussing any subsidiary point. when the agreement was made known, the writer pointed out in the _westminster review_, that, "portugal, italy and austria have but to acquiesce and rest assured of the 'most favoured nation' treatment, as will all the other powers save one. that one, of course, is germany, _whose sole interest in morocco is the possibility of placing a drag on france_. she will have to be dealt with. having disposed of england, which had real interests at stake, in the command of the straits and the maintenance of gibraltar, france should be able to accomplish this as well. five and twenty years ago germany had not even a commercial interest in morocco. great britain did three-fourths of the trade, or more, france about a tenth, spain and others dividing the crumbs between them. but an active commercial policy--by the encouragement and support of young firms in a way that made britishers envious, and abusive of their own foreign office--has secured for germany a growing share of the trade, till now she stands next to great britain, whose share is reduced to one-half."[ ] [ : it is curious, indeed, how little the german empire or its component states figure in the history of diplomatic relations with morocco. one has to go back to the time of rudolf ii., in , to find an active policy in force with regard to moroccan affairs, when that remarkable adventurer or international diplomatist, sir anthony sherley, was accredited to abd el azîz iii., the last of the moorish rulers to bear the same name as the present one. this intrepid soldier, a man after the kaiser's own heart, had been accredited to germany by the great shah of persia, abbás, whose confidence he had won to a marvellous degree, and he appears to have made as great an impression on rudolf, who sent him as his envoy to morocco. arrived there, he astonished the natives by coolly riding into the court of audience--a privilege still reserved to the sultan alone. but the ameer, as he was called in those days, was too politic or too polite to raise the question, only taking care that the next time the "dog of a christian" should find a chain stretched across the gateway. this sir anthony could not brook, so rode back threatening to break off negotiations, and it affords a striking lesson as to the right way of dealing with orientals, that even in those days the moors should have yielded and imprisoned the porter, permitting sir anthony's entrance on horseback thereafter. the treaty he came to negotiate was concluded, and relations with the germans were established on a right footing, but they have been little in evidence till recent years.] after all, the interests of germany in morocco were but a trifling consideration, meaning much less to her than ours do to us, and it was evident that whatever position she might assume, however she might bluster, she, too, had her price. this not being perceived by the ill-informed press of this country, the prey of political journalists in paris, cologne and madrid--more recently even of washington, whence the delusive reports are now re-echoed with alarming reverberations--there was heated talk of war, and everything that newspapers could do to bring it about was done. even a private visit of the kaiser to tangier, the only important feature of which was the stir made about it, was utilized to fan the flame. however theatrical some of the political actions of wilhelm ii. may have been, here was a case in which, directly he perceived the capital being made of his visit, he curtailed it to express his disapprobation. it was in tangier bay that he received the newspaper cuttings on the subject, and although the visit was to have extended in any case but to a few hours, he at once decided not to land. it was only when it was urged upon him what disappointment this would cause to its thirty thousand inhabitants and visitors for the occasion, that he consented to pay one short visit to his legation, abandoning the more important part of the programme, which included a climb to the citadel and an interchange of visits with a kinsman of the sultan. nothing more could have been done to emphasize the private nature of the visit, in reality of no greater moment than that of king edward to algeria almost at the same time. neither such a personal visit, nor any other action should have been required to remind great britain and france that they and spain alone were affected by their agreements, and that not even official notification to morocco or the other powers could restrict their perfect liberty of action. when, therefore, the distracted sultan turned to germany as the most influential power still faithful to its undertakings, the response of germany was perfectly correct, as was his own action. but germany, although prepared to meet him with a smile, and not averse to receiving crumbs in the form of concessions, had no more intention of embroiling herself on his behalf than great britain. extraordinary rumours, however, pervaded the country, and the idea of german intervention was hailed with delight; now general disappointment is felt, and germany is classed with england among the traitors. mulai abd el azîz had but one resource, to propose another conference of the powers, assured that france and germany would never come to an understanding, and that this would at least ward off the fatal day indefinitely. yet now that france and germany have agreed, it is probable that this step is regretted, and that, since the two have acted in concert, the moorish court has been at its wits' ends; it would now regard as a god-send anything which might prevent the conference from being held, lest it should strengthen the accord among its enemies, and weaken its own position. the diplomatic negotiations between fez, berlin, and paris have been of a character normal under the circumstances; and as the bickerings and insinuations which accompanied them were foreign to morocco, the sultan's invitation only serving as an opportunity for arriving at an understanding, they need not be dwelt on here. it is the french press which has stirred up the commotion, and has misled the british public into the belief that there has been some "morocco tangle." the facts are simply these: since , the date of the madrid convention regarding the vexed question of foreign rights of protecting natives and holding property in morocco, all nations concerned have been placed on an equal footing in their dealings with that country. the "most favoured nation" clause has secured for all the advantages gained by any in its special treaties. nothing has since occurred to destroy this situation. in asking his "friends" to meet again in conference now, the sultan acted wisely and within his rights. the fact that any two or three of them may have agreed to give one of their number a "free hand," should it suit her purposes to upset the _status quo_, does not theoretically affect the position, though it has suggested the advisability of further discussion. it is only in virtue of their combined might that the powers in question are enabled to assume the position they do. spain, the only power with interests in morocco other than commercial, had been settled with by a subsequent agreement in october, , for she had been consulted in time. special clauses dealing with her claims to consideration had even been inserted in the anglo-french agreement-- art. vii. "this arrangement does not apply to the points now occupied by spain on the moorish shore of the mediterranean. art. viii. "the two governments, animated by their sincerely friendly sentiments for spain, take into particular consideration the interests she possesses, owing to her geographical position and to her territorial possessions on the moorish shore of the mediterranean, in regard to which the french government will make some arrangement with the spanish government ... (which) will be communicated to the government of his britannic majesty." these articles apply to ceuta, which spain withheld from the portuguese after the brief union of the crowns in the sixteenth century; to veléz, an absolutely worthless rock, captured in by garcia de toledo with fifteen thousand men, the abandonment of which has more than once been seriously urged in spain; to alhucemas, a small island occupied in ; to melilla, a huge rock peninsula captured, on his own account, by medina sidonia in ; and to the zaffarine (or saffron) islands, only one of which is used, in the seizure of which the french were cleverly forestalled in . all are convict stations; unless heavily fortified in a manner that at present they are not, they would not be of sufficient value to tempt even a foe of spain. ceuta and melilla alone are worthy of consideration, and the former is the only one it might ever pay to fortify. so far have matters gone. the conference asked for by morocco--the flesh thrown to the wolves--is to form the next act. to this conference the unfortunate sultan would like to appeal for protection against the now "free hand" of france, but in consenting to discuss matters at all, she and her ally have, of course, stipulated that what has been done without reference to treaty shall not be treated of, if they are to take part, and as an act of courtesy to us, the united states has followed suit. other matters of importance which mulai abd el azîz desired to discuss have also been ruled out beforehand, so that only minor questions are to be dealt with, hardly worth the trouble of meeting. foremost among these is the replenishing of the moorish exchequer by further loans, which might more easily have been arranged without a conference. indeed, there are so many money-lenders anxious to finance morocco on satisfactory terms, that the competition among them has almost degenerated into a scramble. but all want some direct guarantee through their governments, which introduces the political element, as in return for such guarantee each power desires to increase its interests or privileges. thus, while each financier holds out his gold-bags temptingly before the sultan, elbowing aside his rival, each demands as surety the endorsement of his government, the price of which the sultan is hardly prepared to pay. he probably hopes that by appealing to them all in conference, he will obtain a joint guarantee on less onerous terms, without affording any one of them a foothold in his country, should he be unable to discharge his obligations. he is wise, and but for the difficulties caused by the defection of england and france from the political circle, this request for money might alone have sufficed to introduce a reformed _régime_ under the joint auspices of all. as it is, attempts to raise funds elsewhere, even to discharge the current interest, having failed, his french creditors, who do possess the support of their government, have obligingly added interest to capital, and with official sanction continue to roll the snowball destined one day to overwhelm the state. in the eyes of the moors this is nothing less than a bill-of-sale on the empire. a second point named by the sultan for submission to the conference is the urgency of submitting all inhabitants of the country without distinction to the reformed taxation; a reasonable demand if the taxes were reasonable and justly assessed, but who can say at present that they are either? the exchequer is undoubtedly defrauded of large sums by the exemptions enjoyed by foreigners and their _protégés_, on account of the way in which these privileges are abused, while, to begin with, the system itself is unfair to the native. here again is an excellent lever for securing reforms by co-operation. let the sultan understand that the sole condition on which such a privilege can be abandoned is the reform of his whole fiscal and judicial systems, and that this effected to the satisfaction of the powers, these privileges will be abandoned. nothing could do more to promote the internal peace and welfare of morocco than this point rightly handled. a third demand, the abolition of foreign postal services in his country, may appear to many curious and insignificant, but the circumstances are peculiar. twenty years ago, when i first knew morocco, there were no means of transmitting correspondence up country save by intermittent couriers despatched by merchants, whom one had to hunt up at the _cafés_ in which they reposed. on arrival the bundle of letters was carried round to likely recipients for them to select their own in the most hap-hazard way. things were hardly more formal at the ports at which eagerly awaited letters and papers arrived by sea. these were carried free from gibraltar, and delivered on application at the various consular offices. at one time the moorish government maintained unsatisfactory courier services between two or three of the towns, but issued no stamps, the receipt for the courier's payment being of the nature of a postmark, stamped at the office, which, though little known to collectors, is the only genuine and really valuable moorish postage stamp obtainable. all other so-called morocco stamps were issued by private individuals, who later on ran couriers between some two moorish towns, their income being chiefly derived from the sale of stamps to collectors. some were either entirely bogus services, or only a few couriers were run to save appearances. stamps of all kinds were sold at face value, postmarked or not to order, and as the issues were from time to time changed, the profits were steady and good. the case was in some ways analogous to that of the yangtse and other treaty ports of china, where i found every consul's wife engaged in designing local issues, sometimes of not inconsiderable merit. in morocco quite a circle of stamp-dealers sprang up, mostly sharp jewish lads--though not a few foreign officials contracted the fever, and some time ago a stamp journal began to be issued in tangier to promote the sale of issues which otherwise would not have been heard of. now all is changed; great britain, france, spain and germany maintain head postal offices in tangier, the british being subject to that of gibraltar, whose stamps are used. all have courier services down the coast, as well as despatching by steamer, and some maintain inland mails conveyed by runners. the distance from tangier to fez, some hundred and fifty miles, is covered by one man on foot in about three days and a half, and the forty miles' run from tangier to tetuan is done in a night for a dollar, now less than three shillings. but a more enlightened sultan sees the advantage it would be to him, if not to all parties, to control the distribution of the growing correspondence of both europeans and natives, the latter of whom prefer to register their letters, having very little faith in their despatch without a receipt. and as mulai abd el azîz is willing to join the postal union, provided that the service is placed in efficient european hands there is no reason why it should not be united in one office, and facilities thereby increased. france, however, in joining the conference, has quite another end in view than helping others to bolster up the present administration, and that is to obtain a formal recognition by all concerned, including morocco, of the new position created by her agreement with great britain. that is to say, without permitting her action to be questioned in any way, she hopes to secure some show of right to what at present she possesses only by the might of herself and her friends. she has already agreed with germany to recognize her special claim for permission to "police" the morocco-algerian frontier, and those who recall the appropriation of tunisia will remember that it originated in "policing" the khomaïr--known to the french as "kroumirs"--on the tunisian frontier of algeria. it is, indeed, a curious spectacle, a group of butchers around the unfortunate victim, talking philanthropy, practising guile: two of the strongest have at last agreed between themselves which is to have the carcase, but preparations for the "pacific" death-thrust are delayed by frantic appeals for further consultation, and by the refusal of one of their number who had been ignored to recognize the bargain. consultation is only agreed to on conditions which must defeat its object, and terms are arranged with the intervener. everything, therefore, is clear for the operation; the tender-hearted are soothed by promises that though the "penetration" cannot but be painful, it shall at least not be hostile; while in order that the contumacious may hereafter hold their peace, the consultation is to result in a formal but carefully worded death-warrant. meanwhile it is worth while recalling the essential features of the madrid convention of , mainly due to french claims for special privileges in protecting natives, or in giving them the rights of french citizens. this was summoned by spain at the suggestion of great britain, with the concurrence of morocco. holland, sweden and norway, denmark, belgium, portugal, france, germany, the united states, italy, brazil, and austria-hungary accepted the invitation in the order named, but brazil was ultimately unrepresented. russia was also invited as an after-thought, but did not consider it worth while accepting. the scope of the conference was limited to the subject of foreign protection, though the question of property was by mutual consent included. the representatives of the conferring powers accredited to the spanish court were nominated as members--the english plenipotentiary acting for denmark--as it was felt that those accredited to morocco already held too decided views of the matter. the moorish foreign minister attended on behalf of morocco, and señor canovas, president of the council, represented spain. seventeen meetings were held, under the presidency of señor canovas, between may and july , the last being purely formal. the convention then signed contained little that was new, but it re-stated clearly and harmonized with satisfactory results rights previously granted to one and another. in several particulars, however, its provisions are faulty, and experience of their working has long led to demands for revision, but conflicting interests, and fears of opening up larger issues, have caused this to be postponed. now that the time has arrived for a re-definition of the whole position and rights of foreigners and their governments in morocco, it is earnestly to be hoped that the opportunity may not be lost. the great fault of the madrid convention is that while it recognizes the right of foreigners to acquire land in morocco, it stipulates for the previous consent of the native authorities, which is only to be obtained, if at all, by liberal "presents." but the most pressing need is the establishment of an international tribunal for the trial of cases involving more than one nationality, to replace the present anarchy, resulting from the conflict in one case of any of the thirteen independent jurisdictions at present in force in morocco. such a measure would be an outcome of more value than all possible agreements to respect the independence and integrity of morocco till it suited the purpose of one party or another to encroach thereon. in lands knowing but one jurisdiction it is hard to conceive the abuses and defeats of justice which result from the confusion reigning in morocco, or those which existed in egypt previous to the establishment of international tribunals there. for instance, plaintiff, of nationality a., sues defendants, of nationalities b., c., and d., for the return of goods which they have forcibly carried off, on the ground that they were pledged to them by a party of nationality e., who disputes their claim, and declares the goods sold to original plaintiff. here are five jurisdictions involved, each with a different set of laws, so that during the three separate actions necessitated, although the three defendants have all acted alike and together, the judgment in the case of each may be different, _e.g._ case under law b. dismissed, that under law c. won by plaintiff, while law d. might recognize the defendants' claim, but condemn his action. needless to follow such intricacies further, though this is by no means an extreme case, for disputes are constantly occurring--to say nothing of criminal actions--involving the several consular courts, for the most part presided over by men unequipped by legal training, in which it is a practical impossibility for justice to be done to all, and time and money are needlessly wasted. xxxi france in morocco "who stands long enough at the door is sure to enter at last." _moorish proverb._ in a previous work on this country, "the land of the moors," published in , the present writer concluded with this passage: "france alone is to be feared in the land of the moors, which, as things trend to-day, must in time form part of her colony. there is no use disguising the fact, and, as england certainly would not be prepared to go to war with her neighbour to prevent her repeating in morocco what she has done in tunis, it were better not to grumble at her action. all england cares about is the mouth of the mediterranean, and if this were secured to her, or even guaranteed neutral--were that possible--she could have no cause to object to the french extension. our moorish friends will not listen to our advice; they keep their country closed, as far as they can, refusing administrative reforms which would prevent excuses for annexation. why should we trouble them? it were better far to come to an agreement with france, and acknowledge what will prove itself one day--that france is the normal heir to morocco whenever the present empire breaks up." unpopular as this opinion was among the british and other foreign subjects in the country, and especially among the moors, so that it had at first no other advocate, it has since been adopted in downing street, and what is of more moment, acted upon. nay more, great britain has, in return for the mere recognition of a _fait accompli_ in egypt, agreed to stand aside in morocco, and to grant france a free hand in any attempt to create there a similar state of things. though the principle was good, the bargain was bad, for the positions of the two contracting powers, in egypt and morocco respectively, were by no means analogous. france could never have driven us out of egypt save with her sword at our throat; england had but to unite with other powers in blocking the way of france in morocco to stultify all her plans. had england stood out for terms, whether as regarding her commercial interests in morocco, which have been disgracefully sacrificed, or in the form of concessions elsewhere, a very much more equal-handed bargain might have been secured. the main provisions of the agreement between the two countries, concluded april , , are-- art. ii. "the british government recognizes that it appertains to france, more especially as being the power in contiguity with morocco, to control the peace of the country, and to lend its assistance in all administrative, economical, financial, and military reforms. the british government declares that it will not interfere with the action of france in this regard, provided that this action will leave intact the rights which, in virtue of treaties, conventions, and usages, great britain enjoys in morocco, including the right of coasting between the morocco ports, of which english vessels have had the benefit since ." art. vii. "in order to secure the free passage of the straits of gibraltar, both governments agree not to allow fortifications or any strategic works to be erected on that part of the moorish coast between melilla and the heights which dominate the right bank of the sebu exclusively." france has secured all that she wanted, or rather that her aggressive colonial party wanted, for opinions on that point are by no means identical, even in france, and the agreement at once called forth the condemnation of the more moderate party. what appears to be permissive means much more. now that great britain has drawn back--the power to which the late sir john drummond hay taught the moors to look with an implicit confidence to champion them against all foes, as it did in the case of the wars with france and spain, vetoing the retention of a foot of moorish soil--morocco lies at the feet of france. france, indeed, has become responsible for carrying out a task its eager spirits have been boiling over for a chance of undertaking. morocco has been made the ward of the hand that gripped it, which but recently filched two outlying provinces, figig and tûát. englishmen who know and care little about morocco are quite incapable of understanding the hold that france already had upon this land. separated from it only by an unprotected boundary, much better defined on paper than in fact, over which there is always a "rectification" dispute in pickle, her province of algeria affords a prospective base already furnished with lines of rail from her ports of oran and algiers. from oojda, an insignificant town across the border from lalla maghnîa (marnia), there runs a valley route which lays fez in her power, with táza by the way to fortify and keep the mountaineers in check. at any time the frontier forays in which the tribes on both sides indulge may be fomented or exaggerated, as in the case of tunis, to afford a like excuse for a similar occupation, which beyond a doubt would be a good thing for morocco. fez captured, and the seaports kept in awe or bombarded by the navy, mequinez would fall, and an army landed in mazagan would seize marrákesh. all this could be accomplished with a minimum of loss, for only the lowlands would have to be crossed, and the mountaineers have no army. but their "pacification" would be the lingering task in which lives, time, and money would be lost beyond all recompense. against a european army that of the sultan need not be feared; only a few battalions drilled by european officers might give trouble, but they would see former instructors among the foe, and without them they would soon become demoralized. it would be the tribal skirmishers, of whom half would fall before the others yielded to the nazarenes, who would give the trouble. the military mission which france has for many years imposed on the sultan at his expense, though under her control, which follows him in his expeditions and spies out the land, has afforded a training-ground for a series of future invading leaders. her algerian mohammedan agents are able to pass and repass where foreigners never go, and besides collecting topographical and other information, they have lost no opportunity of making known the privileges and advantages of french rule. in case it may be found advisable to set up a dummy sultan under a protectorate, the french have an able and powerful man to hand in the young idreesi shareef of wazzán, whom the english refused to protect, and who, with his brother, received a french education. but while we, as a nation, have been unable to comprehend the french determination to possess morocco, they have been unable to comprehend our calm indifference, and by the way in which they betray their suspicions of us, they betray their own methods. protestant missionaries in algeria and tunisia, of whatever nationality, are supposed to be the emissaries of the british government, and in consequence are harassed and maligned, while tourists outside the regular beat are watched. when visiting oojda some years ago, i myself was twice arrested in algeria, at tlemçen and lalla maghnîa, because mingling with natives, and it was with difficulty that i could persuade the _juges d'instruction_ of my peaceful motives. determined and successful efforts to become acquainted with the remotest provinces of morocco, the distribution of its population, and whatever could be of use to an invading or "pacifying" force have long been made by france, but the most valuable portion of this knowledge remains pigeon-holed, or circulates only in strictly official _mémoires_. many of the officials engaged here, however, have amused themselves and the public by publishing pretty books of the average class, telling little new, while one even took the trouble to write his in english, in order to put us off the scent! if ever means could justify an end, france deserves to enjoy the fruit of her labours. no longer need she foment strife on the algerian frontier, or wink at arms being smuggled across it; no longer need the mis-named "pretender" be supplied with french gold, or intrigues be carried on at court. abd el azîz must take the advice and "assistance" of france, whether he will or no, and curse the british to whom he formerly looked. this need not necessarily involve such drastic changes as would rouse the people to rebellion, and precipitate a costly conquest. there are many reforms urgently required in the interests of the people themselves, and these can now be gradually enforced. such reforms had been set on foot already by the young sultan, mainly under british advice; but to his chagrin, his advisers did not render the financial and moral support he needed to carry them out. france is now free to do this, and to strengthen his position, so that all wise reforms may be possible. these will naturally commence with civil and judicial functions, but must soon embrace the more pressing public works, such as roads, bridges, and port improvements. railways are likely to be the first roads in most parts, and mulai abd el azîz will welcome their introduction. the western ideas which he has imbibed during the last few years are scoffed at only by those who know little of him. what france will have to be prepared for is court intrigue, and she will have to give the moors plainly to understand that "whatsoever king shall reign, she'll still be 'boss of the show,' sir." as one of the first steps needed, but one requiring the co-operation of all other powers on treaty terms with the moors, the establishment of tribunals to which all should be amenable, has already been touched upon. these must necessarily be presided over by specially qualified europeans in receipt of sufficient salary to remove them from temptation. a clear distinction should then be made between a civil code administered by such tribunals and the jurisdiction of the muslim law in matters of religion and all dependent upon it. but of even more pressing importance is the reform of the currency, and the admission of morocco to the latin union. this could well be insisted on when the financial question is discussed at the algeciras conference, as well as the equally important establishment in competent hands of a state bank. this and the reform of the whole fiscal system must precede every other measure, as they form the ground-work of the whole. whatever public works may be eventually undertaken, the first should be, as far as possible, such as the moors themselves can execute under european direction, and as they can appreciate. irrigation would command enthusiasm where railways would only provoke opposition, and the french could find no surer way of winning the hearts of the people than by coping at once with the agricultural water supply, in order to provide against such years of famine as the present, and worse that are well remembered. that would be a form of "pacific penetration," to which none could object. education, too, when attempted, should be gradually introduced as a means of personal advancement, the requirements of the public service being raised year by year, as the younger generation has had opportunities of better qualifying themselves. above all, every post should be in theory at least thrown open to the native, and in practice as soon as the right man turned up. better retain or instal more of the able moors of to-day as figureheads with european advisers, than attempt a new set to start with. but a clean sweep should be made of the foreigners at present in the moorish service, all of whom should be adequately pensioned off, that with the new order might come new men, adequately paid and independent of "commissions." it is essential that the people learn to feel that they are not being exploited, but that their true welfare is sought. every reform should be carried out along native lines, and in conformity with native thought. [illustration: _albert, photo., tunis._ tunisia under the french--an execution.] the costly lesson of algeria, where native rights and interests were overthrown, and a complete detested foreign rule set up, has taught the french the folly of such a system, however glorious it may appear on paper. they have been wiser in tunisia, where a nominally native government is directed by frenchmen, whom it pays, and sooner or later morocco is almost certain to become a second tunisia. this will not only prove the best working system, but it will enable opposition to be dealt with by moorish forces, instead of by an invading army, which would unite the berber tribes under the moorish flag. this was what prolonged the conquest of algeria for so many years, and the berbers of morocco are more independent and better armed than were those of algeria seventy years ago. what france will gain by the change beyond openings for frenchmen and the glory of an extended colonial empire, it is hard to imagine, but empty glory seems to satisfy most countries greedy of conquest. so far the only outward evidences of the new position are the over-running of the ports, especially of tangier, by frenchmen of an undesirable class, and by an attempt to establish a french colony at the closed port of mehedîya by doubtful means, to say nothing of the increased smuggling of arms. how the welfare of the moors will be affected by the change is a much more important question, though one often held quite unworthy of consideration, the accepted axiom being that, whether they like it or not, what is good for us is good for them. needless to say that most of the reforms required will be objected to, and that serious obstacles will be opposed to some; the mere fact that the foreigner, contemptuously called a "nazarene," is their author, is sufficient to prejudice them in native eyes, and the more prominent the part played by him, the more difficult to follow his advice. but if the sultan and his new advisers will consent to a wise course of quiet co-operation, much may be effected without causing trouble. it is astonishing how readily the moors submit to the most radical changes when unostentatiously but forcibly carried out. never was there a greater call for the _suaviter in modo, fortiter in re_. power which makes itself felt by unwavering action has always had their respect, and if the sultan is prepared not to act till with gold in his coffers, disciplined troops at his command, and loyal officials to do his behest, he can do so with unquestioned finality, all will go well. then will the prosperity of the people revive--indeed, achieve a condition hitherto unknown save in two or three reigns of the distant past, perhaps not then. the poor will not fear to sow their barren fields, or the rich to display their wealth; hidden treasure will come to light, and the groan of the oppressed will cease. individual cases of gross injustice will doubtless arise; but they will be as nothing compared with what occurs in morocco to-day, even with that wrought by europeans who avail themselves of existing evils. so that if france is wise, and restrains her hot-heads, she may perform a magnificent work for the moors, as the british have done in egypt; at least, it is to be hoped she may do as well in morocco as in tunisia. but it would be idle to ignore the deep dissatisfaction with which the anglo-french agreement has been received by others than the moors.[ ] most british residents in morocco, probably every tourist who has been conducted along the coast, or sniffed at the capital cities; those firms of ours who share the bulk of the moorish trade, and others who yearned to open up possible mines, and undertake the public works so urgently needed; ay, and the concession-prospectors and company-mongers who see the prey eluding their grasp; even the would-be heroes across the straits who have dreamed in vain of great deeds to be done on those hills before them; all unite in deploring what appears to them a gross blunder. after all, this is but natural. so few of us can see beyond our own domains, so many hunger after anything--in their particular line--that belongs to a weaker neighbour, that it is well we have disinterested statesmen who take a wider view. else had we long since attempted to possess ourselves of the whole earth, like the conquering hordes of asia, and in consequence we should have been dispossessed ourselves. [ : see appendix.] even to have been driven to undertake in morocco a task such as we were in egypt, would have been a calamity, for our hands are too full already of similar tasks. it is all very well in these times of peace, but in the case of war, when we might be attacked by more than one antagonist, we should have all our work cut out to hold what we have. the policy of "grab," and dabbing the world with red, may be satisfactory up to a certain point, but it will be well for us as a nation when we realize that we have had enough. in morocco, what is easy for france with her contiguous province, with her plans for trans-sáharan traffic, and her thirst to copy our colonial expansion--though without men to spare--would have been for us costly and unremunerative. we are well quit of the temptation. moreover, we have freed ourselves of a possible, almost certain, cause of friction with france, of itself a most important gain. just as france would never have acquiesced in our establishing a protectorate in morocco without something more than words, so the rag-fed british public, always capable of being goaded to madness by the newspapers, would have bitterly objected to french action, if overt, while powerless to prevent the insidious grasp from closing on morocco by degrees. the first war engaging at once british attention and forces was like to see france installed in morocco without our leave. the early reverses of the transvaal war induced her to appropriate tûát and figig, and had the fortune of war been against us, morocco would have been french already. these facts must not be overlooked in discussing what was our wisest course. we were unprepared to do what france was straining to do: we occupied the manger to no one's good--practically the position later assumed by germany. surely we were wiser to come to terms while we could, not as in the case of tunisia, when too late. but among the objecting critics one class has a right to be heard, those who have invested life and fortune in the morocco trade; the men who have toiled for years against the discouraging odds involved, who have wondered whether moorish corruption or british apathy were their worst foe, in whom such feeling is not only natural but excusable. only those who have experienced it know what it means to be defrauded by complacent orientals, and to be refused the redress they see officials of other nations obtaining for rivals. yet now they find all capped by the instructions given to our consuls not to act without conferring with the local representatives of france, which leads to the taunt that great britain has not only sold her interests in morocco to the french, but also her subjects! the british policy has all along been to maintain the _status quo_ in spite of individual interests, deprecating interference which might seem high-handed, or create a precedent from which retraction would be difficult. in the collection of debts, in enforcing the performance of contracts, or in securing justice of any kind where the policy is to promise all and evade all till pressure is brought to bear, british subjects in morocco have therefore always found themselves at a disadvantage in competition with others whose governments openly supported them. the hope that buoyed them up was that one day the tide might turn, and that great britain might feel it incumbent on her to "protect" morocco against all comers. now hope has fled. what avails it that grace of a generation's span is allowed them, that they may not individually suffer from the change? it is the dream of years that lies shattered. here are the provisions for their protection: art. iv. "the two governments, equally attached to the principle of commercial liberty, both in egypt and morocco, declare that they will not lend themselves to any inequality either in the establishment of customs rights or other taxes, or in the establishment of tariffs for transport on the railways.... this mutual agreement is valid for a period of thirty years" (subject to extensions of five years). art. v. secures the maintenance in their posts of british officials in the moorish service, but while it is specially stipulated that french missionaries and schools in egypt shall not be molested, british missionaries in morocco are committed to the tender mercies of the french. thus there can be no immediate exhibition of favouritism beyond the inevitable placing of all concessions in french hands, and there is really not much ground of complaint, while there is a hope of cause for thankfulness. released from its former bugbears, no longer open to suspicion of secret designs, our foreign office can afford to impart a little more backbone into its dealings with moorish officials; a much more acceptable policy should, therefore, be forthwith inaugurated, that the morocco traders may see that what they have lost in possibilities they have gained in actualities. still more! the french, now that their hands are free, are in a position to "advise" reforms which will benefit all. thus out of the ashes of one hope another rises. part iii xxxii algeria viewed from morocco "one does not become a horseman till one has fallen." _moorish proverb._ a journey through algeria shows what a stable and enlightened government has been able to do in a land by no means so highly favoured by nature as morocco, and peopled by races on the whole inferior. the far greater proportion of land there under cultivation emphasizes the backward state of morocco, although much of it still remains untouched; while the superior quality of the produce, especially of the fruits, shows what might be accomplished in the adjoining country were its condition improved. the hillsides of algeria are in many districts clothed with vines which prosper exceedingly, often almost superseding cereals as objects of cultivation by europeans. the european colonists are of all nationalities, and the proportion which is not french is astonishingly large, but every inducement is held out for naturalization as algerians, and all legitimate obstacles are thrown in the way of those who maintain fidelity to their fatherlands. every effort is made to render algeria virtually part of france, as politically it is already considered to be. it is the case of the old days of slavery revived under a new form, when the renegade was received with open arms, and the man who remained steadfast was seldom released from slavery. of course, in these days there is nothing approaching such treatment, and it is only the natives who suffer to any extent. these are despised, if not hated, and despise and hate in return. the conquerors have repeated in algeria the old mistake which has brought about such dire results in other lands, of always retaining the position of conquerors, and never unbending to the conquered, or encouraging friendship with them. this attitude nullifies whatever good may result from the mixed schools in which muslim, jew, and european are brought in contact, in the hope of turning out a sort of social amalgam. most of the french settlers are too conceited and too ignorant to learn arabic, though this is by no means the fault of the government, which provides free public classes for instruction in that language in the chief towns of algeria and tunisia. the result is that the natives who meet most with foreigners have, without the most ordinary facilities enjoyed by the europeans, to pick up a jargon which often does much more credit to them than the usual light acquaintance of the foreigner with arabic does to him. those who make any pretence at it, usually speak it with an accent, a pronunciation and a nonchalance which show that they have taken no pains whatever to acquire it. evidently it pays better to spend money educating natives in french than frenchmen in arabic. it is an amusing fact that most of the teachers have produced their own text-books, few of which possess special merit. as a colony algeria has proved a failure. foreign settlers hold most of the desirable land, and till it with native labour. the native may have safety and justice now, but he has suffered terribly in the past, as the reports of the bureau arabe, established for his protection, abundantly prove, and bitterly he resents his fate. no love is lost between french and natives in tunisia, but there is actual hatred in algeria, fostered by the foreigner far more than by the smouldering bigotry of islám. they do not seem to intermingle even as oil and water, but to follow each a separate, independent course. among the foreign colonists it is a noteworthy fact that the most successful are not the french, who want too much comfort, but almost any of the nationalities settled there, chiefly spaniards and italians. the former are to be found principally in the neighbourhood of Óran, and the latter further east; they abound in tunisia. englishmen and others of more independent nature have not been made welcome in either country, and year by year their interests have dwindled. even in tunisia, under a different system, the same result has been achieved, and every restriction reconcilable with paper rights has been placed on other than french imports. there may be an "open door," but it is too closely guarded for us. the english houses that once existed have disappeared, and what business is done with this country has had to take refuge with agents, for the most part jews. in studying the life of algerian towns, the almost entire absence of well-to-do arabs or berbers is striking. i never came across one who might be judged from his appearance to be a man of means or position, unless in military or official garb, though there are doubtless many independent natives among the berber and arab tribes. the few whom i encountered making any pretence of dressing well were evidently of no social rank, and the complaint on every hand is that the natives are being gradually ousted from what little is left to them. as for european law, they consider this to have no connection with justice, and think themselves very heavily taxed to support innovations with which they have no concern, and which they would rather dispense with. one can, indeed, feel for them, though there is no doubt much to be said on both sides, especially when it is the other side which boasts the power, if not the superior intelligence. the jews, however, thrive, and in many ways have the upper hand, especially so since the wise move which accorded them the rights of french citizenship. it is remarkable, however, how much less conspicuous they are in the groups about the streets than in morocco, notwithstanding that their dress is quite as distinctive as there, though different. the new-comer who arrives at the fine port of algiers finds it as greatly transformed as its name has been from the town which originally bore it, el jazîrah. the fine appearance of the rising tiers of houses gives an impression of a still larger city than it really is, for very little is hidden from view except the suburbs. from a short way out to sea the panorama is grand, but it cannot be as chaste as when the native city clustered in the hollow with its whitewashed houses and its many minarets, completely surrounded by green which has long since disappeared under the advancing tide of bricks and mortar. one can hardly realize that this fine french city has replaced the den of pirates of such fearful histories. yet there is the original light-house, the depôt for european slaves, and away on the top of yonder hill are remains of the ancient citadel. it was there, indeed, that those dreadful cruelties were perpetrated, where so many christians suffered martyrdom. yes, this is where once stood the "famous and war-like city, el jazîrah," which was in its time "the scourge of christendom." whether the visitor be pleased or disappointed with the modern city depends entirely on what he seeks. if he seeks europe in africa, with perhaps just a dash of something oriental, he will be amply satisfied with algiers, which is no longer a native city at all. it is as french as if it had risen from the soil entirely under french hands, and only the slums of the arab town remain. the seeker after native life will therefore meet with complete disappointment, unless he comes straight from europe, with no idea what he ought to expect. all the best parts of the town, the commercial and the residential quarters, have long since been replaced by european substitutes, leaving hardly a trace of the picturesque originals, while every day sees a further encroachment on the erstwhile african portion, the interest of which is almost entirely removed by the presence of crowds of poor europeans and european-dressed jews. the visitor to algiers would therefore do well to avoid everything native, unless he has some opportunity of also seeing something genuine elsewhere. the only specimens he meets in the towns are miserable half-caste fellows--by habit, if not by birth,--for their dress, their speech, their manners, their homes, their customs, their religion--or rather their lack of religion,--have all suffered from contact with europeans. but even before the frenchmen came, it is notorious how the algerines had sunk under the bane of turkish rule, as is well illustrated by their own saying, that where the foot of the turk had trod, grass refused to grow. of all the barbary states, perhaps none has suffered more from successive outside influences than the people of algeria. the porter who seizes one's luggage does not know when he is using french words or arabic, or when he introduces italian, turkish, or spanish, and cannot be induced to make an attempt at arabic to a european unless the latter absolutely refuses to reply to his jargon. then comes a hideous corruption of his mother tongue, in which the foreign expressions are adorned with native inflexions in the most comical way. his dress is barbarous, an ancient and badly fitting pair of trousers, and stockingless feet in untidy boots, on the heels of which he stamps along the streets with a most unpleasant noise. the collection of garments which complete his attire are mostly european, though the "fez" cap remains the distinctive feature of the muslim's dress, and a selhám--that cloak of cloaks, there called a "bûrnûs"--is slung across his shoulder. some few countrymen are to be seen who still retain the more graceful native costume, with the typical camel-hair or cotton cord bound round the head-dress, but the old inhabitants are being steadily driven out of town. [illustration: tent of an algerian sheÏkh.] the characteristic feature of algerian costumes is the head-cord referred to, which pervades a great part of arabdom, in syria and arabia being composed of two twists of black camel hair perhaps an inch thick. in algeria it is about an eighth of an inch thick, and brown. the slippers are also characteristic, but ugly, being of black leather, excellently made, and cut very far open, till it becomes an art to keep them on, and the heels have to be worn up. the use of the white selhám is almost universal, unhemmed at the edges, as in tunis also; and over it is loosely tied a short haïk fastened on the head by the cord. there is, however, even in algiers itself, one class of men who remain unaffected by their european surroundings, passive amid much change, a model for their neighbours. these are the beni m'záb, a tribe of mohammedan protestants from southern algeria, where they settled long ago, as the puritans did in new england, that they might there worship god in freedom. they were the abadîya, gathered from many districts, who have taken their modern name from the tribe whose country they now inhabit. they speak a dialect of berber, and dress in a manner which is as distinctive as their short stature, small, dark, oily features, jet-black twinkling eyes, and scanty beard. they come to the towns to make money, and return home to spend it, after a few years of busy shop-keeping. a butcher whom i met said that he and a friend had the business year and year about, so as not to be too long away from home at a time. they are very hard-working, and have a great reputation for honesty; they keep their shops open from about five in the morning till nine at night. as the beni m'záb do not bring their wives with them, they usually live together in a large house, and have their own mosque, where they worship alone, resenting the visits of all outsiders, even of other muslims. admission to their mosque is therefore practically refused to europeans, but in moorish dress i was made welcome as some distinguished visitor from saintly fez, and found it very plain, more like the kûbbah of a saint-house than an ordinary mosque. there are also many moors in algeria, especially towards the west. these, being better workmen than the algerines, find ready employment as labourers on the railways. great numbers also annually visit Óran and the neighbourhood to assist at harvest time. those moors who live there usually disport themselves in trousers, strange to stay, and, when they can afford it, carry umbrellas. they still adhere to the turban, however, instead of adopting the head cord. at blidah i found that all the sellers of sfinges--yeast fritters--were moors, and those whom i came across were enthusiastic to find one who knew and liked their country. the algerines affect to despise them and their home, which they declare is too poor to support them, thus accounting for their coming over to work. the specimens of native architecture to be met with in algeria are seldom, if ever, pure in style, and are generally extremely corrupt. the country never knew prosperity as an independent kingdom, such as morocco did, and it is only in tlemçen, on the borders of that empire, that real architectural wealth is found, but then this was once the capital of an independent kingdom. the palace at constantine is not moorish at all, except in plan, being adorned with a hap-hazard collection of odds and ends from all parts. it is worse than even the bardo at tunis, where there is some good plaster carving--naksh el hadeed--done by moorish or andalucian workmen. in the palaces of the governor and the archbishop of algiers, which are also very composite, though not without taste, there is more of this work, some of it very fine, though much of it is merely modern moulded imitation. of more than a hundred mosques and shrines found in algiers when it was taken by the french, only four of the former and a small number of the latter remain, the rest having been ruthlessly turned into churches. the mosque of hasan, built just over a century ago, is now the cathedral, though for this transformation it has been considerably distorted, and a mock-moorish façade erected in the very worst taste. inside things are better, having been less interfered with, but what is now a church was never a good specimen of a mosque, having been originally partly european in design, the work of renegades. the same may be said of the mosque of the fisheries, a couple of centuries old, built in the form of a greek cross! one can well understand how the dey, according to the story, had the architect put to death on discovering this anomaly. these incongruities mar all that is supposed in algeria to be arabesque. the great mosque, nevertheless, is more ancient and in better style, more simple, more chaste, and more awe-inspiring. the zawîah of sîdi abd er-rahmán, outside the walls, is as well worth a visit as anything in algiers, being purely and typically native. it is for the opportunities given for such peeps as this that one is glad to wander in algeria after tasting the real thing in morocco, where places of worship and baths are closed to europeans. these latter i found all along north africa to be much what they are in morocco, excepting only the presence of the foreigners. the tile work of algeria is ugly, but many of the older italian and other foreign specimens are exceptionally good, both in design and colour. some of the tunisian tiles are also noteworthy, but it is probable that none of any real artistic value were ever produced in what is now conveniently called algeria. there is nothing whatever in either country to compare with the exquisite fez work found in the alhambra, hardly to rival the inferior productions of tetuan. a curious custom in algeria is to use all descriptions of patterns together "higgledy-piggledy," upside down or side-ways, as though the idea were to cover so much surface with tiling, irrespective of design. of course this is comparatively modern, and marks a period since what art algeria ever knew had died out. it is noticeable, too, how poor the native manufacturers are compared with those of morocco, themselves of small account beside those of the east. the wave of civilization which swept over north africa in the middle ages failed to produce much effect till it recoiled upon itself in the far, far west, and then turned northward into spain. notwithstanding all this, algeria affords an ample field for study for the scientist, especially the mountain regions to the south, where berber clans and desert tribes may be reached in a manner impossible yet in morocco, but the student of oriental life should not visit them till he has learnt to distinguish true from false among the still behind-hand moors. xxxiii tunisia viewed from morocco "the slave toils, but the lord completes." _moorish proverb._ fortunately for the french, the lesson learned in algeria was not neglected when the time came for their "pacific penetration" of tunisia. their first experience had been as conquerors of anything but pacific intent, and for a generation they waged war with the berber tribes. everywhere, even on the plains, where conquest was easy, the native was dispossessed. the land was allotted to frenchmen or to natives who took the oath of allegiance to france, and became french subjects. those who fought for their fatherland were driven off, the villages depopulated, and the country laid waste. in the cities the mosques were desecrated or appropriated to what the native considered idolatrous worship. they have never been restored to their owners. those algerines only have flourished who entered the french army or government service, and affected manners which all but cut them off from their fellow-countrymen. in tunisia the french succeeded, under cover of specious assurances to the contrary, in overthrowing the turkish beys, rehabilitating them in name as their puppets, with hardly more opposition than the british met with in burma. the result is a nominally native administration which takes the blame for failures, and french direction which takes the credit for successes. all that was best in algeria has been repeated, but native rights have been respected, and the cities, with their mosques and shrines, left undisturbed as far as possible. the desecration of the sacred mosque of kaïrwán as a stable was a notable exception. the difference between the administration of algeria and that of tunisia makes itself felt at every step. in the one country it is the ruling of a conquered people for the good of the conquerors alone, and in the other it is the ruling of an unconquered people by bolstering up and improving their own institutions under the pretence of seeking their welfare. the immense advantage of the tunisian system is apparent on all sides. the expense is less, the excuses for irregularities are greater, and the natives still remain a nominal power in the land, instead of being considered as near serfs as is permissible in this twentieth century. the results of the french occupation were summed up to me by a tunisian as the making of roads, the introduction of more money and much drunkenness, and the institution of laws which no native could ever hope to understand. but france has done more than that in tunis, even for the native. he has the benefit of protection for life and property, with means of education and facilities for travel, and an outlet for his produce. he might do well--and there are many instances of commercial success--but while he is jibbing against the foreign yoke, the expatriated jews, whom he treated so badly when he had the upper hand, are outstripping him every day. the net result of the foreigners' presence is good for him, but it would be much better had he the sense to take advantage of his chances as the jew does. many of the younger generation, indeed, learn french, and enter the great army of functionaries, but they are rigidly restricted to the lowest posts, and here again the jew stands first. in business or agriculture there is sure to come a time when cash is needed, so that french and jewish money-lenders flourish, and when the tunisian cannot pay, the merciless hand of foreign law irresistibly sells him up. in the courts the complicated procedure, the intricate code, and the swarm of lawyers, bewilder him, and he sighs for the time when a bribe would have settled the question, and one did at least know beforehand which would win--the one with the longer purse. now, who knows? but the tunisian's principal occasions for discontent are the compulsory military service, and the multiplication and weight of the taxes. from the former only those are exempt who can pass certain examinations in french, and stiff ones at that, so that arabic studies are elbowed out; the unremitted military duties during the ramadán fast are regarded as a peculiar hardship. to the taxes there seems no end, and from them no way of escape. even the milkman complains, for example, that though his goats themselves are taxed, he cannot bring their food into town from his garden without an additional charge being paid! with the superficial differences to be accounted for by this new state of things, there still remains much more in tunisia to remind one of morocco than in algeria. what deeper distinctions there are result in both countries from turkish influence, and turkish blood introduced in the past, but even these do not go very deep. beneath it all there are the foundations of race and creed common to all, and the untouched countryman of tunisia is closely akin to his fellow of morocco. even in the towns the underlying likeness is strong. the old city of tunis is wonderfully like that of fez; the streets, the shops, the paving, being identical; but in the former a picturesque feature is sometimes introduced, stone columns forming arcades in front of the shops, painted in spiral bands of green and red, separated by a band of white. the various trades are grouped there as further west, and the streets are named after them. the mellah, or jewish quarter, has lost its boundary, as at tangier, and the gates dividing the various wards have disappeared too. hardly anything remains of the city walls, new ones having arisen to enclose the one european and two native suburbs. but under a modern arcade in the main street, the avenue de france, there is between the shops the barred gate leading to a mosque behind, which does not look as if it were often opened. tramways run round the line of the old walls, and it is strange to see the natives jumping on and off without stopping the car, in the most approved western style. there, as in the trains, european and african sit side by side, though it is to be observed that as a rule, should another seat be free, neither gets in where the other is. as for hopes of encouraging any degree of amalgamation, these are vain indeed. a mechanical mixture is all that can be hoped for: nothing more is possible. a few french people have embraced islám for worldly aims, and it is popularly believed by the natives that in england thousands are accepting mohammed. the mosques of tunis are less numerous than those of fez, but do not differ greatly from them except in the inferior quality of the tile-work, and in the greater use of stone for the arches and towers. the latter are of the moorish square shape, but some, if not all, are ascended by steps, instead of by inclined planes. the mosques, with the exception of that at kaïrwán--the most holy, strange to say--are as strictly forbidden to europeans and jews as in morocco, and screens are put up before the doors as in tangier. the moors are very well known in tunis, so many of them, passing through from mekka on the hajj, have been prevented from getting home by quarantine or lack of funds. clad as a moor myself, i was everywhere recognized as from that country, and was treated with every respect, being addressed as "amm el háj" ("uncle pilgrim"), having my shoulders and hands kissed in orthodox fashion. there are several _cafés_ where morocco men are to be met with by the score. one feature of this cosmopolitan city is that there are distinct _cafés_ for almost every nation represented here except the english. the arabs of morocco are looked upon as great thieves, but the sûsis have the highest reputation for honesty. not only are all the gate-keepers of the city from that distant province, but also those of the most important stores and houses, as well as of the railway-stations, and many are residents in the town. the chief snake-charmers and story-tellers also hail from sûs. the veneration for mulai táïb of wazzán, from whom the shareefs of that place are descended, is great, and the aïsáwa, hailing from mequinez, are to be met with all along this coast; they are especially strong at kaïrwán. in tunis, as also in algeria and tripoli, the comparative absence of any objection to having pictures taken of human beings, which is an almost insurmountable hindrance in morocco, again allowed me to use my kodak frequently, but i found that the jews had a strong prejudice against portraits. the points in which the domestic usages of tunisia differ from those of morocco are the more striking on account of the remarkably minute resemblance, if not absolute identity, of so very many others, and as the novelty of the innovations wears off, it is hard to realize that one is not still in the "far west." in a native household of which i found myself temporarily a member, it was the wholesale assimilation of comparatively trivial foreign matters which struck me. thus, for instance, as one of the sons of my host remarked--though he was dressed in a manner which to most travellers would have appeared exclusively oriental--there was not a thing upon him which was not french. doubtless a closer examination of his costume would have shown that some of the articles only reached him through french hands, but the broad fact remained that they were all foreign. it is in this way that the more civilized countries show a strong and increasing tendency to develop into nations of manufacturers, with their gigantic workshops forcing the more backward, _nolens volens_, to relapse to the more primitive condition of producers of raw material only. there was, of course, a time when every garment such a man would have worn would have been of native manufacture, without having been in any feature less complete, less convenient, or less artistic than his present dress. in many points, indeed, there is a distinct loss in the more modern style, especially in the blending of colours, while it is certain that in no point has improvement been made. my friend, for instance, had the addition, common there, of a pair of striped merino socks, thrust into a pair of rubber-soled tennis shoes. underneath he wore a second pair of socks, and said that in winter he added a third. above them was not much bare leg, for the pantaloons are cut there so as often to reach right down to the ankles. this is necessitated by the custom of raising the mattresses used for seats on divans, and by sitting at table on european chairs with the legs dangling in the cold. the turban has nothing of the gracefulness of its moorish counterpart, being often of a dirty-green silk twisted into a rope, and then bound round the head in the most inelegant fashion, sometimes showing the head between the coils; they are not folds. heads are by no means kept so carefully shaved as in morocco, and i have seen hair which looked as though only treated with scissors, and that rarely. the fashion for all connected with the government to wear european dress, supplemented by the "fez" (fortunately not the turkish style), brings about most absurd anomalies. this is especially observable in the case of the many very stout individuals who waddle about like ducks in their ungainly breeches. i was glad to find on visiting the brother of the late bey that he retained the correct costume, though the younger members of his family and all his attendants were in foreign guise. the bey himself received me in the frock-coat with pleated skirt, favoured by his countrymen the turks. [illustration: _albert, photo., tunis._ a tunisian jewess in street dress.] the mohammedan women seen in the streets generally wear an elegant fine silk and wool haïk over a costume culminating in a peaked cap, the face being covered--all but the eyes--by two black handkerchiefs, awful to behold, like the mask of a stage villain. more stylish women wear a larger veil, which they stretch out on either side in front of them with their hands. they seem to think nothing of sitting in a railway carriage opposite a man and chatting gaily with him. i learn from an english lady resident in tunis that the indoor costume of the women is much that of the jewesses out of doors--extraordinary indeed. it is not every day that one meets ladies in the street in long white drawers, often tight, and short jackets, black or white, but this is the actual walking dress of the jewish ladies of tunis. xxxiv tripoli viewed from morocco "every sheep hangs by her own legs." _moorish proverb._ when, after an absence of twenty months, i found myself in tripoli, although far enough from morocco, i was still amid familiar sights and sounds which made it hard to realize that i was not in some hitherto unvisited town of that empire. the petty differences sank to naught amid the wonderful resemblances. it was the turkish element alone which was novel, and that seemed altogether out of place, foreign as it is to africa. there was something quite incongruous in the sight of those ungainly figures in their badly fitting, quasi-european black coats and breeches, crowned with tall and still more ungainly red caps. the turks are such an inferior race to the berbers and arabs that it is no wonder that they are despised by the natives. they appear much more out of place than do the europeans, who remain, as in morocco, a class by themselves. to see a turk side by side with a white-robed native at prayer in a mosque is too ridiculous, and to see him eating like a wild man of the woods! even the governor, a benign old gentleman, looked very undignified in his shabby european surroundings, after the important appearance of the moorish functionaries in their flowing robes. the sentinels at the door seemed to have been taught to imitate the wooden salute of the germans, which removes any particle of grace which might have remained in spite of their clumsy dress. it is a strange sight to see them selling their rations of uninviting bread in the market to buy something more stimulating. they squat behind a sack on the ground as the old women do in tangier. these are the little things reminding one that tripoli is but a turkish dependency. we may complain of the moorish customs arrangements, but from my own experience, and from what others tell me, i should say that here is worse still. not only were our things carefully overhauled, but the books had to be examined, as a result of which process arabic works are often confiscated, either going in or out. the confusing lack of a monetary system equals anything even in southern morocco, between which and this place the poor despised "gursh" turns up as a familiar link, not to be met with between casablanca and tripoli. perhaps the best idea of the town for those readers acquainted with morocco will be to call it a large edition of casablanca. the country round is flat, the streets are on the whole fairly regular, and wider than the average in this part of the world. indeed, carriages are possible, though not throughout the town. a great many more flying arches are thrown across the streets than we are accustomed to further west, but upper storeys are rare. the paving is of the orthodox barbary style. the tripolitan mosques are of a very different style from those of morocco, the people belonging to a different sect--the hánafis--moors, algerines and tunisians being of the more rigorous málikis. instead of the open courtyard surrounded by a colonnade, here they have a perfectly closed interior roofed with little domes, and lighted by barred windows. the walls are adorned with inferior tiles, mostly european, and the floors are carpeted. round the walls hang cheap glazed texts from the korán, and there is a general appearance of tawdry display which is disappointing after the chaste adornment of the finer moorish mosques, or even the rude simplicity of the poorer ones. orders may be obtained to view these buildings, of which it is hardly necessary to say i availed myself, in one case ascending also the minaret. these minarets are much less substantial than those of morocco, being octangular, with protruding stone balconies in something of the florentine style, reached by winding stairs. the exteriors are whitewashed, the balconies being tiled, and the cupolas painted green. lamps are hung out at certain feasts. as for the voice of the muédhdhin, it must be fairly faint, since during the week i was there i never heard it. in morocco this would have been an impossibility. the language, though differing in many minor details from that employed in morocco, presents no difficulty to conversation, but it was sometimes necessary to try a second word to explain myself. the differences are chiefly in the names of common things in daily use, and in common adjectives. the music was identical with what we know in the "far west." religious strictness is much less than in morocco, the use of intoxicants being fairly general in the town, the hours of prayer less strictly kept, and the objection to portraits having vanished. there seemed fewer women in the streets than in morocco, but those who did appear were for the most part less covered up; there was nothing new in the way the native women were veiled, only one eye being shown--i do not now take the foreign turks into account. in the streets the absence of the better-class natives is most noticeable; one sees at once that tripoli is not an aristocratic town like fez, tetuan, or rabat. the differences which exist between the costumes observed and those of morocco are almost entirely confined to the upper classes. the poor and the country people would be undistinguishable in a moorish crowd. among the townsfolk stockings and european shoes are common, but there are no native slippers to equal those of morocco, and yellow ones are rare. i saw no natives riding in the town; though in the country it must be more common. the scarcity of four-footed beasts of burden is noticeable after the crowded moorish thoroughfares. on the whole there is a great lack of the picturesque in the tripoli streets, and also of noise. the street cries are poor, being chiefly those of vegetable hawkers, and one misses the striking figure of the water-seller, with his tinkling bell and his cry. the houses and shops are much like those of morocco, so far as exteriors go, and so are the interiors of houses occupied by europeans. the only native house to which i was able to gain access was furnished in the worst possible mixture of european and native styles to be found in many jewish houses in morocco, but from what i gleaned from others this was no exception to the rule. unfortunately the number of grog-shops is unduly large, with all their attendant evils. the wheeled vehicles being foreign, claim no description, though the quaintness of the public ones is great. palmetto being unknown, the all-pervading halfah fibre takes its place for baskets, ropes, etc. the public ovens are very numerous, and do not differ greatly from the moorish, except in being more open to the street. the bread is much less tempting; baked in small round cakes, varnished, made yellow with saffron, and sprinkled with gingelly seed. most of the beef going alive to malta, mutton is the staple animal food; vegetables are much the same as in morocco. the great drawback to tripoli is its proximity to the desert, which, after walking through a belt of palms on the land side of the town--itself built on a peninsula--one may see rolling away to the horizon. the gardens and palm groves are watered by a peculiar system, the precious liquid being drawn up from the wells by ropes over pulleys, in huge leather funnels of which the lower orifice is slung on a level with the upper, thus forming a bag. the discharge is ingeniously accomplished automatically by a second rope over a lower pulley, the two being pulled by a bullock walking down an incline. the lower lip being drawn over the lower pulley, releases the water when the funnel reaches the top. the weekly market, sôk et-thláthah, held on the sands, is much as it would be in the gharb el jawáni, as morocco is called in tripoli. the greater number of blacks is only natural, especially when it is noted that hard by they have a large settlement. [illustration: _photograph by g. michell, esq._ outside tripoli.] it would, of course, be possible to enter into a much more minute comparison, but sufficient has been said to give a general idea of tripoli to those who know something of morocco, without having entered upon a general description of the place. from what i saw of the country people, i have no doubt that further afield the similarity between them and the people of central and southern morocco, to whom they are most akin, would even be increased. xxxv foot-prints of the moors in spain "every one buries his mother as he likes." _moorish proverb._ i. first impressions. much as i had been prepared by the accounts of others to observe the prevalence of moorish remains in the peninsula, i was still forcibly struck at every turn by traces of their influence upon the country, especially in what was their chief home there, andalucia. though unconnected with these traces, an important item in strengthening this impression is the remarkable similarity between the natural features of the two countries. the general contour of the surface is the same on either side of the straits for a couple of hundred miles; the same broad plains, separated by low ranges of hills, and crossed by sluggish, winding streams, fed from distant snow-capped mountains, and subject to sudden floods. the very colours of the earth are the same in several regions, the soil being of that peculiar red which gives its name to the blád hamrá ("red country") near marrákesh. this is especially observable in the vicinity of jeréz, and again at granáda, where one feels almost in morocco again. even the colour of the rugged hills and rocks is the same, but more of the soil is cultivated than in any save the grain districts of morocco. the vegetation is strikingly similar, the aloe and the prickly pear, the olive and the myrtle abounding, while from the slight glimpses i was able to obtain of the flora, the identity seems also to be continued there. yet all this, though interesting to the observer, is not to be wondered at. it is our habit of considering the two lands as if far apart, because belonging to separate continents, which leads us to expect a difference between countries divided only by a narrow gap of fourteen miles or less, but one from whose formation have resulted most important factors in the world's history. the first striking reminders of the moorish dominion are the names of arabic origin. some of the most noteworthy are granáda (gharnátah), alcazar (el kasar), arjona (r'honah), gibraltar (gibel tárik), trafalgár (tarf el gharb, "west point"), medinah (madînah, "town"), algeciras (el jazîrah, "the island"), guadalquivir (wád el kebeer--so pronounced in spain--"the great river"), mulahacen (mulai el hasan), alhama (el hama, "the hot springs"), and numberless others which might be mentioned, including almost every name beginning with "al." the rendering of these old arabic words into spanish presents a curious proof of the changes which the pronunciation of the spanish alphabet has undergone during the last four centuries. to obtain anything like the arabic sound it is necessary to give the letters precisely the same value as in english, with the exception of pronouncing "x" as "sh." thus the word "alhaja," in everyday use--though unrecognizable as heard from the lips of the modern castilian, "aláha,"--is nothing but the arabic "el hájah," with practically the same meaning in the plural, "things" or "goods." to cite more is unnecessary. the genuine pronunciation is still often met with among jews of morocco who have come little in contact with spaniards, and retain the language of their ancestors when expelled from the peninsula, as also in spanish america. the spanish language is saturated with corrupted arabic, at all events so far as nouns are concerned. the names of families also are frequently of arabic origin, as, for instance, alarcos (er-rakkás--"the courier"), alhama, etc., most of which are to be met with more in the country than in the towns, while very many others, little suspected as such, are jewish. although when the most remarkable of nations was persecuted and finally expelled from spain, a far larger proportion nobly sacrificed their all rather than accept the bauble religion offered them by "the catholic kings" (king and queen), they also have left their mark, and many a noble family could, if it would, trace its descent from the jews. some of their synagogues are yet standing, notably at toledo--whence the many toledános,--built by samuel levy, who was secretary to don pedro the cruel. this was in , a century and a half before the moors were even conquered, much less expelled, and if the sons of ishmael have left their mark upon that sunny land, so have the sons of israel, though in a far different manner. morocco has ever since been the home of the descendants of a large proportion of the exiles. the spanish physiognomy, not so much of the lower as of the upper classes, is strikingly similar to that of the mountaineers of morocco, and these include some of the finest specimens. the moors of to-day are of too mingled a descent to present any one distinct type of countenance, and it is the same with the spaniards. so much of the blood of each flows in the veins of the other, that comparison is rendered more difficult. it is a well-known fact that several of the most ancient families in the kingdom can trace their descent from mohammedans. a leading instance of this is the house of mondéjar, lords of granáda from the time of its conquest, as the then head of the house, sidi yahia, otherwise don pedro de granáda, had become a christian. in the generalife at that town, still in the custody of the same family, is a genealogical tree tracing its origin right back to the goths![ ] [ : andalucia is but a corruption of vandalucia.] next to physiognomy come habits and customs, and of these there are many which have been borrowed, or rather retained, from the moors, especially in the country. the ploughs, the water-mills, the water-wheels, the irrigation, the treading out of the corn, the weaving of coarse cloth, and many other daily sights, from their almost complete similarity, remind one of morocco. the bread-shops they call "tahônas," unaware that this is the arabic for a flour-mill; their water-wheels they still call by their arabic name, "naôrahs," and it is the same with their pack-saddles, "albardas" (bardah). the list might be extended indefinitely, even from such common names as these. the salutations of the people seem literal translations of those imported from the orient, such as i am not aware of among other europeans. what, for instance, is "dios guarda vd." ("god keep you"), said at parting, but the "allah îhannak" of morocco, or "se lo passe bien," but "b'is-salámah" ("in peace!"). more might be cited, but to those unacquainted with arabic they would be of little interest. then, again, the singing of the country-folk in southern spain has little to distinguish it from that indulged in by most orientals. the same sing-song drawl with numerous variations is noticeable throughout. once a more civilized tune gets among these people for a few months, its very composer would be unlikely to recognize its prolongations and lazy twists. the narrow, tortuous streets of the old towns once occupied by the invaders take one back across the straits, and the whole country is covered with spots which, apart from any remains of note, are associated by record or legend with anecdotes from that page of spanish history. here it is the "sigh of the moor," the spot from which the last ameer of andalucia gazed in sorrow on the capital that he had lost; there it is a cave (at criptana) where the moors found refuge when their power in castile was broken; elsewhere are the chains (in toledo) with which the devotees of islám chained their christian captives. in addition to this, the hills of a great part of spain are dotted with fortresses of "tabia" (rammed earth concrete) precisely such as are occupied still by the country kaïds of morocco; and by the wayside are traces of the skill exercised in bringing water underground from the hills beyond marrákesh. how many church towers in spain were built for the call of the muédhdhin, and how many houses had their foundations laid for hareems! in the south especially such are conspicuous from their design. to crown all stand the palaces and mosques of córdova, sevílle, and granáda, not to mention minor specimens. when we talk of the moors in spain, we often forget how nearly we were enabled to speak also of the moors in france. their brave attempts to pass that natural barrier, the pyrenees, find a suitable monument in the perpetual independence of the wee republic of andorra, whose inhabitants so successfully stemmed the tide of invasion. the story of charles martel, too, the "hammer" who broke the muslim power in that direction, is one of the most important in the history of europe. what if the people who were already levying taxes in the districts of narbonne and nîmes had found as easy a victory over the vineyards of southern france, as they had over those of spain? where would they have stopped? would they ever have been driven out, or would st. paul's have been a second kûtûbîya, and westminster a karûeeïn? god knows! ii. cÓrdova the earliest notable monument of moorish dominion in andalucia still existing is the famous mosque of córdova, now deformed into a cathedral. its erection occupied the period from to of the christian era, and it is said that it stands on the site of a gothic church erected on the ruins of a still earlier temple dedicated to janus. portions, however, have been added since that date, as inscriptions on the walls record, and the european additions date from , when, notwithstanding the protests of the people of córdova, the bishops obtained permission from charles v. to rear the present quasi-gothic structure in its central court. the disgust and anger which the lover of moorish architecture--or art of any sort--feels for the name of "_carlos quinto_," as at point after point hideous additions to the moorish remains are ascribed to that conceited monarch, are somewhat tempered for once by the record that even he repented when he saw the result of his permission in this instance. "you have built here," he said, "what you might have built anywhere, and in doing so you have spoiled what was unique in the world!" in each of the three great centres of moorish rule, sevílle, granáda and córdova, the same hand is responsible for outrageous modern erections in the midst of hoary monuments of eastern art, carefully inscribed with their author's name, as "cæsar the emperor, charles the fifth." the córdova mosque, antedated only by those of old cairo and kaïrwán, is a forest of marble pillars, with a fine court to the west, surrounded by an arcade, and planted with orange trees and palms, interspersed with fountains. nothing in morocco can compare with it save the karûeeïn mosque at fez, built a century later, but that building is too low, and the pillars are for the most part mere brick erections, too short to afford the elegance which here delights. this is grand in its simplicity; nineteen aisles of slightly tapering columns of beautiful marbles, jasper or porphyry, about nine feet in height, supporting long vistas of flying horse-shoe arches, of which the stones are now coloured alternately yellow and red, though probably intended to be all pure white. other still more elegant scolloped arches, exquisitely decorated by carving the plaster, spring between alternate pillars, and from arch to arch, presumably more modern work. the aisles are rather over twenty feet in width, and the thirty-three cross vaultings about half as much, while the height of the roof is from thirty to forty feet. in all, the pillars number about , though frequently stated to total out of an original , but it is difficult to say where all these can be, since the sum of by is only , and a deduction has to be made for the central court, in which stands the church or choir. since these notes were first published, in , i have seen it disputed between modern impressionist writers which of them first described the wonderful scene as a palm grove, a comparison of which i had never heard when i wrote, but the wonder to me would be if any one could attempt to picture the scene without making use of it. who but a nation of nomads, accustomed to obey the call to prayer beneath the waving branches of african and arabian palm-groves, would have dreamed of raising such a house of god? unless for the purpose of supporting a wide and solid roof, or of dividing the centre into the form of a cross, what other ecclesiastical architects would have conceived the idea of filling a place of worship with pillars or columns? no one who has walked in a palm-grove can fail to be struck by the resemblance to it of this remarkable mosque. the very tufted heads with their out-curving leaves are here reproduced in the interlacing arches, and with the light originally admitted by the central court and the great doors, the present somewhat gloomy area would have been bright and pleasant as a real grove, with its bubbling fountains, and the soothing sound of trickling streams. i take the present skylights to be of modern construction, as i never saw such a device in a moorish building. most of the marble columns are the remains of earlier erections, chiefly roman, like the bridge over the guadalquivir close by, restored by the builder of the mosque. some, indeed, came from constantinople, and others were brought from the south of france. they are neither uniform in height nor girth--some having been pieced at the bottom, and others partly buried;--so also with the capitals, certain of which are evidently from the same source as the pillars, while the remainder are but rude imitations, mostly corinthian in style. the original expenses of the building were furnished by a fifth of the booty taken from the spaniards, with the subsidies raised in catalonia and narbonne. the moors supplied voluntary, and european captives forced labour. [illustration: a shrine in cordova mosque.] on fridays, when the faithful met in thousands for the noon-day prayer, what a sight and what a melody! the deep, rich tones of the organ may add impressiveness to a service of worship, but there is nothing in the world so grand, so awe-inspiring as the human voice. when a vast body of males repeats the formulæ of praise, together, but just slightly out of time, the effect once heard is never forgotten. i have heard it often, and as i walk these aisles i hear it ringing in my ears, and can picture to myself a close-packed row of white-robed figures between each pillar, and rows from end to end between, all standing, stooping, or forehead on earth, as they follow the motions of the leader before them. a grand sight it is, whatever may be one's opinion of their religion. in the manner they sit on the matted floors of their mosques there would be room here for thirteen thousand without using the orange court, and there is little doubt that on days when the court attended it used to be filled to its utmost. to the south end of the cathedral the floor of two wide aisles is raised on arches, exactly opposite the niche which marks the direction of mekka, and the space above is more richly decorated than any other portion of the edifice except the niche itself. this doubtless formed the spot reserved for the ameer and his court, screened off on three sides to prevent the curiosity of the worshippers overcoming their devotion, as is still arranged in the mosques which the sultan of morocco attends in his capitals. until a few years ago this rich work in arabesque and tiles was hidden by plaster. the kiblah niche is a gem of its kind. it consists of a horse-shoe arch, the face of which is ornamented with gilded glass mosaic, forming the entrance to a semi-circular recess beautifully adorned with arabesques and inscriptions, the top of the dome being a large white marble slab hollowed out in the form of a pecten shell. the wall over the entrance is covered with texts from the korán, forming an elegant design, and on either side are niches of lesser merit, but serving to set off the central one which formed the kiblah. eleven centuries have elapsed since the hands of the workmen left it, and still it stands a witness of the pitch of art attained by the berbers in spain. it is said that here was deposited a copy of the korán written by othmán himself, and stained with his blood, of such a size that two men could hardly lift it. when, for a brief period, the town fell into the hands of alfonso vii., his soldiers used the mosque as a stable, and tore up this valuable manuscript. when a moorish embassy was sent to madrid some years ago, the members paid a visit to this relic of the greatness of their forefathers, and to the astonishment of the custodians, having returned to the court-yard to perform the required ablutions, re-entered, slippers in hand, to go through the acts of worship as naturally as if at home. what a strange sight for a christian cathedral! right in front of the niche is a plain marble tomb with no sign but a plain bar dexter. evidently supposing this to be the resting-place of some saint of their own persuasion, they made the customary number of revolutions around it. it would be interesting to learn from their lips what their impressions were. of the tower which once added to the imposing appearance of the building, it is recorded that it had no rival in height known to the builders. it was of stone, and, like one still standing in baghdád from the days of harûn el rasheed, had two ways to the top, winding one above the other, so that those who ascended by the one never met those descending by the other. according to custom it was crowned by three gilded balls, and it had fourteen windows. this was of considerably later date than the mosque itself, but has long been a thing of the past. the european additions to the córdova mosque are the choir, high altar, etc., which by themselves would make a fine church, occupying what must have been originally a charming court, paved with white marble and enlivened by fountains; the tower, built over the main entrance, opening into the court of oranges; and a score or two of shrines with iron railings in front round the sides, containing altars, images, and other fantastic baubles to awe the ignorant. an inscription in the tower records that it was nearly destroyed by the earth-quake of , and though it is the least objectionable addition, it is a pity that it did not fall on that or some subsequent occasion. it was raised on the ruins of its moorish predecessor in . the chief entrance, like that of sevílle, is a curious attempt to blend roman architecture with mauresque, having been restored in , but the result is not bad. recent "restorations" are observable in some parts of the mosque, hideous with colour, but a few of the original beams are still visible. i am inclined to consider the greater part of the roof modern, but could not inspect it closely enough to be certain. though vaulted inside, it is tiled in ridges in the usual moorish style, but very few green tiles are to be seen. from the tower the view reminds one strongly of morocco. the hills to the north and south, with the river winding close to the town across the fertile plain, give the scene a striking resemblance to that from the tower of the spanish consulate at tetuan. all around are the still tortuous streets of a moorish town, though the roofs of the houses are tiled in ridges of moorish pattern, as those of tangier were when occupied by the english two hundred years ago, and as those of el k'sar are now. the otherwise moorish-looking building at one's feet is marred by the unsightly erection in the centre, and its court-yard seems to have degenerated into a play-ground, where the neighbours saunter or fill pitchers from the fountains. after enduring the apparently unceasing din of the bells in those erstwhile stations of the muédhdhin, one ceases to wonder that the lazy moors have such a detestation for them, and make use instead of the stirring tones of the human voice. rest and quiet seem impossible in their vicinity, for their jarring is simply head-splitting. and as if they were not excruciating enough, during "holy week" they conspire against the ear-drums of their victims by revolving a sort of infernal machine made of wood in the form of a hollow cross, with four swinging hammers on each arm which strike against iron plates as the thing goes round. the keeper's remark that the noise was awful was superfluous. the history of the town of córdova has been as chequered as that of most andalucian cities. its foundation is shrouded in obscurity. the romans and vandals had in turn been its masters before the moors wrested it from the spaniards in the year a.d. though the spaniards regained possession of it in , it was not for long, as it soon fell into the hands of the invaders once more. the spanish victors only left a moorish viceroy in charge, who proved too true a berber to serve against his countrymen, so he betrayed his trust. in it was finally recovered by the spaniards, after five hundred and twenty-four years of moorish rule. since that time the traces of that epoch of its history have been gradually disappearing, till there only remain the mutilated mosque, and portions of the ancient palace, or of saint-houses (as the side-chapel of the church of st. miguel), and of a few dwellings. since the first train steamed to this ancient city, in , the railway has probably brought as many pilgrims to the mosque as ever visited it from other motives in its greatest days. the industry founded here by the moors--that of tanning--which has given its name to a trade in several countries,[ ] seems to have gone with them to morocco, for though many of the old tan-pits still exist by the river side, no leather of any repute is now produced here. the moorish water-mills are yet at work though, having been repaired and renewed on the original model. these, as at granáda and other places, are horizontal wheels worked from a small spout above, directly under the mill-stone, such as is met with in fez and tetuan. [ : sp. _cordován_, fr. _cordonnier_, eng. _cordwainer_, etc.] iii. sevÍlle in the girálda tower of sevílle i expected to find a veritable moorish trophy in the best state of preservation, open to that minute inspection which was impossible in the only complete specimen of such a tower, the kutûbîya, part of a mosque still in use. imagine, then, my regret on arriving at the foot of that venerable monument, to find it "spick and span," as if just completed, looking new and tawdry by the side of the cathedral which has replaced the mosque it once adorned. instead of the hoary antiquity to which the rich deep colour of the stone of the sister towers in morocco bears witness in their weather-beaten glory, this one, built, above the first few stone courses, of inch pan-tiles, separated by a like thickness of mortar, has the appearance of having been newly pointed and rubbed down, while faded frescoes on the walls testify to the barbarity of the conquerors of the "barbarians." the delicate tracery in hewn stone which adds so greatly to the beauty of the morocco and tlemçen examples, is almost entirely lacking, while the once tasteful horse-shoe windows are now pricked out in red and yellow, with a hideous modern balcony of white stone before each. the quasi-moorish belfry is the most pardonable addition, but to crown all is an exhibition of incongruity which has no excuse. the original tile-faced turret of the moors, with its gilded balls, has actually been replaced by a structure of several storeys, the first of which is doric, the second ionic, and the third corinthian. imagine this crowning the comely severity of the solid moorish structure without a projecting ornament! but this is not all. swinging in gaunt uneasiness over the whole, stands a huge revolving statue, supposed to represent faith, holding out in one hand a shield which catches the wind, and causes it to act as a weather-vane. such is the girálda of the twentieth century, and the guide-books are full of praises for the restorer, who doubtless deserves great credit for his skill in repairing the tower after it had suffered severely from lightning, but who might have done more towards restoring the original design, at all events in the original portion. we read in "raôd el kártás" that the mosque was finished and the tower commenced in , during the reign of mulai yakûb el mansûr, who commenced its sisters at marrákesh and rabat in the same year. one architect is recorded to have designed all three--indeed, they have little uncommon in their design, and have been once almost alike. some assert that this man was a christian, but there is nothing in the style of building to favour such a supposition. the plan is that of all the mosque towers of morocco, and the only tower of a mosque in actual use which i have ascended in that country--one at mogador--was just a miniature of this. it is, therefore, in little else than point of size that these three are remarkable. the similarity between these and the recently fallen tower of st. mark's at venice is most striking, both in design and in the method of ascent by an inclined plane; while around the italian lakes are to be seen others of less size, but strongly resembling these. all three are square, and consist of six to eight storeys in the centre, with thick walls and vaulted roof, surrounded by an inclined plane from base to summit, at an angle which makes it easy walking, and horses have been ridden up. the unfinished hassan tower at rabat having at one time become a place of evil resort, the reigning ameer ordered the way up to be destroyed, but it was found so hard that only the first round was cut away, and the door bricked up. each ramp of the girálda, if i remember rightly, has its window, but in the hassan many are without light, though at least every alternate one has a window, some of these being placed at the corner to serve for two, while here they are always in the centre. the girálda proper contains seven of these storeys, with thirty-five ramps. to the top of the eighth storey, which is the first addition, dating from the sixteenth century, now used as a belfry, the height is about feet. the present total height is a little over feet. the original turret of the girálda, similar to that at marrákesh, was destroyed in by a hurricane. the additions were finished in . an old view, still in existence, and dating from the thirteenth century, shows it in its pristine glory, and there is another--moorish--as old as the tower itself. after all that i had read and heard of the palace at sevílle, i was more disappointed than even in the case of the girálda. not only does it present nothing imposing in the way of moorish architecture, but it has evidently been so much altered by subsequent occupants as to have lost much of its original charm. to begin with the outside, instead of wearing the fine crumbling appearance of the palaces of morocco or granáda, this also had been all newly plastered till it looks like a work of yesterday, and coloured a not unbecoming red. even the main entrance has a gothic inscription half way up, and though its general aspect is that of moorish work, on a closer inspection, the lower part at least is seen to be an imitation, as in many ways the unwritten laws of that style have been widely departed from. the gothic inscription states that don pedro i. built it in . inside, the general ground plan remains much as built, but connecting doorways have been opened where moors never put them, and with the exception of the big raised tank in the corner, there is nothing african about the garden. even the plan has been in places destroyed to obtain rooms of a more suitable width for the conveniences of european life. the property is a portion of the royal patrimony, and is from time to time occupied by the reigning sovereign when visiting sevílle. a marble tablet in one of these rooms tells of a queen having been born there during the last century. much of the ornamentation on the walls is of course original, as well as some of the ceilings and doors, but the "restorations" effected at various epochs have greatly altered the face of things. gaudy colours show up both walls and ceilings, but at the same time greatly detract from their value, besides which there are coarse imitations of the genuine tile-work, made in squares, with lines in relief to represent the joints, as well as patterns painted on the plaster to fill up gaps in the designs. then, too, the most prominent parts of the ornamentation have been disfigured by the interposition of spanish shields and coats-of-arms on tiles. the border round the top of the dado is alternated with these all the way round some of the rooms. to crown all, certain of the fine old doors, resembling a wooden patchwork, have been "restored" with plaster-of-paris. some of the arabesques which now figure on these walls were actually pillaged from the alhambra. many of the arabic inscriptions have been pieced so as to render them illegible, and some have been replaced upside down, while others tell their own tale, for they ascribe glory and might to a spanish sovereign, don pedro the cruel, instead of to a "leader of the faithful." a reference to the history of the country tells us that this ruler "reconstructed" the palace of the moors, while later it was repaired by don juan ii., before ferdinand and isabella built their oratories within its precincts, or charles v., with his mania for "improving" these monuments of a foreign dominion, doubled it in size. for six centuries this work, literally of spoliation, has been proceeding in the hands of successive owners; what other result than that arrived at, could be hoped for? when this is realized, the greater portion of the historic value of this palace vanishes, and its original character as a moorish palace is seen to have almost disappeared. there still, however, remains the indisputable fact, apparent from what does remain of the work of its builders, that it was always a work of art and a trophy of the skill of its designers, those who have interfered with it subsequently having far from improved it. according to arab historians, the foundations of this palace were laid in a.d. and it was reconstructed between and . in a fire did considerable damage, which was not repaired till . the inscriptions are of no great historical interest. "wa lá ghálib ílá allah"--"there is none victorious but god"--abounds here, as at the alhambra, and there are some very neat specimens of the kufic character. of moorish sevílle, apart from the girálda and the palace--el kasar, corrupted into alcazar--the only remains of importance are the torre del oro--borj ed-daheb--built in at the riverside, close to where the moors had their bridge of boats, and the towers of the churches of ss. marcos and marina. others there are, built in imitation of the older erections, often by moorish architects, as those of the churches of omnium sanctorum, san nicolas, ermita de la virgen, and santa catalina. many private houses contain arches, pillars, and other portions of moorish buildings which have preceded them, such as are also to be found in almost every town of southern spain. as late as the town had thirteen gates more or less of moorish origin, but these have all long since disappeared. sevílle was one of the first cities to surrender to the moors after the battle of guadalete, a.d. , and remained in their hands till taken by st. ferdinand after fifteen months' siege in , six years after its inhabitants had thrown off their allegiance to the emperor of morocco, and formed themselves into a sort of republic, and ten years after the moorish kingdom of granáda was founded. it then became the capital of spain till charles v. removed the court to valladolid. iv. granÁda "o palace red! from distant lands i have come to see thee, believing thee to be a garden in spring, but i have found thee as a tree in autumn. i thought to see thee with my heart full of joy, but instead my eyes have filled with tears." so wrote in the visitors' album of the alhambra, in , an arab poet in his native tongue, and another inscription in the same volume, written by a moor some years before, remarks, "peace be on thee, o granáda! we have seen thee and admired thee, and have said, 'praised be he who constructed thee, and may they who destroyed thee receive mercy.'" as the sentiments of members of the race of its builders, these expressions are especially interesting; but they can hardly fail to be shared to some extent by visitors from eastern lands, of whatever nationality. although the loveliest monument of moorish art in spain, and a specimen of their highest architectural skill, destructions, mutilations, and restorations have wrought so much damage to it that it now stands, indeed, "as a tree in autumn." it was not those who conquered the moors on whom mercy was implored by the writer quoted--for they, ferdinand and isabella, did their best to preserve their trophy--but on such of their successors as charles v., who actually planted a still unfinished palace right among the buildings of this venerable spot, adjoining the remains of the alhambra, part of which it has doubtless replaced. this unartistic austrian styled these remains "the ugly abominations of the moors," and forthwith proceeded to erect really ugly structures. but the most unpardonable destroyers of all that the moors left beautiful were, perhaps, the french, who in entered granáda with hardly a blow, and under sebastian practically desolated the palace. they turned it into barracks and storehouses, as inscriptions on its walls still testify--notably on the sills of the "miranda de la reina." ere they left in , they even went so far as to blow up eight of the towers, the remainder only escaping through the negligence of an employee, and the fuses were put out by an old spanish soldier. the spaniards having thus regained possession, the commissioners appointed to look after it "sold everything for themselves, and then, like good patriots, reported that the invaders had left nothing." after a brief respite in the care of an old woman, who exhibited more sense in the matter than all the generals who had perpetrated such outrages upon it, the alhambra was again desecrated by a new governor, who used it as a store of salt fish for the galley slaves. while the old woman--washington irving's "tia antonia"--was in possession, that famous writer did more than any one to restore the ancient fame of the palace by coming to stay there, and writing his well-known account of his visit. mr. forde, and his friend mr. addington, the british ambassador, helped to remind people of its existence, and saved what was left. subsequent civil wars have, however, afforded fresh opportunities of injury to its hoary walls, and to-day it stands a mere wreck of what it once was. the name by which these buildings are now known is but the adjective by which the arabs described it, "el hamra," meaning "the red," because of its colour outside. when occupied it was known only as either "the palace of granáda," or "the red palace." the colour of the earth here is precisely that of the plains of dukála and marrákesh, and the buildings, being all constructed of tabia, are naturally of that colour. in no part of spain could one so readily imagine one's self in morocco; indeed, it is hard to realize that one is not there till the new european streets are reached. in the palace grounds, apart from the fine carriage-drive, with its seats and lamp-posts, when out of sight of the big hotels and other modern erections, the delusion is complete. even in the town the running water and the wayside fountains take one back to fez; and the channels underneath the pavements with their plugs at intervals are only moorish ones repaired. on walking the crooked streets of the part which formed the town of four centuries ago, on every hand the names are moorish. here is the kaisarîya, restored after a fire in ; there is the street of the grain fandaks, and beyond is a hammám, now a dwelling-house. the site of the chief mosque is now the cathedral, in the chief chapel of which are buried the conquerors of granáda. there lie ferdinand and isabella in plain iron-bound leaden coffins--far from the least interesting sights of the place--in a spot full of memories of that contest which they considered the event of their lives, and which was indeed of such vital importance to the country. the inscription on their marble tomb in the church above tells how that the moors having been conquered and heresy stamped out (?), that worthy couple took their rest. the very atmosphere of the place seems charged with reminiscences of the moors and their successful foes, and here the spirits of prescott and gayangos, the historians, seem to linger still. on either side of the high altar are extremely interesting painted carvings. on one is figured the delivering up of the alhambra. ferdinand, isabella and mendoza ride in a line, and the latter receives the key in his gloved hand as the conquered king offers him the ring end, followed by a long row of captives. behind the victors ride their knights and dames. on the other the moors and mooresses are seen being christened wholesale by the monks, their dresses being in some respects remarkably correct in detail, but with glaring defects in others, just what might be expected from one whose acquaintance with them was recent but brief. before these carvings kneel real likenesses of the royal couple in wood, and on the massive square tomb in front they repose in alabaster. a fellow-tomb by their side has been raised to the memory of their immediate successors. in the sacristry are to be seen the very robes of cardinal mendoza, and his missal, with the sceptre and jewel-case of isabella, and the sword of ferdinand, while that of the conquered bû abd allah is on view elsewhere. here, too, are the standards unfurled on the day of the recapture, january , , and a picture full of interest, recording the adieux of "boabdil" and ferdinand, who, after their bitter contest, have shaken hands and are here falling on each other's necks. as a model of moorish art, the palace of granáda, commenced in , is a monument of its latest and most refined period. the heavy and comparatively simple styles of córdova and sevílle are here amplified and refined, the result being the acme of elegance and oriental taste. this i say from personal acquaintance with the temples of the far east, although those present a much more gorgeous appearance, and are much more costly erections, evincing a degree of architectural ability and the possession of hoards of wealth beside which what the builders of the alhambra could boast of was insignificant; nor do i attempt to compare these interesting relics with the equally familiar immensity of ancient masonry, or with the magnificent work of the middle ages still existing in europe. these monuments hold a place of their own, unique and unassailable. they are the mementoes of an era in the history of europe, not only of the peninsula, and the interest which attaches itself to them even on this score alone is very great. as relics on a foreign soil, they have stood the storms of five centuries under the most trying circumstances, and the simplicity of their components lends an additional charm to the fabric. they are to a great extent composed of what are apparently the weakest materials--mud, gypsum, and wood; the marble and tiles are but adornments. from without the appearance of the palace has been well described as that of "reddish cork models rising out of a girdle of trees." on a closer inspection the "cork" appears like red sandstone, and one wonders how it has stood even one good storm. there is none of that facing of stone which gives most other styles of architecture an appearance of durability, and whatever facing of plaster it may once have possessed has long since disappeared. but inside all is different. instead of crumbling red walls, the courts and apartments are highly ornamented with what we now call plaster-of-paris, but which the moors have long prepared by roasting the gypsum in rude kilns, calling it "gibs." a full description of each room or court-yard would better become a guide-book, and to those who have the opportunity of visiting the spot, i would recommend ford's incomparable "handbook to spain," published by murray, the older the edition the better. to those who can read spanish, the "estudio descriptivo de los monumentos arabes," by the late sr. contreras (government restorer of the moorish remains in spain), to be obtained in granáda, is well worth reading. such information as a visitor would need to correct the mistaken impressions of these and other writers ignorant of moorish usages as to the original purpose of the various apartments, i have embodied in macmillan's "guide to the western mediterranean." certain points, however, either for their architectural merit or historic interest, cannot be passed over. such is the court of the lions, of part of which a model disfigured by garish painting may be seen at the crystal palace. in some points it is resembled by the chief court of the mosque of the karûeeïn at fez. in the centre is that strange departure from the injunctions of the korán which has given its name to the spot, the alabaster fountain resting on the loins of twelve beasts, called, by courtesy, "lions." they remind one rather of cats. "their faces barbecued, and their manes cut like the scales of a griffin, and the legs like bed-posts; a water-pipe stuck in their mouths does not add to their dignity." in the inscription round the basin above, among flowery phrases belauding the fountain, and suggesting that the work is so fine that it is difficult to distinguish the water from the alabaster, the spectator is comforted with the assurance that they cannot bite! the court is surrounded by the usual tiled verandah, supported by one hundred and twenty-two light and elegant white marble pillars, the arches between which show some eleven different forms. at each end is a portico jutting out from the verandahs, and four cupolas add to the appearance of the roofs. the length of the court is twice its width, which is sixty feet, and on each side lies a beautiful decorated apartment with the unusual additions of jets of water from the floor in the centre of each, as also before each of the three doors apiece of the long narrow moorish rooms, and under the two porticoes. the overflows, instead of being hidden pipes, are channels in the marble pavement, for the moors were too great lovers of rippling water to lose the opportunity as we cold-blooded northerners would. to fully realize the delights of such a place one must imagine it carpeted with the products of rabat, surrounded by soft mattresses piled with cushions, and with its walls hung with a dado of dark-coloured felt cloths of various colours, interworked to represent pillars and arches such as surround the gallery, and showing up the beautiful white of the marble by contrast. thus furnished--in true moorish style--the place should be visited on a hot summer's day, after a wearisome toil up the hill from the town. then, lolling among the cushions, and listening to the splashing water, if strong sympathy is not felt with the builders of the palace, who thought it a paradise, the visitor ought never to have left his armchair by the fire-side at home. if, instead of wasting money on re-plastering the walls until they look ready for papering, and then scratching geometrical designs upon them in a style no moor ever dreamed of, the spanish government would entrust a moor of taste to decorate it in his own native style, without the modern european additions, they would do far better and spend less. one step further, and the introduction of moorish guides and caretakers who spoke spanish--easy to obtain--would add fifty per cent. to the interest of the place. then fancy the christian and muslim knights meeting in single combat on the plains beneath those walls. people once more the knolls and pastures with the turban and the helm, fill in the colours of robe and plume; oh, what a picture it would make! doubtless similar apartments for the hareem exist in the recesses of the palaces of fez, mequinez, marrákesh and rabat. some very fine work is to be seen in the comparatively public parts, in many respects equalling this, and certainly better than that of the palace of sevílle. various alterations and "restorations" have been effected from time to time in this as in other parts of the palace, notably in the fountain, the top part of which is modern. it is probable that originally there was only one basin, resting immediately on the "lions" below. its date is given as a.d. the room known for disputed reasons as the hall of the two sisters was originally a bedroom. the entrance is one of the most elaborate in the palace, and its wooden ceiling, pieced to resemble stalactites, is a charming piece of work, as also are those of the other important rooms of the palace. another apartment opening out of the court of lions, known as the hall of justice--most likely in error--contains one of the most curious remains in the palace, another departure from the precepts of the religion professed by its builders. this is no less than a series of pictures painted on skins sewn together, glued and fastened to the wooden dome with tinned tacks, and covered with a fine coating of gypsum, the gilt parts being in relief. though the date of their execution must have been in the fourteenth century, the colours are still clear and fresh. the picture in the centre of the three domes is supposed by some to represent ten moorish kings of granáda, though it is more likely meant for ten wise men in council. on the other two ceilings are pictures, one of a lady holding a chained lion, on the point of being delivered from a man in skins by a european, who is afterwards slain by a mounted moor. the other is of a boar-hunt and people drinking at a fountain, with a man up a tree in a dress which looks remarkably like that of the eighteenth century in england, wig and all. this work must have been that of some christian renegade, though considerable discussion has taken place over the authorship. it is most likely that the lions are of similar origin, sculptured by some one who had but a remote idea of the king of the forest. after the group of apartments surrounding the court of the lions, the most valuable specimen of moorish architecture is that known as the hall of the ambassadors, probably once devoted to official interviews, as its name denotes. this is the largest room in the palace, occupying the upper floor in one of the massive towers which defended the citadel, overlooking the vega and the remains of the camp-town of santa fé, built during the siege by the "catholic kings." the thickness of its walls is therefore immense, and the windows look like little tunnels; under it are dungeons. the hall is thirty-seven feet square, and no less than seventy-five feet high in the centre of the roof, which is not the original one. some of the finest stucco wall decoration in the place is to be seen here, with elegant arabic inscriptions, in the ancient style of ornamental writing known as kufic, most of the instances of the latter meaning, "o god, to thee be endless praise, and thanks ascending." over the windows are lines in cursive arabic, ascribing victory and glory to the "leader of the resigned, our lord the father of the pilgrims" (yûsef i.), with a prayer for his welfare, while everywhere is to be seen here, as in other parts, the motto, "and there is none victorious but god." between the two blocks already described lie the baths, the undressing-room of which has been very creditably restored by the late sr. contreras, and looks splendid. it is, in fact, a covered patio with the gallery of the next floor running round, and as no cloth hangings or carpets could be used here, the walls and floor are fully decorated with stucco and tiles. the inner rooms are now in fair condition, and are fitted with marble, though the boiler and pipes were sold long ago by a former "keeper" of the palace. the general arrangement is just the same as that of the baths in morocco. one room of the palace was fitted up by ferdinand and isabella as a chapel, the gilt ornaments of which look very gaudy by the side of the original moorish work. opening out of this is a little gem of a mosque, doubtless intended for the royal devotions alone, as it is too small for a company. surrounding the palace proper are several other buildings forming part of the alhambra, which must not be overlooked. among them are the two towers of the princesses and the captives, both of which have been ably repaired. in the latter are to be seen tiles of a peculiar rosy tint, not met with elsewhere. in the dar aïshah ("gabinete de lindaraxa"--"x" pronounced as "sh") are excellent specimens of those with a metallic hue, resembling the colours on the surface of tar-water. ford points out that it was only in these tiles that the moors employed any but the primary colours, with gold for yellow. this is evident, and holds good to the present day. both these towers give a perfect idea of a moorish house of the better class in miniature. outside the walls are of the rough red of the mud concrete, while inside they are nearly all white, and beautifully decorated. the thickness of the walls keeps them delightfully cool, and the crooked passages render the courts in the centre quite private. of the other towers and gates, the only notable one is that of justice, a genuine moorish erection with a turning under it to stay the onrush of an enemy, and render it easier of defence. the hand carved on the outer arch and the key on the inner one have given rise to many explanations, but their only significance was probably that this gate was the key of the castle, while the hand was to protect the key from the effects of the evil eye. this superstition is still popular, and its practice is to be seen to-day on thousands of doors in morocco, in rudely painted hands on the doorposts. the watch tower (de la vela) is chiefly noteworthy as one of the points from which the spanish flag was unfurled on the memorable day of the entry into granáda. the anniversary of that date, january nd, is a high time for the young ladies, who flock here to toll the bell in the hopes of being provided with a husband during the new-begun year. at a short distance from the alhambra itself is a group known as the torres bermejas (vermilion towers), probably the most ancient of the moorish reign, if part did not exist before their settlement here, but they present no remarkable architectural features. across a little valley is the generalife, a charming summer residence built about , styled by its builder the "paradise of the wise,"--jinah el arîf--which the spaniards have corrupted to its present designation, pronouncing it kheneraliffy. truly this is a spot after the moor's own heart: a luxuriant garden with plenty of dark greens against white walls and pale-blue trellis-work, harmonious at every turn with the rippling and splashing of nature's choicest liquid. of architectural beauty the buildings in this garden have but little, yet as specimens of moorish style--though they have suffered with the rest--they form a complement to the alhambra. that is the typical fortress-palace, the abode of a martial court; this is the pleasant resting-place, the cool retreat for love and luxury. nature is here predominant, and art has but a secondary place, for once retaining her true position as great nature's handmaid. light arched porticoes and rooms behind serve but as shelter from the noonday glare, while roomy turrets treat the occupier to delightful views. superfluous ornament within is not allowed to interfere with the contemplation of beauty without. between the lower and upper terrace is a remarkable arrangement of steps, a moorish ideal, for at equal distances from top to bottom, between each flight, are fountains playing in the centre, round which one must walk, while a stream runs down the top of each side wall in a channel made of tiles. what a pleasant sight and sound to those to whom stair climbing in a broiling sun is too much exercise! the cypresses in the garden are very fine, but they give none too much shade. the present owner's agent has bû abd allah's sword on view at his house in the town, and this is a gem worth asking to see when a ticket is obtained for the generalife. it is of a totally different pattern and style of ornament from the modern moorish weapons, being inlaid in a very clever and tasteful manner. to the antiquary the most interesting part of granáda is the albaycin, the quarter lying highest up the valley of the darro, originally peopled by refugees from the town of baeza--away to the north, beyond jaen--the baïseeïn. as the last stronghold of moorish rule in the peninsula, when one by one the other cities, once its rivals, fell into the hands of the christians again, granáda became a centre of refuge from all parts, and to this owed much of its ultimate importance. unfortunately no attempt has been made to preserve the many relics of that time which still exist in this quarter, probably the worst in the town. many owners of property in the neighbourhood can still display the original arabic title deeds, their estates having been purchased by spanish grandees from the expelled moors, or later from the expelled jews. a morning's tour will reveal much of interest in back alleys and ruined courts. one visitor alone is hardly safe among the wild half-gipsy lot who dwell there now, but a few copper coins are all the keys needed to gain admission to some fine old patios with marble columns, crumbling fandaks, and ruined baths. by the roadside may be seen the identical style of water-mill still used in morocco, and the presence of the spaniard seems a dream. v. hither and thither having now made pilgrimages to the more famous homes of the moor in europe, let us in fancy take an aërial flight over sunny spain, and glance here and there at the scattered traces of muslim rule in less noted quarters. everything we cannot hope to spy, but we may still surprise ourselves and others by the number of our finds. even this task accomplished, a volume on the subject might well be written by a second borrow or a ford, whose residence among the modern moors had sharpened his scent for relics of that ilk.[ ] let not the reader think that with these wayside jottings all has been disclosed, for the moor yet lives in spain, and there is far more truth in the saying that "barbary begins at the pyrenees" than is generally imagined. [ : to the latter i am indebted for particulars regarding the many places mentioned in this final survey which it was impossible for me to visit.] we will start from tarifa, perhaps the most ancient town of andalucia. the moors named this ancient punic city after t'arîf ibn málek ("the wise, son of king"), a berber chief. they beleaguered it about , and it is still enclosed by moorish walls. the citadel, a genuine moorish castle, lies just within these walls, and was not so long ago the abode of galley-slaves. close to sevílle, where the river guadalquivir branches off, it forms two islands--islas mayor y menor. the former was the kaptal of the moors. at coria the river winds under the moorish "castle of the cleft" (el faraj), now called st. juan de alfarache, and passes near the torre del oro, a monument of the invader already referred to. old xeres, of sherry fame, is a straggling, ill-built, ill-drained moorish city. it was taken from the moors in . part of the original walls and gates remain in the old town. the moorish citadel is well preserved, and offers a good specimen of those turreted and walled palatial fortresses. but it is not till we reach sevílle that we come to a museum of moorish antiquities. here we see arabesque ceilings, marqueterie woodwork, stucco panelling, and the elegant horse-shoe arches. there are beautiful specimens in the citadel, in calle pajaritos no. , in the casa prieto and elsewhere. the moors possessed the city for five hundred years, during which time they entirely rebuilt it, using the roman buildings as materials. many moorish houses still exist, the windows of which are barricaded with iron gratings. on each side of the patios, or courts, are corridors supported by marble pillars, whilst a fountain plays in the centre. these houses are rich in moorish porcelain tilings, called azulejos--from the arabic ez-zulaïj--but the best of these are in the patio of the citadel. carmona is not far off, with its oriental walls and castle, famous as ever for its grateful springs. the tower of san pedro transports us again to tangier, as do the massy walls and arched gate. some eight leagues on the way to badajos from sevílle rises a moorish tower, giving to the adjoining village the name of castillo de las guardias. five leagues beyond are the mines of the "inky river"--rio tinto--a name sufficiently expressive and appropriate, for it issues from the mountain-side impregnated with copper, and is consequently corrosive. the moors seem to have followed the romans in their workings on the north side of the hill. further on are more mines, still proclaiming the use the moors made of them by their present name almádin--"the mine"--a name which has almost become spanish; it is still so generally used. five leagues from rio tinto, at aracena, is another moorish castle, commanding a fine panorama, and the belfry of the church hard by is arabesque. many more of these ruined kasbahs are to be seen upon the heights of andalucia, and even much further north; but the majority must go unmentioned. one, in an equally fine position, is to be seen eleven leagues along the road from sevílle to badajos, above santa olalla--a name essentially moorish, denoting the resting-place of some female mohammedan saint, whose name has been lost sight of. (lallah, or "lady," is the term always prefixed to the names of canonized ladies in morocco.) three leagues from sevílle on the granáda road, at gandul, lies another of these castles, picturesquely situated amid palms and orange groves; four leagues beyond, the name arahal (er-rahálah--"the day's journey") reminds the arabicist that it is time to encamp; a dozen leagues further on the name of roda recalls its origin, raôdah, "the cemetery." riding into jaen on the top of the diligence from granáda, i was struck with the familiar appearance of two brown tabia fortresses above the town, giving the hillside the appearance of one of the lower slopes of the atlas. this was a place after the moors' own heart, for abundant springs gush everywhere from the rocks. in their days it was for a time the capital of an independent kingdom. at ronda, a town originally built by the moors--for old ronda is two leagues away to the north,--their once extensive remains have been all but destroyed. its tortuous streets and small houses, however, testify as to its origin, and its moorish castle still appears to guard the narrow ascent by which alone it can be reached from the land, for it crowns a river-girt rock. down below, this river, the guadalvin, still turns the same rude class of corn-mills that we have seen at fez and granáda. other remnants are another moorish tower in the calle del puente viejo, and the "house of the moorish king" in calle san pedro, dating from about . descending to the river's edge by a flight of stairs cut in the solid rock, there is a grotto dug by christian slaves three centuries later. some five leagues on the road thence to granáda are the remains of the ancient teba, at the siege of which in , when it was taken from the moors, lord james douglas fought in obedience to the dying wish of the bruce his master, whose heart he wore in a silver case hung from his neck, throwing it among the enemy as he rushed in and fell. on the way from ronda to gibraltar are a number of villages whose arab names are startling even in this land of ishmaelitish memories. among these are atajate, gaucin, benahali, benarraba, benadalid, benalaurin. at gaucin an excellent view of gibraltar and jibel mûsa is obtainable from its moorish citadel. this brings us to old "gib," whose relics of tárîk and his successors are much better known to travellers than most of those minor remains. an inscription over the gate of the castle, now a prison, tells of its erection over eleven centuries ago, for this was naturally one of the early captures of the invaders. yet the mud-concrete walls stand firm and sound, though scarred by many a shot. algeciras--el jazîrah--"the island" has passed through too many vicissitudes to have much more than the name left. malaga, though seldom heard of in connection with the history of mohammedan rule in the peninsula, played a considerable part in that drama. it and cadiz date far back to the time of the carthaginians, so that, after all, their origin is african. if its name is not of an earlier origin, it may be from málekah, "the queen." every year on august , at p.m. the great bell of the cathedral is struck thrice, for that is the anniversary of its recovery from the aliens in . the flag of ferdinand then hoisted is (or was recently) still to be seen, together with a moorish one, probably that of the vanquished city, over the tomb of the conde de buena vista in the convent of la victoria. though odd bits of moorish architecture may still be met with in places, the only remains of note are the castle, built in , with its fine horse-shoe gate--sadly disfigured by modern barbarism--and what was the dockyard of the moors, now left high and dry by the receding sea. the name alhama, met with in several parts of spain, merely denotes "the hot," alluding to springs of that character which are in most instances still active. this is the case at the alhama between malaga and granáda, where the baths are worth a visit. the moorish bath is called the strong one, being nearer the spring. at antequera the castle is moorish, though built on roman foundations, and it is only of recent years that the mosque has disappeared under the "protection" of an impecunious governor. leaving the much-sung andalûs, the first name striking us in murcia is that of guadíx (pronounced wadish), a corruption of wád aïsh, "river of life." its moorish castle still stands. some ten leagues further on, at cullar de baza is another moorish ruin, and the next of note, a fine specimen, is fifteen leagues away at lorca, whose streets are in the genuine intricate style. the city of murcia, though founded by the moors, contains little calling them to remembrance. in the post-office and prison, however, and in the public granary, mementoes are to be found. orihuela, on the road from carthagena to alicante, still looks oriental with its palm-trees, square towers and domes, and elche is just another such, with flat roofs and the orthodox kasbah, now a prison. the enormous number of palms which surround the town recall marrákesh, but they are sadly neglected. monte alegre is a small place with a ruined moorish castle, about fifteen leagues from elche on the road to madrid. between alicante and xativa is the moorish castle of tibi, close to a large reservoir, and there is a square moorish tower at concentaina. xativa has a hermitage, san felin, adorned with horse-shoe arches, having a moorish cistern hard by. valencia the moors considered a paradise, and their skill in irrigation has been retained, so that of the guadalaviar (wad el abîad--"river of the whites") the fullest use is made in agriculture, and the familiar water-wheels and conduits go by the corruptions of their arabic names, naôrahs and sakkáïahs. the city itself is very moorish in appearance, with its narrow tortuous streets and gloomy buildings, but i know of no remarkable legacy of the moors there. there are the remains of a moorish aqueduct at chestalgár--a very arabic sounding name, of which the last two syllables are corrupted from el ghárb ("the west") as in the case of trafalgár (terf el ghárb--"west point"). all this district was inhabited by the moriscos or christianized moors as late as the beginning of the seventeenth century, and there must their descendants live still, although no longer distinguished from true sons of the soil. whatever may remain of the ancient saguntum, what is visible is mostly moorish, as, for instance, cisterns on the site of a roman temple. not far from valencia is burjasot, where are yet to be seen specimens of matmôrahs or underground granaries. morella is a scrambling town with moorish walls and towers, coroneted by a castle. entering catalonia, tortosa, at the mouth of the ebro, is reached, once a stronghold of the moors, and a nest of pirates till recovered by templars, pisans and genoese together. it was only withheld from the moors next year by the valour of the women besieged. the tower of the cathedral still bears the title of almudena, a reminder of the muédhdhin who once summoned muslims to prayer from its summit. here, too, are sundry remnants of moorish masonry, and some ancient matmôrahs. tarragona and barcelona, if containing no moorish ruins of note, have all, in common with other neighbouring places, retained the arabic name rambla (rimlah, "sand") for the quondam sandy river beds which of late years have been transformed into fashionable promenades. in the cathedral of tarragona an elegant moorish arch is noticeable, with a kufic inscription giving the date as a.d. for four centuries after this city was destroyed by tarîf it remained unoccupied, so that much cannot be expected to call to mind his dynasty. of a bridge at martorell over the llobregat, ford says it is "attributed to hannibal by the learned, and to the devil, as usual, by the vulgar. the pointed centre arch, which is very steep and narrow to pass, is feet wide in the span, and is unquestionably a work of the moors." not far away is a place whose name, mequineza, is strongly suggestive of moorish origin, but i know nothing further about it. now let us retrace our flight, and wing our way once more to the north of sevílle, to the inland province of estremadura. here we start from mérida, where the roman-moorish "alcazar" towers proudly yet. the moors repaired the old roman bridge over the guadiana, and the gateway near the river has a marble tablet with an arabic inscription. the muslims observed towards the people of this place good faith such as was never shown to them in return, inasmuch as they allowed them to retain their temples, creed, and bishops. they built the citadel in , and the city dates its decline from the time that alonzo el sabio took it from them in . zámora is another ancient place. it was taken from the moors in , when , of them are said to have been killed. the moorish designs in the remarkable circular arches of la magdalena are worthy of note. in toledo the church of santo tomé has a brick tower of moorish character; near it is the moorish bridge of san martin, and in the neighbourhood, by a stream leading to the tagus, moorish mills and the ruins of a villa with moorish arches, now a farm hovel, may still be seen. the ceiling of the chapel of the church of san juan de la penetencia is in the moorish style, much dilapidated ( a.d.). the toledan moors were first-rate hydraulists. one of their kings had a lake in his palace, and in the middle a kiosk, whence water descended on each side, thus enclosing him in the coolest of summer-houses. it was in toledo that ez-zarkal made water-clocks for astronomical calculations, but now this city obtains its water only by the primitive machinery of donkeys, which are driven up and down by water-carriers as in barbary itself. the citadel was once the kasbah of the moors. the cathedral of toledo is one of the most remarkable in spain. the arches of the transept are semi-moorish, xamete, who wrought it in arcos stone in - , having been a moor. the very ancient manufactory of arms for which toledo has a world-wide fame dates from the time of the goths; into this the moors introduced their damascene system of ornamenting and tempering, and as early as this identical "fabrica" was at work under abd er-rahman ibn el hákim. the moors treasured and named their swords like children. these were the weapons which othello, the moor, "kept in his chamber." [illustration: _cavilla, photo., tangier._ the market-place, tetuan.] at alcazar de san juan, in la mancha, i found a few remnants of the moorish town, as in the church tower, but the name is now almost the only moorish thing about it. hence we pass to alarcon, a truly moorish city, built like a miniature toledo, on a craggy peninsula hemmed in by the river jucar. the land approach is still guarded by moorish towers and citadel. in zocodovar--which takes its name from the word sôk, "market-place"--we find a very moorish "plaza," with its irregular windows and balconies, and in san eugenio are some remains of an old mosque with kufic inscriptions, as well as an arch and tomb of elaborate design. in the calle de las tornarías there used to be a dilapidated moorish house with one still handsome room, but it is doubtful whether this now survives the wreck of time. it was called el taller del moro, because ambron, the moorish governor of huesca, is said to have invited four hundred of the refractory chiefs of toledo to dine here, and to have cut off the head of each as he arrived. there is a curious mosque in the calle del cristo de la luz, the roof is supported by four low square pillars, each having a different capital, from which spring double arches like those at córdova. the ceiling is divided into nine compartments with domes. madrid has passed through such various fortunes, and has been so much re-built, that it now contains few traces of the moors. the only relic which i saw in was a large piece of tabia, forming a substantial wall near to the new cathedral, which might have belonged to the city wall or only to a fortress. the museum of the capital contains a good collection of moorish coins. in the armoury are moorish guns, swords, saddles, and leather shields, the last named made of two hides cemented with a mortar composed of herbs and camel-hair. in old castile the footprints grow rare and faint, although the name of valladolid--blád walîd, "town of walîd," a moorish ameer--sufficiently proclaims its origin, but i am not aware of any moorish remains there. in burgos one old gate near the triumphal arch, erected by philip ii., still retains its moorish opening, and on the opposite hill stands the castle in which was celebrated the bridal of our edward i. with eleanor of castile. it was then a true moorish kasar, but part has since been destroyed by fire. on the road from burgos to vittoria we pass between the mountains of oca and the pyrenean spurs, in which narrow defile the old spaniards defied the advancing moors. moorish caverns or cisterns are still to be seen. turning southward again, we come to medinaceli, or "the city of selim," once the strong frontier hold of a moor of that name, the scene of many conflicts among the moors themselves, and against the christians. here, on august , , died the celebrated el mansûr--"the victorious"--the "cid" (seyyid) of the moors, and the most terrible enemy of the christians. he was born in near algeciras, and by a series of intrigues, treacheries and murders, rose in importance till he became in reality master of the puppet ameer. he proclaimed a holy crusade against the christians each year, and was buried in the dust of fifty campaigns, for after every battle he used to shake off the soil from his garments into a chest which he carried about with him for that purpose. in aragon the situation of daroca, in the fertile basin of the jiloca, is very picturesque. the little town lies in a hill-girt valley around which rise eminences defended by moorish walls and towers, which, following the irregular declivities, command charming views from above. the palace of the mendozas at guadalajara, in the same district, boasts of an elegant row of moorish windows, though these appear to have been constructed after guadalajara was reconquered from the moors by the spaniards. near this place is a moorish brick building, turned into a battery by the invaders, and afterwards used as a prison. before leaving this town it will be worth while to visit san miguel, once a mosque, with its colonnaded entrance, horse-shoe arches, machiolations, and herring-bone patterns under the roof. calatayud, the second town of aragon, is of moorish origin. its moorish name means the "castle of ayûb"--or job--the nephew of mûsa, who used the ancient bilbilis as a quarry whence to obtain stones for its construction. the dominican convent of calatayud has a glorious patio with three galleries rising one above another, and a portion of the exterior is enriched with pseudo-moorish work like the prisons at guadalajara. saragossa gave me more the impression of moorish origin than any town i saw in spain, except sevílle and córdova. the streets of the original settlement are just those of mequinez on a small scale. the only object of genuinely moorish origin that i could find, however, was the aljaferia, once a palace-citadel, now a barrack, so named after jáfer, a muslim king of this province. since his times ferdinand and isabella used it, and then handed it over to the inquisition. some of the rooms still retain moorish decorations, but most of the latter are of the period of their conquerors. on one ceiling is pointed out the first gold brought from the new world. the only genuine moorish remnant is the private mosque, with beautiful inscriptions. the building has been incorporated in a huge fort-like modern brick structure, which would lead no one to seek inside for arab traces. passing from saragossa northwards, we arrive at jaca, the railway terminus, which to this day quarters on her shield the heads of four sheïkhs who were left behind when their fellow-countrymen fled from the city in , after a desperate battle in which the spanish women fought like men. the site of the battle, called las tiendas, is still visited on the first friday in may, when the daughters of these amazons go gloriously "a-shopping." the municipal charter of jaca dates from the moorish expulsion, and is reckoned among the earliest in spain. gerona, almost within sight of france, played an important part, too, in those days, siding alternately with that country and with spain when in the possession of the moors. the ameer sulaïmán, in a.d., entered into an alliance with pepin, and in charlemagne took the town, which the moors re-captured ten years later. it became their headquarters for raids upon narbonne and nîsmes. castellon de ampurias, once on the coast, which has receded, was strong enough to resist the moors for a time, but after they had dismantled it, the normans appeared and finally destroyed it. now it is but a hamlet. we are now in the extreme north-west of the peninsula, where the relics we seek grow scanty, and, in consequence, of more importance. instead of buildings in stone or concrete, we find here a monument of independence, perhaps more interesting in its way than any other. when the pyrenees and their hardy mountaineers checked the onward rush of islám, several independent states arose, recognized by both france and spain on account of their bravery in opposing a common foe. the only one of these retaining a semi-independence is the republic of andorra, a name corrupted from the arabic el (al) darra, "a plenteous rainfall," showing how the moors appreciated this feature of so well wooded and hilly a district after the arid plains of the south. the old moorish castle of the chief town bears the name of carol, derived from that of charlemagne, who granted it the privileges it still enjoys, so that it is a memento of the meeting of arab and teuton. at planes is a church said to be of moorish origin, and earlier than charlemagne; it certainly dates from no later than the tenth century. these "foot-prints" show that the moor got a fairly good footing here, before he was driven back, and his progress stayed. appendix "morocco news" "a lie is not worth the lying, nor is truth worth repeating." _moorish proverb._ so unanimous have been the uninformed reiteration of the press in contravention of much that has been stated in the foregoing pages, that it will not be out of place to quote a few extracts from men on the spot who do know the facts. the first three are from leaders in _al-moghreb al-aksa_, the present english paper in morocco, which accurately voices the opinion of the british colony in that country, opinions shared by most disinterested residents of other nationalities. "however we look upon the situation as it stands to-day, and wherever our sympathies may lie, it is impossible to over-estimate the danger attending the unfortunate anglo-french agreement. we have always--as our readers will acknowledge--advocated the simple doctrine of the _status quo_, and in this have received the support of every disinterested person in and out of morocco. our policy has at times thrown us into antagonism with the exponents of the french colonial schemes; but we at least have the satisfaction of knowing that, however we may have fallen short of our duty, it has been one which we have persevered in, prompted by earnest conviction, by love of the country and its people, and by admiration for its sultan. the simplicity of our aim has helped us in our uphill fight, and will, no doubt, continue to do so in the future. "needless to say we look forward with no little anxiety to the result of the conference. this needs no explanation. in the discussion of such a question it is absolutely imperative that the individual members of the conference should be selected from those who know their morocco, and who are acquainted with the causes which led up to the present dead-lock. only the keenest, shrewdest men should be selected, for it must be borne in mind that france will spare no pains to uphold the recent anglo-french convention. her most astute diplomats will figure largely, for her dignity is at stake. indeed, her very position, diplomatic and political, is in effect challenged. taking this into consideration, it is more than necessary to see that the representatives of great britain are not chosen for their family influence or for the perfection they may have attained in the french language. "the task is hard and perilous. england is waking to the fact that she has blundered, and, as usual, she is unwilling to admit the fact. circumstances, however, will sooner or later force her to modify her terms. germany, spain, the united states, and other nations, to say nothing of morocco, must point out the absurdity of the situation. if the agreement is inoperative with regard to morocco, it may as well be openly admitted to be useless. this is not all. should english statesmanship direct that this injudicious arrangement be adhered to, france and great britain will stand as self-confessed violators of the convention of madrid. "fortunately the moorish cause has some excellent champions. for many years she has been dumb. now, however, that she is assailed, we find a small but influential band of writers coming forward with their pens to do battle for her. "this is the great consolation we have. moorish interests will no longer be the sport of european political expediency. these men will, no doubt, protest against the land-grabbing propensities of the french colonial party, and they may find time to point out that after a thousand years of not ignoble independence, the moorish race deserves a little more consideration than has hitherto been granted. "even those people who are responsible for this deplorable state of affairs must now stand more or less amazed at their handiwork. no diplomatic subterfuge can efface the humiliation that underlies the situation; and no one can possibly exaggerate the danger that lies ahead of us." * * * * * "two centuries ago great britain abandoned tangier, and it is only the present generation that has realized the huge mistake. a maudlin sentimentalism, to avoid displeasing the french king, prevented us from handing the city back to portugal; an act which would have been wise, either strategically, commercially, or with a view to the suppression of the famous salee rovers, who were for long a scourge to ships entering the straits. a commission of experts was appointed to consider the question of the abandonment, one of them being mr. pepys.... "whatever the opinion may have been of the experts consulted by the government on the present agreement with france, we are strongly disposed to believe that if they have been endowed with greater sense than those of , there is probably more, as we must hope there is, in favour of british interests, than appears to the public eye. time alone will tell what reservation, mental or otherwise, may be locked up in the british foreign office. it is difficult to believe that any british statesman would wantonly give away any national interest, but too lofty a policy has often been wanting in practical sense which, had that policy descended from principles to facts, would have saved the nation thousands of lives, millions of money, and sacrifices of its best interests." * * * * * "the events that have been fully before the eyes of british subjects in morocco in the abnormal condition of the country during the past two years, seem to have been ignored by our foreign office. in short, it fully appears that our foreign office policy has been designed to lead the sultan to political destruction, and to sacrifice every british interest. "about two years ago our foreign office began well in starting the sultan on the path of progress: in carrying out its aims it has done nothing but blunders. had it but acted with a little firmness, the opening up of this country would have already begun, and there would have been no 'declaration' which will assuredly give future foreign secretaries matter for some anxiety. the declaration is only a display of political fireworks that will dazzle the eyes of the british public for a while, delighting our little englanders, but only making the future hazy and possibly more dangerous to deal with. it seems only a way of putting off the real settlement, which may not wait for thirty years to be dealt with, on the points still at issue, and for which a splendid opportunity has been thrown away at downing street, and could have been availed of to maintain british interests, prestige, and influence in this country. briefly, we fear that the attainment of the end in view may yet cost millions to the british nation. "that morocco will progress under french guidance there can be no question, and france may be congratulated on her superior diplomacy and the working of her foreign office system." with regard to the moorish position, a contributor observes in a later issue-- "the attitude of the sultan and his cabinet may be summed up in a few words. 'you nations have made your agreements about our country without consulting us. we owe you nothing that we are unable to pay on the conditions arranged between us. we did not ask your subjects to reside and trade on moorish soil. in fact, we have invariably discouraged their so doing. troubles exist in morocco, it is true, but we are far greater sufferers than you--our unbidden guests. and but for the wholesale smuggling of repeating rifles by _your_ people, our tribes would not be able to cause the disorders of which you complain. as to your intention to intervene in our affairs, we agree to no interference. if you are resolved to try force, we believe that the faith of the prophet will conquer. we still believe there is a god stronger than man. and should the fight go against us, we believe that it is better to earn paradise in a holy war for the defence of our soil, than to submit tamely to christian rule.' "the position, however lamentable, is intelligible; but on the other hand it is incredible that france--her mind made up long ago that she is to inherit the promised land of sunset--will sit down meekly and allow herself to be flouted by the monarch and people of a crumbling power like morocco. and this is what she has to face. not indeed a nation, as we understand the term, but a gathering of units differing widely in character and race--arabs, berbers, mulattoes, and negroes--unable to agree together on any subject under the sun but one, and that one the defence of islám from foreign intervention. under the standard of the invincible prophet they will join shoulder to shoulder. and hopeless and pathetic as it may seem, they will defy the disciplined ranks and magazine guns of europe. thus, wherever our sympathies may lie, the possibilities of a peaceful settlement of the morocco question appear to be dwindling day by day. the anarchy paramount in three-quarters of the sultanate is not only an ever-increasing peril to european lives and property, but a direct encouragement to intervention. of one thing we in morocco have no kind of doubt. the landing of foreign troops, even for protective service, in any one part of the coast would infallibly be the signal for a general rising in every part of the empire. no sea-port would be safe for foreigners or for friendly natives until protected by a strong european force. and, once begun, the task of 'pacifying' the interior must entail an expenditure of lives and treasure which will amply satisfy french demands for colonial extension for many a year to come." one more quotation from an editorial-- "and so it would appear, that, with the smiling approval of the world's press, the wolf is to take over the affairs of the lamb. we use the phrase advisedly. we have never hesitated to criticize the action, and to condemn the errors, of the makhzen where such a course has been needful in the public interest. we can, therefore, with all the more justice, call attention to the real issues of the compact embodied in the morocco clauses of the anglo-french agreement of april, . how long the leading journals of england may continue to ignore the facts of the case it is impossible to say; but that there will come a startling awakening seems inevitable. every merely casual observer on this side of the mediterranean knows only too well that the most trifling pretext may be at any hour seized for the next move in the development of french intervention. evidence is piling up to show that the forward party in france, and still more in algeria, is burning to strike while yet the frantic enthusiasm of the entente lasts, and while they can rely upon the support--we had almost written, the moral support--of great britain. can we shut our eyes to the deliberate provocations they are giving the makhzen in almost every part of the sultanate? "these things are not reported to europe, naturally. in spite of all our comfortable cant about justice to less powerful races, who in england cares about justice to morocco and her sultan? we owe it to germany that the thing was not rushed through a few months ago. who has heard, who wants to hear, the moorish side of the question? morocco is mute. the sultan pulls no journalistic wires. he has no advocate in the press, or in parliament, or in society. hardly a public man opens his mouth in england to refer to morocco, without talking absolute twaddle. the only member of either house of parliament who has shown a real grasp of the tremendous issues of the question is lord rosebery, in the memorable words-- "'no more one-sided agreement was ever concluded between two powers at peace with each other. i hope and trust, but i hope and trust rather than believe, that the power which holds gibraltar may never have cause to regret having handed morocco over to a great military power.' "had that true statesman, and true englishman, been in power eighteen months ago, england would never have been pledged to sacrifice her commercial interests in morocco, to abandon her wholesome, traditional policy in the mediterranean, and to revoke her solemn engagement to uphold the integrity of the sultan's dominions." an excellent idea of the discrepancies between the alarmist reports with which the press is from time to time deluged, and the facts as known on the spot, is afforded by the following extracts from _al-moghreb al-aksa_ of january , , when the london papers had been almost daily victimized by their correspondents regarding morocco:-- "the dismissal of the military _attachés_ at the moorish court threatened to raise a terrible conflagration in europe, and great indignation among foreign residents in this country--according to certain press reports. this fiery disposition of some offered a remarkable contrast with the coolness of the others. for instance, the british took almost no interest in the matter, for the simple reason that there has never been any british official military mission in the moorish court. it is true there are a few british subjects in moorish military service, but they are privately employed by the sultan's government, and their service is simply voluntary. even personally, they actually show no great concern in remaining here or not. "the italian military mission is composed of very few persons. the chief, col. ferrara, is on leave in italy, and the mission is now represented by captain campini, who lives at fez with his family. they report having received all kind attentions from the sultan quite recently, and that they know nothing about the dismissal which has so noisily sounded in europe. according to the same press reports, great fears were entertained of a general rising against the foreign residents in fez and other places in the interior, and while it is reported that the military _attachés_, consular officers and residents of all nations were notified to leave fez and come to tangier or the coast ports as a matter of precaution, we find that nobody moves from the court, because, they say, they have seen nothing to induce them to leave that residence. and what has mulai abd el azîz replied to french complaints and demands respecting the now historical dismissal of the military _attachés_? a very simple thing--that h.s.m. did not think that the dismissal could resent any of the civilized nations, because it was decided as an economic measure, there being no money to pay even other more pressing liabilities. however, the sultan, wishing to be on friendly terms with france and all other nations, immediately withdrew the dismissal and promised to pay the _attachés_ as long as it is possible to do so. the missions, consuls, etc., have now no need to leave fez, and everything remains stationary as before. the only thing steadily progressing is the insecurity of life and property in the outskirts and district of tangier, where murders and robberies proceed unabated, and this state of affairs has caused the british and german residents in this town to send petitions to their respective governments, through their legations, soliciting that some measure may be adopted to do away with the present state of insecurity which has already paralysed all overland traffic between this city and the neighbouring towns. "the contrasts of the situation are as remarkable as they are comic, and while the whole country is perfectly quiet, those places more in contact with the civilized world, like tangier and the algerian frontier, are the only spots which are seriously troubled with disturbances." so much for northern morocco. the same issue contains the following report from its mogador correspondent regarding the "disturbed state" of southern morocco. "it would puzzle even the trained imagination of certain journalists we wot of to evolve anything alarmist out of the condition of the great tribes between mogador and the atlas. during the recent tribal differences not one single highway robbery, even of a native, was, i believe, committed. the roads are open everywhere; the rival chieftains have, figuratively, exchanged the kiss of peace, and the tribes have confessed that it was a mistake to leave their farms and farm-work simply to please an ambitious and utterly thankless governor. "as for europeans, they have been rambling all over the country with their wonted freedom from interference. a frenchman, travelling almost alone, has just returned from imintanoot. another has twice crossed the atlas. needless to say the route to marrákesh is almost as devoid of other than pleasurable novelty as a stroll on the embankment or down the shady side of pall mall. when, indeed, will folks at home grasp the fact that the berber clans of southern morocco belong to a race differing utterly in character and largely in customs from the ruffians infesting the northern half of the sultanate? "'nothing but the unpleasant prospect of being held up by brigands,' writes a friend, 'prevents me from revisiting your beautiful country.' how convince such people that brigandage is an art unknown south of the oom rabya? that the prayer of the shluh, when a nazarene visits their land, is that nothing may happen to bring trouble on the clan? they may inwardly hate the _rûmi_, or they may regard him merely as an uncouth blot on the scenery; but should actual unpleasantness arise, he will, in almost every case, have himself to thank for it. (london papers please copy!)" this letter was dated two days after the paris correspondent of the _times_ had telegraphed-- "events would seem likely to be coming to a head in consequence of the anarchy prevailing in the shereefian empire. the pretender is just now concentrating his troops in the plain of angad, and is preparing to take an energetic offensive against ujda. the camp of the pretender is imposing in its warlike display. all the caids and the sons of bu amema surround mulai mahomed. the men are armed with french _chassepots_, and are well dressed in new uniforms supplied by an oran firm. all the war material was embarked on board the french yacht _zut_, which landed it last month on the shores of rastenga between cape eau and melilla under the direction of the pretender's troops." towards christmas, , circumstantial reports began to appear in the newspapers of an overwhelming defeat of the imperial army by rebels who were marching on fez, who had besieged it, and had cut off the aqueduct bringing its water, the sultan retreating to the palace, europeans being ordered to the coast, etc., etc. these statements i promptly and categorically denied in an interview for the london _echo_; there was no real "pretender," only a religious fanatic supported by two disaffected tribes, the imperial army had not been defeated, as only a small body had been despatched to quell the disturbance; the "rebels" were not besieging fez, as they had no army, and only the guns captured by the clever midnight surprise of sleeping troops, of which the "battle"--really a panic--consisted; they had not cut the "aqueduct," as fez is built on the banks of a river from which it drinks; the sultan's palace was his normal abode; the europeans had not fled, seeing no danger, but that _on account of the alarming telegrams from europe_, their ministers in tangier had advised them to withdraw, much against their will. so sweeping a contradiction of statements receiving daily confirmation from tangier, heightened colour from oran, and intensification from madrid, must have been regarded as the ravings of a madman, for the interview was held over for a week for confirmation. had not thirty-four correspondents descended on tangier alone, each with expenses to meet? something had to be said, though the correspondent nearest to the scene, in fez, was two days' journey from it, and six from tangier, the nearest telegraph station. it is true that some years ago an american boldly did the journey "from fez to fleet street in eight days," by forgetting most of the journey to tangier, but this was quite out-done now. meanwhile every rumour was remodelled in oran or madrid, and served up afresh with confirmatory _sauce piquante_, _à la française_ or _à l'espagnol_, as the case might be. it was not till reuter had obtained an independent, common-sense report, that the interview was published, my statements having been all confirmed, but by that time interest had flagged, and the british public still believes that a tremendous upheaval took place in morocco just then. yet, notwithstanding the detailed accounts of battles and reverses--a collation of which shows the "father of the she-ass" fighting in several places at once, captured or slain to-day and fighting to-morrow, and so on--the government of morocco was never in real danger from the "rogi's" rising, and the ultimate issue was never in doubt. the late sultan, el hasan, more than once suffered in person at the hands of the same tribes, defeats more serious than those experienced by the inadequate forces sent by his son. the moral of all this is that any news from morocco, save that concerning europeans or events on the coast, must be received with caution, and confirmation awaited. the most reliable accounts at present available are those of the _times_ correspondent at tangier, while the _manchester guardian_ is well informed from mogador. whatever emanates from paris or algeria, not referring directly to frontier events; or from madrid, not referring to events near the spanish "presidios," should be refused altogether, as at best it is second-hand, more often fabricated. how the london press can seriously publish telegrams about morocco from new york and washington passes comprehension. the low ebb reached by american journals with one or two notable exceptions in their competitive sensationalism would of itself suffice to discredit much that appears, even were the countries in touch with each other. the fact is that very few men in morocco itself are in a position to form adequate judgements on current affairs, or even to collect reliable news from all parts. so few have direct relations with the authorities, native and foreign; so many can only rely on and amplify rumour or information from interested sources. so many, too, of the latter _must_ make money somehow! the soundest judgements are to be formed by those who, being well-informed as to the conditions and persons concerned, and moorish affairs in general, are best acquainted with the origin of the reports collected by others, and can therefore rightly appraise them. index a abbas, shah of persia, _note_ abd allah bin boo shaïb es-sálih, story of: protection system, - abd allah ghaïlán, former rebel leader, abd el hakk and the widow záïdah, story of the, , addington, mr., british ambassador at granáda, aghmát, capital of southern morocco, ahmad ii., "the golden," addressed by queen elizabeth, algeria, ; the french in, - , ; viewed from morocco, - ; under french rule, - ; failure as a colony, ; arabs in, ; moors in, ; mosques, ; tilework, ; field for scientist, algiers (el jazîrah), the city and people, - alhambra, the, at granáda (_q.v._) _al-moghreb al-aksa_ on the political situation, - andorra, the pyrenean republic of, , , ; its privileges granted by charlemagne, anglo-french agreement, , , , , ; clauses in, , anne, queen, arabs, the wandering, - ; tent-life, - ; food, ; hospitality, ; in algeria, ; in tunisia, b beggars, native, , berber race, , , - ; pirates, ; men brave and warlike, , ; reefian, , ; women often very intelligent, ; they, not saracens or arabs, real conquerors of spain, , ; origin still a problem, ; ghaïátà berbers in revolt, - boabdil, , boo ziaro miliáni, arrest and release of, c café, moorish, - carthage, ; christian and mohammedan, charlemagne, charles martel, the "hammer," charles v., "improver" of spanish monuments of moorish art, , , chess, , ; an arab game, child-life, moorish, - ; infancy, ; school days, ; youth, ; early vices, "cid," the, el mansûr, city life in morocco, - civil war in morocco: asni and the aït mîzán, - coinage, moorish, - , córdova, , - , ; its famous mosque (cathedral), - ; aisles, columns, arches, , ; the kiblah niche, ; moorish worshippers in, ; european additions to, - ; history of the town, corrosive sublimate tea--for disgraced officials, d debts in morocco, how settled, - delbrel, m., leader of the "rogi's" forces, dining out in morocco, - diplomacy in morocco. _see_ embassy draughts, game of, e edward i. and eleanor of castile, edward vii. in algeria, elizabeth, queen, el k'sar es-sagheer, el menébhi, ambassador to london and minister of war, el moghreb el aksa, native name of morocco, el yazeed, sultan in , declares war on all christendom, embassy to court of sultan, a typical, - ; requisitioning provisions, , ; _personnel_ and _attachés_, , ; native agent, ; arrival at marrákesh, ; reception, , ; the diplomatic interview: ambassador, interpreter, and sultan, - ; the result: as it appeared in the press, ; as it was in reality, , ; diamond cut diamond, - ; failure, and its causes, - england and morocco, , , , - ; british trade, ; british policy in, - ; anglo-french agreement (_q.v._); "morocco news," - f ferdinand and isabella of spain, , , , , , ; their nuptials the death-knell of moorish rule in europe, ; tomb of, fez, founded by son of mulai idrees, ; karûeeïn mosque at, , , , football, moorish, , ford's "handbook to spain," , , france in morocco, , - ; "policing" the frontier, ; her rule inevitable and desirable, - ; hope for the moors, , , ; anglo-french agreement (_q.v._); in algeria, - ; in tunisia, - ; _see_ political situation, the, and appendix, - g german interests in morocco, - gerona: sulaïmán, pepin, and charlemagne, , gibraltar, moorish castle, granáda, , - ; the alhambra palace, loveliest monument of moorish art in spain, - , - ; despoiled by charles v. and the french, ; "tia antonia," , ; morocco-like surroundings, ; mosques, ; tomb of ferdinand and isabella, ; remains of cardinal mendoza, , ; bu abd allah's sword, , ; courts and halls of the alhambra, - ; other moorish remains, - h hamed zirári, story of: protection system, - hareems, royal, - ; and other, - hasheesh, opium of morocco, hay, sir john drummond, herbs, fragrant, use of, , , i infant mortality in morocco high, irving, washington, at granáda, ; his "tia antonia," ismaïl the bloodthirsty exchanges compliments with queen anne, j jaca, site of desperate battle between spaniards and moors, jelálli zarhôni, the "rogi," head of the revolt of the ghaïátà berbers, - jewish interpreter, astute, - jews in morocco, - ; justice for, - ; in spain, traces of, k kabyles, kaïd, the, and his court, - kesk'soo, the national dish, , , , , khalia, staple article of winter diet, korán, the, at schools, ; the standard work at colleges, kufic inscriptions, , , , l _l'aigle_ at mogador and agadir, "land of the moors, the," _lex talionis_, m machiavellian arts, moors excel in, madrid convention of ... , ; essential features of, , madrid, moorish remains in, malaga, moorish dockyard, market-place, moorish, - , - , - ; and marketing, , - , - marrákesh, founded in the middle of the th century, ; kingdom of, , ; the kûtûbîya at, , , marriage in morocco, , ; country wedding, - ; feastings, presents, and rejoicings, - mauretania tingitana, titular north african bishopric still, mavrogordato, kyrios dimitri: typical embassy, - medicine-men, - ; cupping, - , ; exorcising, , ; cauterizing, ; charms, ; curious remedies, - ; philtres and poisons, mekka, pilgrimage to. _see_ pilgrimage mendoza, cardinal, , ; remains of the mendozas, merchants, moorish, , - mérida, muslim toleration at, mokhtar and zóharah, wedding of, - monk, general, moors in spain, traces of. _see_ spain morals, moorish, lax, - , morocco: retrospect, - ; of present day, - ; races: berbers, arabs, moors, - , - ; life of the people--society, business, pastime, religion, - ; diplomacy (_q.v._); law and justice, - ; the political situation (_q.v._); her neighbours, - ; moors in spain (_q.v._); "morocco news," _al-moghreb al-aksa_, - morocco-algerian frontier, france "policing" the, mosques, french treatment of, , mulai abd allah v., , makes war upon gibraltar, mulai abd el azîz iv., present sultan, - mulai abd el káder, a favourite saint, mulai el hasan iii., late sultan, , , mulai idrees, direct descendant of mohammed, and early arabian missionary to morocco, ; founded the shurfà idreeseeïn dynasty, mulai yakûb el mansûr, builder of mosque towers at sevílle, marrákesh, and rabat, musical instruments, , , , o official rapacity, , - , - orihuela, palms at, p pawkers, admiral, pepys, samuel, once on a moorish commission, pilgrims to mekka, - ; sea-route preferred to-day, ; camp at tangier, - ; comforts and discomforts, - ; a novel tent, - ; food, - ; returning home, - piracy of moors, - ; tribute extorted from european powers, , , ; abandoned by algiers, ; not wholly unknown to-day, political situation, the, - ; the sultan and reforms, - ; unsettled state of the empire, - ; a change welcome, ; agreement among the three great powers remote, ; anglo-french agreement (_q.v._); famine and unrest, ; german interests, ; spanish interests, ; conference proposed, , ; points for discussion, - ; "morocco news" must be received with caution, - postal reform needed, powder play, , , , prayer, moslem, , , ; call to, , prisons and prisoners, miserable, - ; long terms, - ; the lash, , ; the bastinado, ; jews in, protection system, the, , - ; the need: story of hamed zirári, - ; the search: story of abd allah bin boo shaïb es-sálih, - ; patent of, ; "farming," _note_ r rabat, hassan tower at, , railways would be welcomed by the sultan, raïsûli, rebel leader in the disaffected north, - rio tinto copper-mines, ronda, corn-mills at, rosebery, lord, on morocco, rudolf ii., : his active policy respecting moroccan affairs, _note_ s saragossa, the aljaferia at, school, moorish, , sevílle, , - , ; girálda tower, - ; palace, el kasar, - ; royal "improvers" of moorish work, ; capital of charles v., ; moorish remains at, sherley, sir anthony, , adventurer and diplomatist, _note_ shurfà idreeseeïn dynasty founded by mulai idrees, sidi mohammed, son of mulai abd allah v., si marzak and his fair azîzah, the loves of, - slave-markets, marrákesh and fez, - slavery in morocco, , , _et passim_, - ; sources of supply, ; girls for hareems, ; treatment fairly kind, , ; men have risen to high positions, ; use chiefly domestic, ; a slave-girl's cruel story, - smeerah, quaint incident at, smin, use of, , smith, sir chas. euan, snake-charming, , - social life, moorish, - spain, moorish empire in, founded by berbers, , ; footprints of moors in, - ; place-names and words of arabic origin, , ; physiognomy of the people, ; habits and customs, ; salutations, ; narrow streets, ; forts and mosques (churches), ; the mosque at córdova (_q.v._); girálda and el kasar at sevílle (_q.v._); the alhambra at granáda (_q.v._); other moorish towns, villages, castles, and remains, - ; women of, at the battle of jaca, sports and pastimes, moorish: active, , - ; passive, - , - , - stamps and stamp-dealers, story-teller, the, , , - ; mulai abd el káder and the monk of monks, - t tafilált, home for discarded sultanas, tangier, english cede possession of, , ; drunkenness and vice, ; north african mission, ; shopping in, - ; market-place, - ; sunday market, - ; salt-pans, ; english church at, ; starting-place for mekka pilgrims, , ; residence of ambassadors, ; gaol at, ; many frenchmen at, tarifa, moorish remains at, tarragona, cathedral of, tea, making, , tilework of algeria, toledo, , ; moorish hydraulists, ; ez-zarkal's water-clocks, ; cathedral, ; sword-manufacture, tortosa, ancient pirate stronghold, tripoli, city and people, - ; the turkish element in, ; viewed from morocco, - ; mosques, ; irrigation, tunis, city, , tunisia, , ; viewed from morocco, - ; under french rule, - ; jews in, ; arabs in, ; moors in, ; women in, v valencia, ancient moorish paradise, w water-carriers, moorish, , water-clocks, ez-zarkal's, wazzân, shareef of, present representative of shurfá idreeseeïn dynasty, , wilhelm ii. in tangier bay, women of morocco, occupations, , , , , ; seclusion, , , , , ; subservient position, - , ; possibilities of influence, ; marriages, , , - ; divorce, ; social visits, - ; wearing apparel, ; excellent cooks, , , , ; slaves, , , , ; women in tunisia, ; in tripoli, x xeres, old, moorish citadel, z zarhôn, most sacred town, zawîah of sîdi abd er-rahmán, zummeetah, "mixed," quaint story of, the end printed by william clowes and sons, limited, london and beccles. transcriber's note: page : missing accent added to seville (sevílle). page : corrected mis-matched quotes. page : restored missing ^ accent to karûeeïn page : 'whch' corrected to 'which'. page : 'beats' changed to 'beasts', to fit context. page : 'flead' [sic] page : corrected mis-matched quotes. ("and when at home? ') page : 'rabhah' is spelled 'rabbah' in previous illustration. page : sic: carraway/caraway page : changed comma for period at sentence end. (sighted, this) page : 'through' changed to 'though', to fit context. page : 'accetpance' changed to 'acceptance'. page : 'territoral' changed to 'territorial'. page : carcase/carcass, both are correct: oxford dictionary. page : sic: instal/install. page : added missing accent to iii seville (sevÍlle), for conformity. (ii cÓrdova is accented). page : added missing accent to giralda (girálda), for conformity. page : corrected 'architectual' to 'architectural'. page : comma corrected to period. (a moorish cistern hard by.) page : colon corrected to semicolon. (moorish worshippers in, ;). page : added comma (debts in morocco, how settled, - ). page : added closing quote to "castle of ayûb. page : 'bobadil' changed to 'boabdil'. page : removed extraneous ' ' reference for charlemagne. page : removed extraneous ' ' reference for ferdinand and isabella. page : removed extraneous entry ( ) for 'kufic inscriptions'; changed ' ' to ' '. page , : missing accent added to seville (sevílle). page : missing accent added to cordova (córdova). page : comma added after 'remains' (other moorish towns, villages, castles, and remains, - ;). page : comma added after 'occupations' (women of morocco, occupations, , , , , ;). oe ligatures are indicated with [oe] i also removed the partial square brackets before or after the photographer's names accompanying illustration titles. and the booksmiths at http://www.ebookforge.net [illustration: isabel savory] in the tail of the peacock by isabel savory. author of "_a sportswoman in india_" with illustrations from photographs and a photogravure portrait "the earth is a peacock: morocco is the tail of it" _moorish proverb_ london: hutchinson & co. paternoster row printed by hazell, watson and viney, ld., london and aylesbury _preface_ _this book contains no thrilling adventures, chronicles, no days devoted to sport. it will probably interest only those minds which are content with "the c major of this life," and which find in other than scenes of peril and excitement their hearts' desire._ _such as care to wander through its pages must have learnt to enjoy idleness, nor find weeks spent beneath the sun and stars too long--that is to say, the fascination of a wandering, irresponsible life should be known to them: waste and solitary places must not appal, nor trifling incident weary, while human natures remotely removed from their own, alternately delight and repel. those who understand not these things, will find but a dull chronicle within the following pages._ _if to live is to know more, and to know more only to love more, the least eventful day may possess a minimum of value, and even quiet monotones and grey vistas be found and lost in a glamour born of themselves._ _in this loud and insistent world the silent places are often overlooked, and yet they are never empty._ _isabel savory._ westfield old hall, east dereham. _february, ._ contents chapter i page tangier--country people--the pilgrimage to mecca--moorish prisons--we ride to cape spartel--decide to leave tangier and push inland chapter ii camp outfit--a night at a caravanserai--tetuan--the british vice-consul--moorish shops--we visit a moorish house and family chapter iii difficulties of "lodgings" in morocco--a spanish fonda--a moorish tea party--poison in the cup--slaves in morocco--el doollah--moorish cemetery--ride to semsar--shopping in tetuan--provisions in the city chapter iv the fast of rÁmadhan--mohammed--his life and influence--the flood at saffi--a walk outside tetuan--the french consul's garden-house--jews in morocco--european protection chapter v plans for christmas at gibraltar--a rough night--the steamer which would not wait--an ignominious return to tetuan--a rascally jew--the aborigines and the present occupants of morocco--the sultan, court, government, and moorish army chapter vi we look over a moorish courtyard house with a view to taking it--we rent jinan dolero in spite of opposition--an englishman murdered--our garden-house--the idiosyncrasies of moorish servants--a native guard--the riff country chapter vii country people fording the river--we call on ci hamed ghralmia--an expedition across the river in search of the blue pool--moorish belief in ginns--the basha--powder play--tetuan prison chapter viii missionaries at tetuan--poisoning in morocco--fatima's reception--divorce--an expedition into the anjeras--an emerald oasis chapter ix we leave tetuan--a wet night under the stars--s`lam deserts us--we sail for mogador--the palm-tree house--sus and wadnoon countries--the sahara--the atlas mountains chapter x on the march once more--buying mules--a bad road--first camp--argan-trees--coos-coosoo--a terrible night--doctoring the khaylifa--roughing it under canvas chapter xi a parting mona--fording sheshaoua river--jars of food--first sight of marrakesh--a perilous crossing--ride into marrakesh--the slave market chapter xii the thursday market--we might have gone to glaouia--leave marrakesh and set out on our last march for the coast--flowers in morocco--on the wrong trail--arab tents--good-bye to el moghreb list of illustrations _except where otherwise stated, the illustrations are from photographs by rose a. bainbridge._ facing page photogravure portrait _frontispiece_ the road to fez r. on a pack two sheikhs tangier tetuan _photo by a. cavilla, tangier._ ourselves and baggage clouds over tetuan alarbi abresha's house _photo by a. cavilla, tangier._ our camp outside tetuan a veiled figure outside the gate a mohammedan cemetery out shopping shops in tetuan a cluster of country women a typical moorish street _photo by a. cavilla, tangier._ a street in the jews' quarter, tetuan _photo by a. cavilla, tangier._ refuse going out of tetuan a moorish prison gate a peep of tetuan _photo by a. cavilla, tangier._ a saint-house, tetuan jinan dolero our servants, s`lam and tahara two women from the riff country selling earthenware pots a ferry-boat on market day the author fording the wad-el-martine the basha going to pray the feddan, tetuan charming snakes moors at home straw for sale a group in the feddan, tetuan a breezy camping-ground on a roof-top illustrative of the way we rode in morocco lighters loading after rain in mogador where manchester goods are sold, mogador our camp at ain-el-hadger a blindfolded camel working a water-wheel ships of the desert we pass on the march transporting our baggage marrakesh the open gate the kutobea, marrakesh _photo by a. cavilla, tangier._ the wad-el-azell _photo by a. cavilla, tangier._ the sultan's garden _photo by a. cavilla, tangier._ the river tensif outside marrakesh _photo by a. cavilla, tangier._ one of our last camps. loading the camel chapter i tangier--country people--the pilgrimage to mecca--moorish prisons--we ride to cape spartel--decide to leave tangier and push inland. chapter i the vague and hazy ideals which the white light of an english upbringing relegates to dreamland and dismisses as idle fancies, rise up in the glare of african sunlight, alive, tangible, unashamed; the things that are, not the things that might be:--the vivid colouring, the hot crowding, the stately men and veiled women, the despotism and stoicism, the unchanging picturesqueness of the thousand and one nights, the dramatic inevitability of the old testament.--a. j. d. there was no desert in morocco. if a country has not been "read up" beforehand, the imagination has free play and forms many false conclusions: yet though it suffer on the one hand rude awakenings, it is on the other compensated by certain new lights--indelible and unique impressions--which come only in the train of things _inconnu_. so though we found no desert, there are other things in morocco. it is one of the few countries in the world, and they grow fewer each year, which is still unexplored--unknown. thousands of square miles in morocco have never been crossed by a european, or at any rate none have returned to tell the tale: maps mark only blank spaces, and have no names for villages, no records of mountains or rivers: there are no roads, still less railways, in the country: the only means of transport along the wild, worn tracks is by camels, mules, and donkeys: he who will not ride perforce walks. the bare fringe alone of morocco, its coast towns, and the choice, let us say, of two roads connecting them with its capitals, fez and morocco city, are open to travellers; beyond these limits it is difficult and dangerous for europeans to venture. of even its coasts towns england knows little enough: a daily paper printed in describes one flourishing seaport of thirty thousand inhabitants as "a village." there is more vagueness, in fact, about a country three times the size of great britain and four days' journey from london than of many a remote corner in the heart of asia. the reason is at hand. an old arabic proverb, "the earth is a peacock: morocco is the tail of it," typifies the entire satisfaction of its inhabitants with their native land. what is, is good; why "civilize" and "progress"? as far as possible there shall no european enter therein. realizing that, were new blood allowed to come into morocco, its own effete and uneducated people would have no chance in the race of life, and end by hopelessly knuckling under to the european, the country isolates itself; nor is it likely that the jealous powers of europe will allow any one of their number to disturb that isolation and pluck the tempting fruit. and so to-day morocco drowses in an atmosphere of _laissez faire_, a decadent nation, a collection of lawless tribes, who have changed little for the last two thousand years, living still much after the manner of old testament days. they are devout mussulmans. they believe the world to be flat, and to come to an end with the west coast of morocco. their country they call _el moghreb el aksa_, which means, "the extreme west," or "the land of the setting sun": "morocco" and "moors" are entirely european words, and never used by the moors themselves--the one being a corruption of the name of their capital city, the other having been given them by the spaniards. morocco should be fascinating on the face of it: a great country running into hundreds of thousands of square miles, the only independent mussulman state of north africa, with six million followers of the great prophet, and a perfect climate, soil, and water-supply to boot, needs no extolling. and yet its chiefest fascination lies in things which, from some points of view, ought not to be. its remote removal from all appertaining to the twentieth century, its strangely simple, untaught life, the solemn, stately men, the veiled women and their eyes, the steely blue cactus, the white cities and the glaring light, the mystery and the fatalism which intensify the air, are alike oddly inevitable and incomprehensible to a european. the other side of the closed door has always constituted, for the wandering vagrants among mankind, their hearts' desire. for them there is still morocco; and the door will be shut in their faces again and again by a people and a faith and customs which they can never understand. and though it be useless they will still go on, because it seems the best thing. about six weeks before was due, rose a. bainbridge and myself left behind us the last outpost of england--gibraltar--with its cluster of civilization round the bottom of the great rock. four hours brought us across the straits; and seen from the deck of the dirty little _gibel musa_, on to which we had changed from a p. & o. at gibraltar, morocco shaped itself into a rugged country, ridge behind ridge of low hills and jagged mountains cutting the sky-line. a long white sand-bank lying back in a bay on the african shore, broken at one end by irregular vegetation, gradually developed upon its slopes a yellowish-white, fantastic city, which resolved itself into tangier. landing at tangier among vociferating moors has been described often enough, and needs no further enlargement. the next morning, november , , found us sitting over coffee and an omelette out of doors, on a little balcony opening off the hotel villa valentina, over-looking the road to fez, and facing the broad, blue straits which divided us from europe. it was like a june morning at home, soft and balmy: the city dropped from us down to the beach, and the sun poured upon the flat-roofed houses, coloured yellow to pale cream or washed-out blue, alternating with a lavish coat of glaring whitewash. tangier is an example of structure without architecture; at the same time there is a certain fitness in the crude moorish buildings, whose flat expanse of wall is unbroken either by windows or ornament: they are simple and "reserved." gleaming in high light under an equally light sky, they huddle almost one on top of the other, built upon every available square yard inside the "papery" old city wall, which looks as if cannon would blow it away. patches of blue sea break the white city outline, and the towers of the mosques rise above it all: their tesselated surfaces, tiled in shades of green and polished by the years, shimmer in the sunshine like peacocks' tails. [illustration: the road to fez. [_to face p. ._] two or three gateways pierce the drab-coloured city wall, their horseshoe-shaped arches washed over with salmon-pink. the same plaster-work arch repeats itself occasionally in the rough stone- and mortar-work of the houses, all of an inferior quality, short-lived and rebuilt again and again on the _débris_ of successive years, until they stand in time right above the cobble-stones of the narrow streets. outside the city wall a few private houses and two hotels lie back among eucalyptus, palms, and bushy stone-pines: several of the legations which represent the european powers have modern houses, lost in greenery of sorts. behind these, again, a suburb of jerry-built spanish houses, with the scum of spain, is inclined to grow, which offshoot of fifth-rate europe gives at last upon the rolling pastures and windswept hills of the open country. our breakfast-table brought us face to face with every traveller who passed along the great sandy track leading eventually to fez, which people in morocco call a road, beaten to-day and for the last two thousand years by the feet of generations of camels, mules, donkeys, horses, cattle, and mankind. though the wayfarers, plodding through the dusty hoof-marks, were desultory, it was quiet for few hours even at night, and under our windows we waked to an eternal shuffling in the soft sand, the champing of bits, and guttural arabic tones. r. and i leaned over the balcony. women passed us wrapped in voluminous whity-yellow garments--_haiks_--black eyes and red slippers alone showing. date-coloured boys passed us, wearing red fezes and dirty-white turbans. countrymen passed us in great, coarse, brown woollen cloaks--_jellabs_--the hood pulled right on over the head, short wide sleeves, the front joined all down, and having scarred bare legs and feet coming out from underneath. these drove strings of diminutive donkeys, a couple of water-barrels balanced across the back of each--supplies of water for tangier when the rain-water tanks are giving out: there are few wells in the city. more women, veiled to the eyes, passed us, in delightful shoes--milk-coloured leather, embroidered with green: an african woman, black as a boot, with thick negro lips and yellow metal bracelets on her charcoal-sticks of arms. more donkeys passed us, carrying vegetables to market, driven by countrywomen in yellowish-white haiks, vast straw hats, and the inevitable veil. two men passed us with an immense open box containing thousands of eggs, hung between them by a pole on the shoulder of each--export for england: forty-eight millions were sent off in , and this morning's omelette might not be our first morocco egg. a moor of some means came by, riding at a hard-held ambling walk his star-gazing white mule: the high-peaked saddle and bridle were of scarlet cloth, the stirrup-leathers of scarlet twisted wool; he wore a creamy woollen haik, falling in soft folds down to his yellow slippers, a turban whose snowy disc of enormous size framed his cinnamon-coloured face in symmetrical folds of spotless white, and the top of a scarlet fez showed in the centre of it. almost opposite us a beggar had sat himself down at the edge of the road, under the shelter of the high cane fence--a grimy old greybeard, tanned and worn like a walnut, in a tattered jellab and shady turban. "for the love of god; for the love of god," he rolled out incessantly in arabic, ending in a throaty gobble like a turkey; and the country people threw him, as they passed, of their bundles--here an orange, there a lump of charcoal--whatever it might be it was crammed into the hood of the jellab; and the sing-song and the gobble began again. in a mohammedan country it is counted a duty as well as a holy deed to encourage beggars: almsgiving represents to the faithful mussulman equivalent gain in paradise; and no one starves in morocco, though occasionally dismissed with a wave of the hand and "god provide for you." mad people are regarded as saints, and credited with the gift of prophecy. it is an exceedingly holy thing to walk about naked. a holy man in fez was in the habit of sitting at a missionary's gate stark naked; eventually this proceeding had to be put a stop to, because the holy man would insist upon holding the horses of the missionary's afternoon callers. our beggar sat in the same spot day after day, hour after hour, fatuitously happy, blissfully content. "god is great, and what is written is written": remorse, regrets, are alike unknown to mussulmen; and it is this which dignifies their religion and themselves. life passes lightly over them, and chisels few lines and puckers in the serene patriarchal faces--they may be scamps of the first water, for all one can tell; it sits lightly upon them. a small boy in a white tunic and red fez, who called himself larbi, was playing about near the beggar: being able to speak a little english, he made himself useful to visitors, and was rapidly exchanging his good qualities for the drawbacks of the hanger-on: he came out with us for a day or two, smoked several cigarettes in the course of the afternoon, and picked us useless bunches of ordinary flowers. remonstrance was futile, but when no more little silver coins were forthcoming he left off shadowing us. we found our own way down to the great _sok_, or market-place, in the wake of some donkeys carrying live cackling fowls, fastened by a bit of string and their feet to any part of the donkey and its baskets which came handy. on each side of the road and everywhere in tangier the obstinate steely-grey cactus, or prickly pear, dominates the landscape: its fat fleshy leaves make as good a protection as the sharp-pointed aloe round the irregular plots of cultivated ground. alternating with them, tall bound cane fences swish and rattle in the wind. steely-grey and a yellow-bleached white describe the vegetation of tangier, set in its white sand-dunes. morocco is far from having lot or part in the gorgeous east, as tradition says. to begin with, from the end of august to the end of april hazy days greatly predominate, and thirty inches of rain are put in: naturally the country and people take their cue from the general colour of the sky, from its white-yellow light, in which a wan sun is yet able to produce a glare. morocco is yellow-white, and the moors themselves run from the colour of cinnamon, through shades of coffee and old gold, to biscuit and skim-milk. their houses and their clothes take on the same whites and greys, yellows and browns, and the sand and the scrub again and again repeat the tale. perhaps it has a saddening effect, borne out in the colourless monotone of the lives of its countrywomen. presently we passed a skin-yard, salted goat-skins, drying by the hundred under the sun, spread upon the ground, upon the flat roofs, wherever a skin could lie, curling with dryness, the empty legs of the late owners standing stiff and upright, like petrified stockings, pointing dismally to heaven. we overtook a string of camels as we neared the sok, strolling along and regarding the skies, r. and myself with an exaggerated superciliousness. they were laden with dates, carpets, and slippers from fez, and, together with mules and donkeys, constitute the vans and railway-trucks of morocco, substituting over the face of the land a dilatory calm in the place of speed and bustle. but at first it was a real effort to take in a tenth part of surroundings so different from those of england; and when we found ourselves in the sok--the _hub_ of moorish life--it was to be jostled by donkey-drivers shouting "baarak! baarak!" by black water-carriers from the sus country, by veiled women, by negroes from timbuctoo, by mules and camels, by men walking, men riding, without one sight or sound familiar, in a dream-world of intense life, recalling nothing so much as the old testament. it was worth the journey out from home to see this sok--an open space crawling with brown-and-white, cloaked and hooded humanity, mixed up with four-legged beasts, also brown, and the whole more like a magnified ant-hill on the flat than anything human. in front of the squatted country people their stock-in-trade lay in piles, gorgeous in tone: oranges and oranges and more oranges, selling at one thousand seven hundred for a shilling; scarlet chillies--hot blots of colour; pink onions; red carrots; white salt, collected down on the beach; green pumpkins blotched with yellow; besides grain of all sorts, basketsful of charcoal, bundles of wood, dried fruit, flat round loaves of bread, cabbages, and what not. the sound of a perpetual muffin-bell was ringing backwards and forwards--the _bhisti_ of tangier, with his hairy goatskinful of water across his back, and two bright brass bowls hung by a chain round his neck, a bell in one hand, with the other dealing out drinks of water for a moorish copper coin of which a penny contains fifteen. we elbowed our way through the _báb-el-sok_, or gate of the market-place, into the city, and found ourselves in a long, narrow, straight street, dropping down to the _marsa_, or harbour. the irregular, light colour-washed houses jut out promiscuously over the minute cupboard-like shops crammed with oddments of every sort and hue, and leaving scanty room for the owner to squat on some carpet or mattress, until it strikes him that it is time to eat or go to prayers, and he locks up the double doors of his "store cupboard" and strolls away. looking down this attenuated piccadilly of tangier, over the white turbans and red fezes of the multitude, right away at the far end a field of blue sea was to be seen: half-way between, the faithful were beginning to pass into the big mosque one by one for midday prayers, each leaving his shoes behind him and stepping over the high doorstep barefoot on to the marble floor beyond, thence disappearing behind the ponderous green iron doors, where the great line is drawn between europeans and asiatics, debarring from entry any except mussulmen. the villa valentina breakfasted at . , and cut the morning short. we were out again later with a guide--hadj riffi he called himself--bent on a visit to the _kasbah_, or fortress of the city. hadj riffi provided a donkey and pack, which of all substitutes for saddles is most foolish, intended only for loads of all sorts to be slung across them; but packs are easy to slip off and on, and have answered their purpose in morocco since the days when in judæa mary rode on one to bethlehem. conducted through the queer, intricate city, we wound along maze-like alleys three or four feet wide, ever the old aromatic smell of the east, almost impossible to recall, yet recognized again in an instant's flash, and born of the oriental world we jostled against--of berbers, arabs, negroes, men from the sahara, men from the mountains of the riff, turks, greeks, levantines, syrians, even an occasional hindoo, all wanderers up and down the earth, unable to resist the call of the open road, engendered by nomadic habits of old. [illustration: r. on a pack. [_to face p. ._] one word on the inhabitants of the country. the berbers are the aborigines of morocco, and live more or less in the hills and mountains, into which they were driven by the arabs in the seventh century, when they overran morocco. the arabs, on the other hand, live in the plains; and arabs and berbers practically halve the country between them. both peoples divide into numerous tribes, of which the men from the riff are a berber tribe. the negroes in morocco are merely slaves imported from the south. one and all the arab and berber tribes are called indiscriminately by europeans "moors." the other wanderers in tangier filter through the land from their own countries: who can tell why or wherefore? hadj riffi himself had obeyed his prophet mohammed in so far as to make the pilgrimage to mecca. a journey the prospect of which would horrify a tradesman at home is undertaken by an earnest-minded shop-keeping moor as a matter of course. what are the twelve uncomfortable days by sea to jeddah? or the journey thence to mecca, lying stretched in a long pannier on one side of a camel, balanced by a second pilgrim in a pannier on the other side, and over the whole an awning spread? but this luxurious travelling is for the rich pilgrim, who swings silently along day after day, under the burning sun or the cold stars, across the tideless sea of sand, towards an illimitable horizon. hadj riffi "footed it," spent three days at mecca, at this time transformed into a city of a myriad tents, among which it is easy enough to be lost, teeming with pilgrims--chinese, hindoos, circassians, georgians, bosnians--most of them unable to understand each other, beyond a verse or two from the kor[=a]n and a few pious ejaculations. hadj riffi and his fellow-moors prayed three days at mecca, and performed the ceremonies round the celebrated _k[=a]aba_, the chief shrine and holiest of all holy places, built by adam and eve after the pattern of their own sanctum sanctorum in the garden of eden. the far-famed black stone, presented to the masons by the angel gabriel, built into the east corner of the outer wall of the k[=a]aba, is a semicircular fragment of volcanic basalt, sprinkled with coloured crystals, about six by eight inches large, bordered with silver, and the surface of it reddish brown, undulating, and polished. having kissed the black stone and performed other rites, the moors went three days' journey to the prophet's mountain to pray; then they took themselves back to morocco, but on their way, missing a steamer, were obliged to travel by land through tunis, which took them five months, and, running short of money, lived, hadj riffi said, largely on roots. in the meantime he urged our donkey along, breaking his discourse with "arrah! arrah!" until at last it was cajoled under the gateway and into the kasbah. this fortress, reported a good specimen of moorish architecture, could impress nobody: it has no regular garrison; the batteries are antiquated, the artillery hopelessly inefficient. the crumbling battlements are overgrown with rank grass and fig-trees, though tradition has it they were once brass, when the city was built of gold and silver. tangier is immensely old, and has seen many conquerors, many demolitions. arabs, greeks, carthaginians, romans, goths, spaniards, and portuguese have all in their turn besieged and taken, ruled and deserted, the white city. england has had her turn too. when charles ii. married catherine of braganza, tangier and bombay formed part of her dowry and passed into british hands. the portuguese, to whom tangier then belonged, withdrew; the english entered, repaired the city wall, built forts, and in the course of three years a great mole across the harbour at a cost of £ , . trade increased rapidly under the protection of the plucky tangier regiment (now the queen's royal west surrey). an english mayor and corporation--six aldermen and twelve common council men--were established in the little colony, and attended church in scarlet and purple. and then the home government made a mistake. the slovenly tangier board in london wasted money, sent adventurers out to tangier as governors. an exposure of their mismanagement followed, which induced the home government to throw up a troublesome charge, and to evacuate as valuable a port as england ever possessed, in a country which, unlike india, is admirably adapted for european colonization, and blessed with every natural advantage creation can offer. the mole and fortifications were blown up, lord dartmouth and his garrison marched out of tangier on february , , and the moors took possession of a heap of fragmentary ruins. with tangier in our hands we could have confidently commanded the passage of the straits for seventy miles, nor would there have been a risk to gibraltar of having all her supplies cut off in the event of spain and morocco being hostile to us. fresh-comers to morocco regret these things: in a few weeks the spirit of the country induces a lazy tolerance and a general apathy towards the past as well as towards the present state of affairs. we found inside the kasbah an entirely moorish element--one sacred spot where no "christians" may live. a children's school was making a deafening noise on our right, and we looked in to see a group of small boys sitting round an ancient, turbaned moor, who was sewing at a jellab and paying small attention to his pupils: one and all were on their heels, lighted by the open door, there being of course no windows; and each held in his two hands a board inscribed with arabic characters, which he swayed backwards and forwards as he swayed his body in time with sentences from the kor[=a]n, learnt thus by heart and chanted in a high sing-song key. there were no girls. boys alone are taught anything; and in general their education begins and ends, as above, with the kor[=a]n. few moors can write or read: there are no books in morocco, except the kor[=a]n and a religious treatise or two, to tempt them to learn. as for geography, an intelligent moor will know by name england, france, and germany, not russia, and that his own country is the biggest, the best, and the most powerful. leaving the noisy little school, which did not approve of being stared at, we came to the empty palace, with its great horse-shoe doorway, painted blue-white and carved in a rudimentary way, called in arabic "the little garden," descriptive of its inside courtyard, planted with oranges, figs, and palms. farther on stands the forge of the fortress: "for the slippers for the horses," hadj riffi explained. the blacksmith wore an apron of a whole goat-skin; he pared down the hoof with an instrument like a shovel, helped by the horse's owner or any chance onlooker, for moors "hunt in packs," and only a mere christian does anything by himself. the shoe is a complete circle of iron, has three nails on each side, and in some places a bar across the centre. at last we reached the prison, the principal feature of the kasbah. much has been written about moorish prisons, to be put down by ignorant critics as exaggerated. english visitors have shown up their horrors, only to be forbidden now by a stringent order to go inside. it is hard to say what happens behind the scenes, but torture is lightly thought of in morocco; "cruelty," as europeans understand it, has no place nor meaning in ignorant, fanatical minds; and an unpleasant inference is therefore to be drawn. of course many of the prisoners are confined, in all good faith, for offences, and will be released in time; but there are also moors, in high positions socially, or possessed formerly of means, who "wither and agonize" year after year in captivity, their only fault that they were rich or influential in bygone days, thus tempting a jealous rival to remove them out of his path, or a greedy government to confine them and feed upon their money. if they ever come out, it will be because a wealthy friend has chosen to pay the government for their release, or because it has happened to occur to the ministers at court to send for them; and half of them will reappear but scarred remnants of the men who went in. descriptions of tortures which were unknown even in the middle ages in england may well be omitted: tortures which result in blind and tongueless creatures, without hands; bled of every penny they once possessed, and maimed in order to induce them to reveal the spot where their money was hidden, or the friends' names with whom they traded. we looked in through a small iron grating in the door about two feet square, revealing a space open to the skies, with roofed recesses in the walls round the four sides, where the prisoners had huddled themselves in their rags. at night they are chained by the leg. an oriental does not require "a bed," but he is provided with no substitute in prison, still less with food and drink, for which he is dependent on friends or relations willing to supply him. of late years, in certain prisons, a small loaf of bread per day is given to each man. he has the great advantage of being able to talk all day to his fellow-prisoners; but in the case of a refined man such close intercourse has its drawbacks, more especially when a raving lunatic happens to be chained by an iron collar round his neck to one of the pillars. madmen and all alike, without respect of persons, veritably rot to death, cheek by jowl, in a moorish prison. disease, starvation, and injuries tend to shorten their captivity. whoever has smelt the smell within those walls will endorse the adjective "kindly" death, than which there surely can be no more welcome visitor. a few of the sound prisoners, sitting on the ground, were weaving baskets, some of which we bought through the keeper of the prison; then turned away, struck by the stoicism among the prisoners themselves in a situation of such uncertainty. was it to end in death or release? who knows? they merely shrug their shoulders, and ejaculate, "ift shallah" (god will show). passing the soldiers guarding the outside of the prison, and out under a second gateway of the kasbah, we stumbled down what is called one of the sultan's "highways," something very rocky and not far off the perpendicular. r. chose her own feet, much to hadj riffi's annoyance. though the ways are such that no donkey can be ridden without stumbling among cobble-stones and pitfalls, and thereby running a risk of pitching the rider off the insecure pack into a refuse-heap, it was impossible for a european, in his eyes, to walk and to maintain his dignity at the same time. [illustration: two sheikhs. [_to face p. ._] that no moor runs when he can walk, or walks when he can ride, or stands when he can sit, or sits when he can lie down, is a saying fulfilled to the letter. and what poor man, however heavily he loads his small donkey with garden produce, forgoes mounting himself on top of all, and making the little beast stagger along, at a fair pace too, to market? the life of such a man is not eventful, but what there is of it is good: he sings as he jogs along in a monotonous tone, and has a word for every soul he meets, and a laugh too, curses his donkey--he is never quiet--and lands the produce of his little melon-patch in the market. the melons are sold by degrees, much gossip is interspersed, possibly he washes and prays, then eats, and sleeps a little; more gossip, until the sun tells him it is time to get outside the city gates; and then off he jogs again, singing, talking, back to the little reed-thatched hut, fenced in by its hedge of cactus. life is too full of--call it resignation or content--to leave room for disturbing speculations, and he is born of a race which never repines: there is allah and the one faith, and the sun to lie down beneath and meditate and sleep. not that the typical countryman is idle--far from it: he is hard-working, without any beer to do it upon. it is a matter of more speculation as to what the courteous, solemn men, in turbans like carved snow, whom one meets walking along the beach telling their beads, or sees sitting in sunshine reading aloud in a low voice, steadily praising allah, occupy themselves with from month to month; or the sleek sheikh--a countryman of some means, with smooth coffee-coloured face and a haik whiter than an iced birthday cake--perched between the peaks of his red cloth saddle, under which his hard, hammer-headed mule paces at an intermittent amble. probably the sheikh has ridden out of the city to inspect his crops. his house, with his wife, he has locked up: the keys are in his pocket. he swings along a sandy track bordered with cactus, reaches his garden door, which is painted reckitt's blue, unlocks it, and, tying his mule up inside to a fruit-tree, proceeds to inspect his vines and prune casually some of the ashy-white branches of his fig-trees. then he sets two ragged countrywomen to work to cut his vines and hoe his beans. he may read a few verses of the kor[=a]n later on. he may sleep. eventually he ambles home. other days he spends among his friends in the city, sitting in their little shops and gossiping consumedly. he may hire an empty shop of his own for the same purpose, and turn it into what might be called "a club." he will pray regularly; will play chess and draughts sitting in the front of a shop; will drink green tea. whatever he does is done without haste, and towards evening he strolls serenely, with many interruptions, in the direction of his own house. the climate of morocco has never any of the brisk, freezing "grip" of a hard english winter, but rather tends towards encouraging indolence. in tangier itself energetic english visitors find little superabundant scope for action: naturally enough, the residents, whom an enervating summer or two shears of much of the vitality with which they first landed, end in settling down into an enjoyable, mild routine. there is, however, shooting and a little pig-sticking for who will; but guns may not be brought into the country, and no european would be allowed to exploit its _nullahs_: if not killed, he would be turned back and escorted into trodden ways. the principal day's excursion from tangier is out to cape spartel and back again: before we left the place we started early one morning with this end in view, taking a donkey and boy carrying a camera, lunch, etc.--first along a cobbled roadway of which tangier is immensely proud, across the river by a new bridge, and up the mountain. the mountain is the summer abode of tangier, and shady houses and gardens civilize what was once a wild hill, in the days when our great british minister, sir john hay, did an unprecedented thing, and built himself a house there. forty years ago no christian was safe outside tangier without a guard, and it is largely to sir john hay's fearless trust in the honour of the moor that the change is due. it may still be unwise to walk in lonely places after dark, or to become involved in a street row; for if one ruffian is excited to throw a stone, thirty will follow suit, and europeans have thus been stoned to death. but those who live out in the mountain and visitors to spartel have nothing to fear in these days in the shape of attack and robbery. it was about ten o'clock when we left behind us the leggy remains of a roman aqueduct over the river, and, having climbed the mountain, broke into open ground, stretching far away at the top. the cobbled road resolved itself into an unsophisticated path; the stiff cane fences, shutting out all but the tree-tops in the gardens from view, came to an end; and we were in a breeze off the atlantic, on undulating hills covered with short scrub, gum-cistus, arbutus, tall white heather, oleander, and pink-and-white convolvulus. the track led us up and down, and grew more stony as we went on, gradually rising, till we were about a thousand feet above the sea. looking back, tangier lay far below, and beyond it in the distance white cragged mountains glinted in the sun. it was a glorious day, november : a fresh breeze, tempered as it so seldom is in england at that time of year. our path wound round the hills and dipped towards the sea. from the stretches of heather through which we brushed we could hear below us the surf breaking on the rocks: it might have been a corner of the west coast of scotland. after eight miles' up-and-down tramp, the lighthouse at the end of the great cape, spartel, the north-west corner of the african continent, came into sight. this lighthouse was built at the instigation of the eleven powers, but actually by the sultan. the powers--great britain, france, germany, spain, austria, belgium, portugal, italy, russia, america, and brazil--share the cost of its maintenance, and that of the whole road from tangier to the lighthouse, which follows the line of telegraph-posts, the cable being laid to spartel. the lighthouse is french built; its fixed intermittent white light can be seen thirty-six miles away, and it stands feet above sea-level. sitting down at its base, looking out to sea, we watched the black spines of rock underneath us, set in whirlpools of foam--the dark continent showing the last of its teeth. on our left the coast trended away into the hazy distance: to our right across the blue straits lay the yellow sands of the bay where trafalgar was fought, and the irregular little town of tarifa, backed by purple spanish hills. the evenings were short, and we were soon on our homeward way. the stunted bushes on each side of the path, disturbed by the devastating woodcutters, could hardly hold a lion in the present day. yet in the course of sir john hay's forty odd years of administration in morocco two were seen in these same woods, and he shot there himself a striped _hyæna rufus_, a great shaggy animal with a bristling mane. one of the two lions ought to have been shot, but he doubled back, and was heard of afterwards travelling at a swinging trot between tangier and tetuan. he killed an ox in the valley the next day, and disappeared in the direction of the snow-topped mountains. in this twentieth century lions in the north of morocco would be a rare sight: towards the south the mountain-fastnesses hold them still, together with leopards, wild cats, etc.; but, like everywhere else, big game moves off as civilization moves on. there remains the wild boar. the moors hunt him with greyhounds, europeans shoot him, and englishmen have introduced pig-sticking. the largest pig sir john hay speared scaled twenty stone clean, and measured six foot four from snout to tail. but even pig are getting scarce. the tent club in tangier organizes expeditions, and parties go out under canvas for a few days at a time: the result is nothing very great. when it is a question of shooting pig, the moors, born sportsmen, join one and all--small farmers and peasants--purely from the love of sport. some act as beaters, wearing leathern aprons and greaves--such as the greek peasantry wore--to protect their legs. they carry bill-hooks to cut their way through the thickets, and bring along a tribe of native dogs, which do good service--a cross between a collie and a jackal, veteran poachers, which prowl through the scrub, winding a boar at any distance. the thickets where pig lie are for the most part backed by the sea, and bordered by lake and marsh or plain, in which case it is not difficult to inveigle the driven boar to break where the guns are posted. a haunch of wild pig judiciously roasted, with a _soupçon_ of wine in the gravy, is one of the delicacies of morocco. as many as fifteen boars have been accounted for in a couple of days' shooting. the sun went down; the soft air grew colder: we walked quickly back through the outskirts of tangier, between gardens full of plumbago, dituria, geraniums, hibiscus, pointsettias, narcissus, frescia, and roses of all sorts, besides other flowers. anything would grow in a soil which has been known to bear three crops of potatoes in one year, and where corn is sometimes sown and reaped all within the space of forty days. an enterprising english market-gardener is this year growing vegetables and fruit for the london market, expecting to have green peas in covent garden in december, the duty on peas and tomatoes having been lowered to per cent. this man acts as agent to a land-owner. fortunes, indeed, might be made, if it were not a question of find the land; for while land cannot now be bought in morocco by europeans, the few fortunates who own inherited acres price them high, and, hoping for a boom in the course of the next fifteen years, demand £ an acre. as we turned into the villa valentina a wonderful opal light warmed the white city and the sand-hills--they were no longer cold nor colourless; while banks of "rose" sunset-clouds were reflected "rose" in a grey-green sea. tangier has two sides to it--one native, the other european. the european side is all which appears on the surface, and it swamps the other. given each of the eleven powers, with its minister, its minister's family, its secretary, its attaché, its interpreter, its student; add to these a handful of english residents, a handful of english and american visitors, and a handful of varied nationalities thrown in; back them up with the necessary foundation of purveyors, and lower down still a substratum of leeches and black-sheep, greedy jews, needy spaniards, introducing drink and tobacco and gambling,--and there you have before you all the elements of a highly civilized town on the mediterranean shore. it may be tangier: it is not morocco. [illustration: tangier. [_to face p. ._] the moorish aristocracy themselves speak of the place as "christian-ridden tangier," and will have none of it: the sultan says it "no longer belongs to him." its trade is _nil_, and what there is of it is in the hands of the jews, who boast eleven synagogues, schools, and a grand rabbi at the head of all. we brought introductions with us to various people, and met with every hospitality in tangier. sir arthur and lady nicolson, representing great britain, do all in their power for visitors; and the colony of mixed nationalities fills its off hours together, most successfully, with a round of picnics, afternoon rides, tea parties, and other amusements, implied by "wintering at tangier"; from all of which any knowledge of morocco, or association with moors, is far removed indeed. a seaport which has neither roads nor railways to connect it with the surrounding country, is isolated a week's journey from the nearest capital town, and whose links with the outer world all tend seawards through steamers to foreign countries, can never constitute a study of the land to which it belongs only by right of position. but morocco itself had brought us to the north of africa. tangier could only be a base for future operations, and consequently a fortnight of tangier sufficed, finding us bent upon moving on, before the heavy rains broke, and the swollen rivers made travelling impossible. travelling in morocco is never at the best of times luxurious. "say explore, rather than travel," somebody writes, speaking of morocco; and many were the injunctions and warnings which the post brought us from friends at home--above all, to expect no ransoms, in the event of capture by lawless tribes. it is true that a _wanderjahr_ in morocco has not the luxuries of travel in india; and englishmen who would break new ground must wear moorish dress, talk arabic, and prepare to face considerable risks, with the off-chance of writing in some such strain as davidson: "to-day i have parted with all my hair except one long tuft over my right ear. i never expect to become white again. my beard is very long. my legs covered with bites of vermin. my cheek-bones prominent, and my teeth sharp from having very little to do." not that r. and myself had such adventures in view; but we believed that even as humble followers in the tracks of others we should find no lack of interest in a country so little known, among a people of "the arabian nights," under conditions which tempt the unexpected to stalk out from behind every corner. chapter ii camp outfit--a night at a caravanserai--tetuan--the british vice-consul--moorish shops--we visit a moorish house and family. chapter ii _tetuan_--the tiger-cat! so curiously beautiful. recollections of it hang in the gallery of one's memory, not so much as pictures, but as correggio-like masses of vivid colouring and intangible spirals of perfume. the place we had set our hearts upon visiting, to begin with, was the northern capital, fez--only to find, on going into particulars, that insurmountable barriers blocked the way. even if we escaped the december rains on the ride there, they would break sooner or later, making sleeping out under canvas impossible: the flooded rivers might mean a long delay--probably a week or more--on the banks; bridges in morocco are harder to find than diamonds on the seashore, and when a river is in flood there remains only to sit down in front of it until the waters abate. the "road" to fez, after the tropical rains, soon becomes a slough of clay and water, ploughed up by mules and donkeys, and so slippery that nothing can keep its legs. we decided, therefore, to leave fez till the spring, when the rains would be over, and to visit for the present a city called tetuan, only two days' journey from tangier, camping out as long as we felt inclined, and returning to the villa valentina in a week, or when the weather should drive us back. but the gods thought otherwise. tetuan was, by report, in the most beautiful part of morocco: its situation reminded travellers of jerusalem; it was among the anjera and riff mountains; and though, of course, travel was impossible within the forbidden land of the riff, it was likely we should gather some interesting crumbs of information, and come across a few of the famous tribesmen, while we were staying on the borders. above all, it was a moorish city, and counted an aristocratic one at that: no european element spoilt its originality. on the face of it tetuan had attractions. accordingly we made preparations to be off. the first thing to be done was to get hold of a man who could cook, act as guide, interpreter, and muleteer: plenty of them presented themselves, and we closed with a certain mohammed, who had been with colonel h----. every third moor is named mohammed, or some corruption of it--eldest sons invariably. next we ransacked tangier for commissariat and camp outfit. out of a dirty little spanish shop two men's saddles of antiquated english make, with rolls, were unearthed, and hired in preference to some prehistoric side-saddles, with moth-eaten doe-skin seats and horned third pommels. [illustration: _photo by a. cavilla, tangier._] tetuan. [_to face p. ._] then we obtained a permit from the english consul, for the sum of seven-and-sixpence, authorizing us to apply to the governor of the kasbah for one of the moorish soldiers quartered in tangier, who should act as our escort to tetuan. the sultan of morocco undertakes to protect british subjects travelling in his dominions as far as possible, provided they supply themselves with an adequate escort and avoid roads through unsafe territory. the various tribes from among themselves sometimes provide an armed guard to see travellers safely across their own country, handing them on at the borders to the next tribe, who sends its mounted escort to meet them. the headman arranges for the safety of europeans, and his tribe answers for their lives. but this plan involves prearrangement, publicity, and fuss. now from tangier to tetuan the road by daylight is perfectly safe--though it happens that, at the time of writing, the body of a peasant, presumably out after sunset, has been found robbed and murdered close to it. therefore one soldier was all we should want; and at last this bodyguard was supplied, a ragged moor, with a lean mule and a french rifle--all for five shillings per day. we next visited a general "stores," lined with the familiar cadbury, keiller, and huntley & palmer tins: there we invested in corned beef, tinned soup, potted meats, cheese, salt, macaroni, marmalade, tea, coffee, sugar, candles, soap, matches, etc. things not to be forgotten were nails, hammer, rope, methylated spirit and etna. a revolver for its moral effect is necessary, and may be invaluable in a tight corner. we provided ourselves with two tents, one for the servants and a larger one for ourselves; a set of camp furniture, including kitchen pots and pans; and an enamel breakfast and dining service, which, if time had mattered little, would have been well exchanged for an aluminium set out from england, as lighter and more convenient. mohammed hired four mules and another man--ali--himself taking charge of the cooking department, providing meat, bread, vegetables, fruit, etc.: then with our _bundobust_ complete, and a letter of introduction from sir arthur nicolson to the british vice-consul at tetuan, we started on november . it was one of the hottest mornings we had had, not a fleck of cloud in the sky, and what air there was due east: the sea lay flat as a blue pool, and five or six white sails might have been swans on its glassy surface. mohammed appeared early in the sandy road underneath our windows. to avoid waking people in the hotel, we handed our diminutive kit out through the window to him--only a couple of waterproof rolls, which held rugs and bare necessities; then locking up the bulk of our worldly goods behind us, slipped out of the villa valentina, mounted our mules, and were off across the white sand-dunes bordering the sea. tetuan lies forty-four miles to the south-east of tangier: people with much time and little energy have made a three days' march of it. a range of hills rather more than half-way makes a natural division, and on the top of this watershed a _fondâk_ (caravanserai) stands for the use of travellers during the night: here it is usual to camp. we were an odd little procession as we left tangier. our mounted soldier, cadour, led the way, in a brown weather-worn jellab, which he pulled right up over his head like a franciscan friar: his legs were bare, his feet thrust into a pair of old yellow shoes. he carried his gun across his saddle in front of him, inside one arm: it was in a frayed brown canvas case, which had holes in each end, out of which both stock and barrel respectively protruded. with his other hand he jogged incessantly at the mule's mouth. take him all in all, a soldier's was the last trade he outwardly impersonated. behind him rode r. and myself, shaking down by degrees into our saddles, glad not to have before us eight or ten hours' jog across rough country on provincial side-saddles, which, apart from the strained position, are inconvenient for slipping off and on again. behind us followed the two baggage-mules with our tents, etc.: loaded as they were, mohammed and ali had climbed upon the tops of their great packs. a mule carries as much as he can get along under in morocco: the man climbs up afterwards, and does not count. two hundredweight, with a moor on top, is a fair load for a long journey, marching seven hours every day. enough barley should be carried for each night's fodder: the ordinary mule and pony live on barley and broken straw, beans when in season, and grass in the spring to fatten them. sevenpence a day will feed a mule, and hire comes to three shillings a day. good mules are not bought easily, and are worth, on account of their toughness, more than ponies, fetching £ any day. ours were but second-rate hirelings, and we made up our minds to buy later on, when starting on a long expedition. a mule should be chosen chiefly for its pacing powers, doing four and a half miles an hour on an average for seven hours a day, without turning a hair or tiring the rider, whose comfort depends on an easy pace. the longer the overlap of the hind-shoe print over the fore-shoe print, the better the pace. moorish horses are wiry little beasts, but you seldom see a handsome one: either they are ewe-necked or they fall away in the hindquarters; their feet are allowed to grow too long, and their legs are ruined through tight hobbling. nor is there much inducement to a moor to breed a handsome foal, liable to be stolen from him, if seen by a governor or agent of the sultan's. naturally he breeds the inferior animal he has a chance of keeping, and puts a valuable mare to a common stallion, branding and otherwise disfiguring a colt which by bad luck turns out good-looking. the slender desert-horse, the _habb-er-reeh_ (gust of wind, as they call him), with the small aristocratic head, a nose which will go into a tea-cup, perfect shoulders, and diminutive sloping hindquarters, is seldom met with and hardly ever used, except quite in the south of the country, where he is given camel's milk to drink. people as a rule start off on their day's march with the dawn, after a light breakfast of coffee, beaten-up eggs, and dry biscuits; halt about ten o'clock, supposing they are near water; and, if necessary, do two or three hours more, comfortably, before sunset. but we had made a late start, and the sun was far up as we jogged along one after the other, leaving behind the sands, the orange gardens, and the gimcrack spanish houses, at every step the open country widening in front of us. we followed a narrow path, one of the countless footpaths which zigzag in and out, and wind away to every point of the compass, like ants' tracks from an ant-hill. donkeys, mules, countrywomen, eternally pass and re-pass along the polished ways, with the everlasting burdens of charcoal, faggots, vegetables, and flour: life in some form moving along them there always is. towards the edge of the horizon, clumps of dwarf palm and coarse grass slanted in the breeze: here and there grey rocks stuck up on the hillside like fossilized bones, and met the blue sky. a stream was meandering, hidden under deep banks, on our right. we wound along the wide valley, doing our best to keep the mules going at a respectable pace, and finding that there was quite an art in accomplishing it on a hireling. cadour cut in behind, and supplemented our sticks and heels with arabic words of much effect, his own mule's mouth suffering badly from his jogging, remorseless hand. [illustration: ourselves and baggage. [_to face p. ._] a raven, "a blot in heaven, flying high," sailed over our heads up in the blue, and then, leisurely dropping, sat on a rock and croaked at us. morocco is a country of circling kites and keen-eyed hawks, whose easy, buoyant flight and vibrating "hover" in the hot air are things of undying fascination. now and again a puff of east wind--life-giving--would stir the whole countryside and pass on, leaving us glowing under a sun which warmed every cranny, and made the section of air just above the flat fields rock with heat. two countrywomen toiled towards us under their bundles--a couple of figures swathed in yellowy white; they gazed at us as people gaze who have few interests in their lives, then smiled and spoke, gesticulated, and laughed again: a herd of goats was outlined on the hill above; the goat-herd called to another far-off brown-clad figure, and the echoes filtered down to us: a rabbit dashed up out of a palm-bush and scuttled away: and then there was silence profound, and we paced on eastwards, talking and singing a song sometimes, while the sun climbed right-handed. there is no life like it--that life of the open air and its absolute freedom. monotonous it would certainly be to many people: small and uneventful matters, and a palette set in greys and browns, charm but a few, for whom solitary rides and waste places are "things in common," and chance meetings and little incidents by the way suffice. two or three miles outside tangier stretch rich undulating lands between low hills: a few divisionless fields bear witness to both primitive and erratic farming, and give that regretful air to the landscape which land not "done well by" always imparts. the writer has lately read a somewhat pessimistic letter upon the state of morocco. morocco is a decadent empire, it is true: primarily, because the two races to whom the country belongs live, and have always lived from time immemorial, under a tribal system; and secondarily, because those same races, arab and berber, hate one another with a racial hatred. these two reasons by themselves augur badly for the land they live upon, implying a state of armed neutrality, no cohesion, and no settled peace. under a tribal system the tribe is the unit, not the individual--"one for all, and all for one": it follows that transgression and retribution are both upon a wholesale scale, and alike disastrous towards the consolidation of a united nation. the government in a country cursed by the tribal system must in the very nature of things be despotic: lawless tribes need the tyrant's hand of iron. to the fact of his being a despot the sultan owes his security, coupled with one other reason. arabs and berbers alike are fanatics: religion is the air they breathe, the salt of life. the sultan is descended direct from the one great prophet; consequently the sultan is acknowledged as lord. his policy is an oriental one: tribe is played off against tribe, one european power against the other european power; the empire is isolated; innovations are prohibited, lest european civilization should oust moorish eccentricities. so much for the oriental policy of "the balance of jealousies." despotism breeds despotism. while every moor below the sultan ranks as equal, the fact remains that government officials are all in their own sphere little despots, governing districts many days' journey from court, with every chance of robbing and oppressing those under them, until the day of reckoning comes, when the court, hearing how fat their fine bird has grown, summons him to the capital, and the process of plucking and imprisoning their wealthy servant follows. life exists upon life, from the _sheikhs_ (farmers), who live upon what they can squeeze out of the peasants, to the _bashas_ (governors), who exist on tithes, taxes, and extortion wrung from the sheikhs and townspeople, up to higher officials, who receive no salaries, and line their pockets by a process of bleeding the bashas and others . . . . . . thus _ad lib_. even the gaolers--also unpaid--earn their living by extorting money from the prisoners. the whole system of government reacts upon itself; for the venality of the officials drives the tribes to redress their wrongs at intervals by raids and open rebellion, to punish whom there follows slaughter upon slaughter, and the country is laid waste. hence the principal reasons--wheels within wheels--which account for the morocco of : its prehistoric customs, its uncultivated acres. no reformer, no missionary, will alter the condition of morocco. the moors themselves have made it what it is; but since for an ethiopian to change his skin is no light matter, there is small probability of the moors themselves unmaking it. a gloomy prospect, yet one which, taking the case of the people and looking upon it from a "happiness" point of view, must not be altogether judged from a european standpoint. the likes and dislikes of moors are not the likes and dislikes of europeans, and most of them view their good times and bad times with equal calm, as merely the will of allah. besides which, anything in the shape of law and order and daily routine rasps their raw nature. just as a moor prefers to eat to repletion when there is food, and to go without when there is not, so he would choose a desultory and irresponsible life, alternating between perfect freedom and excessive tyranny, to any regular humdrum form of government which europe could offer him. the country people we met, if hard-worked, had at the same time cheerful enough faces: their enjoyment of life probably equals that of the english labourer. on the whole, it is possible that, when the day comes--as it must come--that an effete and inadequate people goes to the wall, and civilized blood occupies their room, it may bring good, but that good will be tinged with regret--certainly in the eyes of those selfish mortals to whom one country, neither wire-fenced nor scored by railways, nor swept nor garnished, but coloured to-day by the smoke of many thousand years, still offers palmy days. thus giving thanks to allah for things as they are, after the manner of the country, we jogged along, looking out for a halting-ground: it was between twelve and one o'clock, and time to stretch our legs. the river and some oleander-bushes, with green lawns between them, offered all we wanted. cadour took off his brown jellab, and spread it for us to sit upon. there we lunched and waited for an hour. some oxen were ploughing close to us, driven in a desultory way by a figure clad in a pair of once white drawers, and a once white tunic with a leather belt. all which this husbandman wanted being corn enough to supply himself, and no surplus to fall into the sheikh's hands, the field was naturally small. a well-to-do farmer might rise to growing a little maize or cummin or millet or fenugreek for exportation, perhaps some broad-beans, chick-peas, or canary-seed; but the duties are heavy. wheat and barley have been forbidden export: the infidel shall not eat bread of the true believer's corn. our arabic at that time was _nil_; there was no chance of a word with the ploughman unless through mohammed. such a mere scratch of a furrow as he made, into which the grain would be casually thrown, with never a harrow or substitution for one! allah provides, and there is no reason to interfere with his arrangements: "b`ism allah." thus will the fields be reaped, the corn ground, the bread made, the loaf eaten, with the same old invocation muttered beforehand: "b`ism allah" (in the name of god). the two little oxen drew the patriarchal plough, hewn out of a log of wood, and shod with an iron point, entirely by means of their heads, to which it was fastened with dried grass-fibres across their foreheads and round their horns, making a sort of large straw bonnet on top of all which they held high in the air or sideways, with expressions of extreme disgust. in the middle of the field, yoked by the bonnet to a second plough and a fellow-ox, the companion had inconsiderately lain down, to the great inconvenience of its foolish partner, which remained standing, with its head forced into the most unpleasant angle downwards, and the stoical expression of a true mussulman underneath its bonnet. on the opposite side of the stream some sheep, suggestive of the lean, tough mutton we fed upon, were searching round for anything in the shape of pasture: flocks of small cows and calves were on the same quest between the palmetto-bushes: somewhere a boy in charge was no doubt asleep. by this time mohammed was impatient to be off: the bits were put back into the mules' mouths, we got into our saddles again, and pushed on. in wet weather the track must be a bad one to follow: innumerable streamlets, which have eaten out deep gullies in the clay, have to be crossed, making the going hard upon heavily laden beasts, and after heavy rains impossible. we slipped about a little. mohammed and his man had their hands full with the two baggage-mules, which they had long ago given up trying to ride. the slopes became more bleak: far away in the distance cadour pointed out our destination, a white speck on the top of a range of hills, to be seen for a moment and lost sight of the next, as we dipped down on to lower ground. another hour brought it very little nearer: fresh irregularities between opened up continually, meaning _détours_ to the right or left. a few plover wailed over some marsh: in such places partridge, hares, golden grouse, and quail ought to be found; but since every male possesses a gun of sorts, from the peasant hoeing beans upwards, and is not troubled with game laws or ideas upon preserving, they become rarer. we passed clump after clump of white narcissus in full bloom, and marigolds in yellow patches; but as we neared the hills the country grew wilder, and short scrub, palmetto, and cistus took the place of coarse grass. at last we were at the foot of the pass, and the end of our march was all uphill, steep in places, the scrub turning into respectable bushes, with almost a "jungly" aspect. the baggage-mules were pushed and urged ahead. at last, about five o'clock, the sun setting, we reached our camping-ground, up in the teeth of a rising wind. standing by itself, the caravanserai--called a _fondâk_ in morocco--was a white-walled enclosure, with a great open space in the middle and colonnades all round the insides of the four walls, where men and mules huddled and slept unconcernedly. there is also one room to be had; but filthy, of course, such quarters always are, and dear at any price (the rate for accommodation is not large). one look into the walled enclosure, crowded with transport animals and their drivers, was enough, and we turned to see to the pitching of the tents outside. the panorama of hills in the west had a red, lurid light, such as julius ollsson loves to paint: across the stormy glow trailed a few white wisps of smoke where the peasants were burning wood on the hillside for charcoal. making a _détour_ of the fondâk while there was light to see, we chose the west side for our camp, apparently the most sheltered; but the place is a temple of the four winds and gusty upon a breathless day. it was quite dark before the men had things ready, hampered as they were by the gale which was getting up and the want of light. we tried to keep warm, and watched the first star come out from a knoll; at last took refuge in our wind-shaken tent, unpacked, and sat ourselves down with outstretched legs, wrapped in a medley of garments, round the little camp-table, lit by the flicker of two candle-lanterns, the flaps of the tents snugly fastened together from within, awaiting mohammed's first culinary effort. by-and-by from out of the chaotic kitchen-tent, pitched in the dark, filled with confused commissariat, and further blocked by cadour, ali, and their small effects, mohammed emerged, and handed in through an opening in our tent chicken and eggs cooked in moorish fat. after a long interval tea followed, and fruit. we sat listening to the wind, writing up a diary and talking till bed seemed the best and only warm place. the gale woke me after an hour or two: the tent, torn by raging gusts, threatened to give at every moment. i got up and took a look outside. a wild, gustful night indeed, of glimmering stars and a great white half-moon--cold too: the mountains stood out sharp; there was little cloud; round our tent a guard of men from the fondâk--always supplied, for the safety of travellers--were sleeping on the ground, heads and all wrapped up in their jellabs,--the moon shone on the queer bundles, and on our five mules, picketed opposite the tent door, backs to the wind, munching their barley. neither of us got much sleep; roused periodically by the hammering in afresh of our strained tent-pegs, by the men's voices, which would relapse into silence for half an hour, and then break out again; above all, by the flapping and rattling of the canvas. for a moment there was a lull, and we heard the mules feeding and the thousand sounds of the night; then a wild blast almost carried the tent away, and the monotonous undertone of voices would begin once more. we were up early, spent little time over dressing in a stiff breeze, and turned out to look at the weather. banks of cloud lay piled up in the wind, but rain never comes with the _sharki_ (east wind). the sun was up--no chance of seeing it for the present. mohammed boiled eggs and tea, and in another twenty minutes we were ready to quit our exposed camping-ground. from the fondâk to tetuan the distance is only fifteen miles, half a day's journey. the day before we had done twenty-eight miles, and ought to have started at dawn, avoiding the pitching of our tents in the dark. to-day we were off betimes. it was cold, and i walked the first hour or two, cadour and r. riding behind with my mule, coming slowly down the steep, rocky ridge into the valley in which tetuan lies. it was a bad bit of riding, a continuous descent, and the baggage-mules fell far behind: the rocky ravine was uncultivated and treeless, scrub and rocks only on the bare mountains. sometimes a crest would have a saw edge against the sky, suggesting fir woods; but as a matter of fact every tree worth having which is not planted by a saint's tomb, and therefore holy, has long ago been made into fire-wood, no coal finding its way into the interior of morocco, and mining being a thing unknown. at last the slopes gave on to more level ground and strips of cultivation: we had our first view of tetuan, at that distance little more than a streak of white lying in the shelter of the hills. it was better going; and r. having jogged on some way ahead, i waited for cadour, climbed into my saddle, and caught her up. here and there, perched on each side of us, far above in the mountains, wherever an oasis of green lay between sheltering cliffs, a village had sprung up, an irregular cluster of brown-and-white huts, thatched with cane, weathered to shades of brown, the whole pile hedged with grey aloes and cactus, on the steep mountain-side--also brown--where, unless looked for, they could easily have been passed over altogether. these were the only signs of man; for tetuan shared the speciality of the fondâk the night before, in vanishing behind intervening hills and never growing any nearer. but the mules this time were fresher, or we had learnt the art of keeping them up to the mark; they broke into a canter, and scampered across the rich-looking flats bordering the river wád martîl. the wád martîl is the proud possessor of one of the seven bridges which the empire of morocco can show--a somewhat quaint construction, but a _bonâ-fide_ stone bridge: no carriage could have crossed it; the middle cobble-stones were so steep and rough that they amounted to rocks. but morocco knows not carriages, and at least it was a bridge. once across, tetuan was not more than a few miles off. seen from any height, it is one of the whitest cities in the world, and the whitewashed walls lend themselves to flat shadow as blue as the sky above. tetuan has been described as "a cluster of flat-backed white mice, shut up in a fortress in case they should escape": it has also been likened to jerusalem, with "the hills round about." for my own part, it was like nothing i had seen, nor was prepared then and there to classify--this heap of chalk, this white city. not a particle of smoke floated over it: purity and sunlight alone were suggested by the outside of the platter. the moor has a weakness for whitewashed houses, for long white garments, for veiled women: there shall be no outer windows in his house, nor in his own private life. ugliness there may be, enough and to spare, inside these white cities--it oozes out sometimes; but as far as possible let a haik and a blank wall enshroud it all in mystery. none can fix the age of tetuan: once upon a time the city was on the seashore--now seven miles of flats lie between, and crawling mules and donkeys link the two, working backwards and forwards, week in, week out, jogging down with empty packs to the cargo-steamers, and labouring back across deep-flooded country half the year, under solid burdens, to the city. from the flat roof-tops the weekly visit of a merchant-vessel is duly looked for, and a long black steamer lies at anchor for the day in the narrow ribbon of blue sea seen to the east, near the white customs house, which stands back from the beach. [illustration: clouds over tetuan. [_to face p. ._] southwards tetuan faces the riff country, range after range of mountains, inhabited by that indomitable tribe, whose "highlands" are closed to europeans. the river wád martîl, between tetuan and _the riff_, winds across the seven miles of flats to the sea, and is fordable in two or three places except in heavy rains; and days "in the mountains"--safe within sight of the city--promised us many an expedition, and opened up another world of heights foreshadowed and gulfs forbidden, where the hours were all too short. behind tetuan to the north, the mountainous anjera country, wild, bare hills abut upon the very city wall. the name _tetuan_ means in arabic "the eyes of the springs," and all over the city water gushes out of the limestone rock--the hardest water, i submit, that ever mortal tried to drink. such a supply is worth a kingdom to an eastern city. every tank, fountain, and _hummum_ (turkish bath) has its never-failing supply, gratis, from the heart of the hills. the little streets are watered by it, and the sewage carried off on the lower side of the city in a strong current, which--still useful--works primitive corn-mills under the wall on the south side, where a sack receives the flour from a couple of flat revolving stones. a miller was robbed the other night asleep by his sack: the door burst open, and he expected a bullet, but was let off with a clout on the head and the confiscation of his sack. having ground the corn, sewage and all is conducted over the land, and enriches the fertile apricot- and peach-orchards, corn-fields and vineyards. the great orange-gardens lie beyond in the rich river-deposit. there is no want of fruit round tetuan: may sees pomegranates, apricots, peaches, figs, prickly pears, in due course; september brings the grape season; acres upon acres of gardens are covered with green muscats ripening on the dry ground, and protected from the sun by branches strewn over the plants. west of the city, upon which side we rode in, there are fewer orchards and more fields. since crossing the wád martîl a string of travellers had caught us up and passed us: a soldier as escort led the way; a rich jew ambled on a fat brown mule hard behind; a muleteer and three starved mules laden with isaac's worldly goods brought up the rear. the muleteer, a happy fellow in a brown jellab, sang all the way, as he rode sideways on his beast. he begged a match from cadour, produced a ragged cigarette from inside his turban, and lit it skilfully in the wind: he probably lived chiefly on cigarettes, kif, and green tea, eating when there was bread; he was lean and sun-dried as a shred of tobacco, would sleep in snatches and often, his jellab-hood over his face to keep off the sun or the dew. we got very near a pair of snowy _ibis_, or cow-birds, as they are called, attending on two grazing cows. white as geese, parading about on black stilt-like legs, which raise them a foot or more off the ground, they have yellow bills and a slightly puffed throat, in flight extending their long legs behind them. cow-birds wage war on the parasites of mules, donkeys, oxen, and sheep, hopping about the fields and dropping down on to their backs: they are never shot. morocco is by no means short of bird life. only that morning, as we rode along, we saw several pairs of whinchats, any number of crested larks, some plover, pied and grey wagtails, starlings, and a sand-martin. starlings in morocco fly literally in clouds like smoke, blackening the sky wherever they are surging and wheeling. a single shot into the middle of a flock has brought down from sixty to seventy of them. we jogged up the last yard of rocky path, and found ourselves in front of tetuan in rather less than four hours after leaving the fondâk, to the satisfaction of cadour: it was an improvement on the day before. this ornament of the cavalry had now come out in a clean white turban, in view of entering the city: he puzzled us at this point by leading the way off the road to a white wall in the middle of the field, behind which travellers occasionally camp, devout people pray, and sheep are slaughtered at the time of the great feast. here he produced our luncheon. but we, in the innocence of our hearts, would "lunch at a café" in tetuan, after calling at the british consulate and leaving our letters of introduction: this, with signs and a spanish word or two, was brought home to cadour, and we turned back, skirted the white city wall, reached a gate built in an angle, and rode in under the archway, passing a few figures in jellabs reclining and talking beside a great stone water-trough, which was running with fresh water. following one of the worst-paved streets upon allah's earth, whose slippery rocks and pools of brown manure-water offered no tempting footpath, the first union jack we had seen for many a long day appeared above a wall and spoke _britain_: towards it we made our way. a soldier in a long dark blue cloak and high-peaked red fez was sitting at the consul's office door: he took our letters of introduction, and, without our being able to explain ourselves in arabic, insisted on ushering us straight into the presence of the consul--mr. w. s. bewicke. we found him surrounded with papers and cigarette-ends: he would most hospitably take no denial in the matter of lunch, but made us come into the house at once. his long, narrow dining-room was flanked by a small kitchen; above, the same shaped, long, narrow sitting-room was flanked by a small bedroom; a flight of narrow, steep stairs divided all four rooms, and completed the consulate: this simple plan is usual in a moorish house of the sort, and admirably adapted for the eastern habits of the people. the consul considered it inadequate. a sunny, walled garden lay in front; big orange- and banana-trees, both covered with fruit, shaded precious seedlings; a large tank, filled with gold-fish, took up much space under the windows; and in the background a high cane fence penned in turkeys, geese, ducks, and chickens, scratching and squabbling under orange-trees. there are no grassy lawns in these gardens: they are devoted to fruit, shrubs, and flowers, bisected into equal divisions by tiled or grass paths. people in morocco, as all the world over, collect curiosities _nolens volens_. mr. bewicke's dining-room was no exception. guns from the riff, eight feet long; brass powder-horns, knives, daggers, pistols, engraved and inlaid with silver, ivory, and coral; a long brass horn, once blown from the top of the mosque, sacred and difficult to get; copper vessels, pots, pans, jugs, bowls; blue china from fez; quaint jewish candelabra and lamps; brown and white native pottery,--all found a place. a young riffian named mohr acted as butler, a coffee-and-cream-coloured boy, with a girlish face and a head with a close weekly shave, all except one long love-lock, which, combed out, fell over one ear in a glossy brown curl. it is worn by all riffs as good mussulmans, and serves a double purpose, that of scalp-lock when the head is decapitated by enemies and borne by the lock instead of by the mouth, and that of handle, by which azrael, the angel of death, carries the body to heaven on the last day. mohr wore a riff turban of brown string, several yards long, wound round and round his head, a white tunic and belt: his legs were bare; and leaving his yellow slippers behind him on the threshold, he moved noiselessly round the table with gracious manners, and, when he spoke, made nonchalant gestures with his hands. had we come a few days earlier, we should have fallen in with a thousand men from the beni has`san tribe, who had come down to pay their respects to the new _basha_ (governor) of tetuan, and to offer him presents. they had fired off a good deal of blank powder, and a stray bullet or two into the consul's garden door; had rushed about the _feddan_ (market-place), discharging their guns; and had thrown stones at some one. on their way to tetuan the thousand odd had pillaged right and left, stealing fruit and robbing houses. finding some women washing, they stole the clothes, and report said two women as well. at last twenty of them were caught and put into prison, after which the nine hundred and eighty marched back to their own country. lunch over, we walked with mr. bewicke into the city. while tangier might be called an anæmic copy of a moorish town, tetuan has the strength of a _bonâ-fide_ life-study, and all that is curiously beautiful, strangely obscure, is unsparingly suggested. the longer a european lives there, the more the paradoxes in moorish life force themselves upon him, and the more tangible grow certain intuitions which his surroundings convey. it is not only such contradictions as lie on the surface--the squalor of some filthy fondâk, the emaciated raw-skinned donkeys, the bent-backed women, rubbing shoulders with the white-scented robes, the sleek mules, the luxurious tiled houses--these a blind man could see: the under-currents which will puzzle an englishman more the longer he lives there are known to those only who have dwelt much in morocco, and they belong by every right to a life which is drawn to the letter in "the arabian nights." the ramifications of the narrow streets in tetuan would take a quarter of a lifetime to master, and then an unexplored alley might be found, though it is easy to walk across the entire length or breadth of the city in ten minutes. down a dozen intricacies we dived with mr. bewicke, through a labyrinth, half dark in places, where houses built overhead shut out the sun. looking along the narrow streets, the buildings jostle one another, and the flat blank walls slope backwards out of the upright, at every turn a haphazard colour-scheme in white and mauve and chocolate, in blue and ochre and cream. here a long dark tunnel opens into sunlight and shops on each side, with great vines trailed on trellis-work--like a pergola--overhead, and sunlight in blotches on the cobbled paving below: there, just beyond, the _slipper quarter_, and we find ourselves in the thick of the tap-tap of the mallets on the hard-hammered leather--dozens of busy little shops on each side, lined with yellow matting, and hung from top to floor with rows of lemon-yellow slippers for the men, rose-red slippers for women, embroidered slippers for the wealthy, crimson slippers for slaves, slippers with heel-pieces and slippers without. in each shop a man and boys at work: the white turbans and dark faces bending over the leather, the coloured jellabs which they wear, the busy hard-white-wood mallets in the deft brown hands, even the waxed thread, the red jelly which glues the soles together, the gimlets, the sharp scissors, have a passing fascination for the wandering moor himself, who sits down lazily in front and talks to the workers. still more for ourselves. leather bags are being sewn next door and ornamented with work in coloured leather and silks. within hearing of the "tap-tap" lies the skin-yard, and the skins are scraped and tanned and dyed and turned into slippers all in the same square acre or two, whence they depart many of them for egypt and supply the cairo bazaars. a few steps farther, and there is a steady clanking of hammers on anvils, beating out hot iron--the _blacksmiths' quarter_. not the old turbaned blacksmiths nor boys with shaved heads, in tunics grimed with age, and leather aprons sewn with red leather, nor the primitive bellows and quaint iron points, all being beaten out for the ploughs, are the features of the blacksmiths' quarter; but the sheep. every forge has its sheep, every shop its pen like a rabbit-hutch, made out of the side of a box, where the sheep lives when it is not lying just at the threshold of the shop in the sun, beside a half-finished meal of bran in a box. sheep after sheep, tame and fat, take up half the room in the street: there are sometimes a few hens, often a tortoiseshell cat curled up on a sack, but to every shop there is always a sheep fattening, as no other animal in morocco fattens, against the _aid-el-kebeer_ (the great feast), when every family kills and eats its own mutton. the little shops in tetuan group themselves together more or less. there is another quarter where sieves are made, a corner where baskets and the countrywomen's huge straw hats are plaited, another where carpenters congregate, and an open square where rugs, carpets, and curios cram the shops, and so on. we left the warm heat from the glowing cinders and the cascade of sparks, and walked on into the _feddan_ (market-place), which was teeming with women from the hills and villages round, come in to sell provisions. the _jews' quarter_ lies on one side of the feddan, shut in by a gate at night and locked--a squalid, noisy, over-populated spot, where the worst-kept donkeys and most filth are to be met with. tetuan is a clean city: on every animal killed the "butchers" have to pay a tax; the tax goes towards the sweeping of the streets once a week, and towards their paving--that is, if the basha is conscientious: the last basha ate and drank the tax. a gutter runs down the middle of the streets, where chickens are killed, and the heads and uneatable parts of flesh, fish, and fowl thrown. mules and donkeys walk along the gutter, while foot-people flatten themselves against the walls. a well-laden mule fairly absorbs the width of the little streets. the condition of these wretched transport animals is not due so much to wanton cruelty as to neglect, and to a callousness bred of long familiarity. a moor will not trouble to prevent his beasts having sore backs and fistulated withers and raw hindquarters, any more than he sees that his children are warmly clad and suitably fed. fond of both, he is foolish and apathetic, treating his mules roughly, cramming them with unnecessary food or neglecting them, and invariably working them till they drop. one or two little cafés we passed round the feddan, and banished any connection between them and lunch for ever and a day. a little room in the shade hung with yellow matting, no chairs, but a wide divan at the far end, where a few moors sat cross-legged or reclined, smoking long pipes of soothing kif, and eating the pernicious haschisch--this constitutes a café. a few of the moors are playing cards; the rest look on. a dome-shaped pewter teapot, filled with a brew of steaming tea, stands on a low table, with a painted glass beside it half full of mint, which a freckled boy in a coarse jellab fills up from the teapot to the brim and puts to his lips; then he lights a cheap cigarette. a great urn, with an oil lamp under it, stands in one corner. no self-respecting moor patronizes these cafés: he is the most fanatical of mohammedans in a land reputed to be more strictly religious than any eastern country. in public he observes his prophet's laws, only indulging _sub rosa_ in smoking--"eating the shameful," as it is called. mohammed knew very well that eastern peoples drink to get drunk, and smoke and eat opium for the purpose of intoxicating their senses. _kif_, a herb something like hemp, produces this effect on the brain. he therefore forbade both. when a moorish "swell" wants to amuse himself, instead of passing the time at a café he goes out for the day into the country. there is generally an expression of perfect satisfaction with life as he finds it, on his lineless biscuit-coloured face and in his brown agate eyes--a content seldom expressed under the top-hats in the park. time is to him no "race": he drifts easily down the years; knows no other home than, it may be, tetuan; nor is conscious that tetuan sleeps, as it has slept for ages, curled up, underneath the towering hills, white, petrified, like lot's wife. still down more streets, and on towards the belgravia of the city we walked, leaving steaming little hot-fritter shops, where _sfins_ are fried in oil and eaten with honey, where cream tarts may possibly be made and honeyed cakes, and crisp pastry prepared with attar of roses, and candied musk lemons, and dates mixed with almond paste. we left the fried-fish shops and fried spitted-meat shops behind, whence emerge _kabobs_--second only to _coos-coosoo_--and a smell indescribable; and we wound down tortuous alleys, past quiet windowless houses, whose great painted doors, yellow and brown, studded with enormous nails and knockers, spoke respectability. never a straight street for six yards. here an angle with a door; turn down under an archway: there a tiny branching alley, which we follow: here another door; plunge down the opposite way. a woman passes us with a friend, walking as only women in morocco walk--figures in creamy haiks of the finest wool, which swathe them entirely from top to toe like a sheet, a pair of eyes barely showing between the folds. at the bottom of the haiks a flash of colour obtrudes, tomato in one, beetle-green in the other, and filmy muslin over both, which in their turn allow a glimpse of ankles wrapped round in snowy linen folds--rose-pink, gold-embroidered slippers completing the whole, suggestive of a tea party. a yard farther and we pass _el-jama-el-kebeer_ (the big mosque), which, unlike that at tangier, stands with its doors wide open, but in front of which no infidel may linger. there was a vision of a cool tiled courtyard and splashing fountains of white marble and clean yellow matting, of endless tiled pillars vanishing into shade. there are saint-houses in the city where women are allowed to pray, but only upon one night in the whole year in el-jama-el-kebeer--a field-day among the wives and concubines, who flit like white moths through the darkness in flocks to worship, carrying red-and-blue lanterns. at last we reached the house of the moor upon whom mr. bewicke intended us to call--a specimen of the best moorish houses. alarbi abresha has been nicknamed "the duke of westminster"--the wealthiest man in tetuan. a slave responded to the hammer of the great knocker, demanded who knocked, and then opened the door. alarbi abresha was out; but his son, a youth badly marked with small-pox, received us, dressed in a jellab of pale blue, tasselled, and worked in white. mr. bewicke asked after _the house_. no one in morocco inquires after the wife or family distinctively. [illustration: _photo by a. cavilla, tangier._] alarbi abresha's house. [_to face p. ._] a long passage led us into a large _patio_ (courtyard), in which orange-trees were growing. it was open to the sky, the floor tiled with shining tesselated tile-work; a marble fountain rippled in the middle: the dado round the four walls, the three rows of pillars which on all sides supported the gallery above--all were tiled in the same mosaic of small saffron-yellow, powder-blue, and white tiles, which are baked, coloured, and glazed in primitive potteries outside the city, and made only in tetuan and fez. a moorish house is the essence of purity and light, with its whitewashed walls, its absence of all stifling furniture, and its capability of being sluiced down from top to bottom every day with rivers of water by barefooted slaves. "the duke" had spared no dollars to make his house beautiful. of the triple row of arches, supported by the pillars round the patio, the outside row was a plain horse-shoe, the inner toothed, the inmost carved. through an avenue of pillars the rooms all round the patio look out upon the fountain and the orange-trees. slaves occupied them. the kitchen also and the hummum are always on the ground floor. we were taken up to the first floor by the tiled staircase, with a plaster fan-shell ceiling, and were shown into the best room--the room belonging to the master of the house. the tiled floor was hidden by an ugly modern french carpet in strips: white and coloured mattresses were laid all round the walls upon the floor instead of chairs. two immense brass bedsteads stood in recesses, blue silk four-posters; a great cushioned mattress on the carpet beside the bed is reported to be used by the wife; a slave will often sleep in the same room. the lower half of the whitewashed walls was hung with ancient silk brocaded hangings, a long-forgotten relic of the old wandering life as nomad arabs, and still used by arabs for the insides of their tents. the richer the owner, the better his silk hangings: the design is invariably a succession of horse-shoe arches, more or less embroidered, and giving the rooms a warm, luxurious air. in the mosques very fine mats are used; in ordinary houses, cafés, and shops, yellow matting lines the walls. above the old hangings the duke had hung a line of immense and tawdry gilt-framed mirrors. there were clocks in the room to the number of ten, some of them going; two inlaid cabinets; three cases of artificial flowers under glass; a great wooden coffer--the wife's property--holding a wardrobe of clothes; a gun on one of the walls; a rosary; a thermometer made in germany: these were the only knick-knacks. moorish rooms combine bedroom with sitting-room, but are devoid of washing-apparatus, tables, chairs, books, or pictures. bathing is done in the hummum or in the courtyard of the mosque; of books there are none; while pictures mohammed forbade, as inclined to lead to idolatry. query: have many artists been lost to the world in fourteen hundred years among a sect numbering a hundred millions? the ceiling and woodwork of the room were painted in barbaric, gaudy hues, which mellow with age and "tone" like a faded kashmir shawl. a row of tiled pillars divided the room lengthwise, and raised the inner half a step above the outer: it was immensely lofty, lighted by the great double doors only, which stood wide open on to the patio. glass is not used in morocco: the windowless rooms are aired by the unfastened doors which look on to the patio, itself open to the winds of heaven. the outside world can have little idea of the life going on within the courtyard house: there is much seclusion therein, in fitting harmony with the spirit of morocco. fireplaces do not exist, though from december to march the thermometer has sometimes, on single occasions, touched freezing-point at night. earthenware pans of charcoal, used for cooking, can be carried upstairs for warmth. the other rooms in alarbi abresha's house were all more or less replicas of the best room shorn of its gilt. as the laws of the medes and persians, so is the arrangement of the mattresses (_divans_) round the walls inside a moorish house. a moor does not spend his day indoors. he eats and sleeps at home, but is otherwise sitting talking with his friends in the city, or in his shop, or out at his garden-house or fields. he eats in any one of the divanned rooms in which he happens to be at the time, his rule being to "sleep where you will and eat where you will." a slave carries in his dish of meat on a tray, and puts it on a table four inches in front of the divan. beef, mutton, and chicken are cooked in oil till they fall apart and can be eaten with the fingers. he eats vegetables and fruit, murmurs a "b`ism allah" beforehand and a "hamdoollah" (god be praised) at the end; washes his hands; drinks green tea, or begins his meal with it and bread of fine white flour. his wife has the refusal of the dish after her lord, never eating with him; and the slaves follow her. as many as five dishes may be brought up at a meal; and the master of the house, sampling each, chooses which he will eat, and sends the rest away. if he has a guest, it is the height of politeness to select small pieces off the dish and put them within the guest's reach, or, still better, into his mouth. moors, unless they are wealthy men, eat "by the eye"--that is, not according to what they require, but according to that they see set before them: frequent hiccups express gratification at hospitality received, accompanied by "hamdoollah." the amount which a moor can eat is prodigious. there was a man at fez who was reverenced as a saint by his neighbours, because he had been known to eat a hundredweight of _coos-coosoo_ (porridge) and a whole sheep at a sitting. alarbi abresha, junior, meanwhile, took us on into his father's guest-house, a suite of magnificent rooms, decorated in execrable taste, the barbaric glories of the old moorish style giving place to modern french vulgarity. a courtyard house can be a strange mixture. its woodwork, possibly _arrar_, a cypress of beautiful grain, scented like cedar, cinnamon-coloured, and immensely hard (out of which the roman patricians cut their precious tables, valued at their weight in gold if as much as four feet wide: beams of arrar put into the córdovo mosque by the moors a thousand years ago still exist); its old silk hangings; its tiles, kept polished like jet, and never desecrated by anything harder than a slippered sole,--all alike are the finest relics of a taste which ruled in the construction of the alhambra, where mauresque design is seen at its best. the aristocrats of tetuan are descendants of the old andalusian families, who, having left morocco and invaded spain, settled there, built the alhambra, were in the course of time driven back over the seas, and took refuge in tetuan and other coast towns. their very title-deeds, together with the keys of their houses in granada, are still in the possession of their descendants in tetuan. while the best work in the courtyard houses of to-day harks back to the brave days of spain, the moor of the twentieth century has less of the vitality and originality which distinguished his forefathers, and he is apt to mix cheap up-to-date decoration with the patio and the windowless wall, of which the duke's guest-house may stand for an example. when the great door had shut behind us, and we were outside in the street again, it seemed both narrow and prosaic after the sunny patio, with the yellow-fringed orange-trees almost branching into the rooms, and the fitful accompaniment of running water, dear to the moorish ear. in the course of the afternoon mohammed, ali, mules, and baggage put in an appearance, and we found them waiting in the feddan, anxious to put our tents up in the middle of the noisy, crowded sok, where the wind, which had dropped but little, was whirling dust round in clouds, and where we should have been the centre of a staring throng--at the same time, an ideal place in the servants' eyes, suggesting cafés and conversation the whole night through. the camping-ground which "the infidel" selects is an insoluble puzzle to the moor, and they went off mystified and disappointed, under orders from the consul to pitch the tents outside the city. later on we followed, by a street redolent and sweet with honey, of which a great quantity had just come in from the riff country, leading to _báb-el-aukla_ (the gate of wisdom), so called because the elders of the city, the wise men, used to sit outside on some of the great rocks: a fine two-storied, square-shaped gateway, with a pointed arch and toothed ornament above it. three little windows overlook the arch; the black noses of small cannon protrude in a long row out of the white parapeted walls; a flagstaff tops the whole, and flies the crimson streamer of morocco. a line of sea-green tiling beneath the cannon breaks the flat wall, where the heads of turbulent tribesmen hang occasionally, sent over from some neighbouring raid by the sultan's orders, and first salted by the jews in the city, _nolens volens_. the cobbles were slippery under the gate. the huge, heavy wooden doors, studded with iron bolts, are barred and locked every night half an hour after sunset. inside, looking back, just at the parting of two streets, a great white wall faced us, topped with green tiles, grass-grown; below, a horse-shoe arch, somewhat in relief, belted with coloured tiles, defaced by age, contained a long solid stone trough, into which two spouts of water gushed--never dry in this city of springs. mules and donkeys and country-folk all stop and drink, and the front of the trough is carved. báb-el-aukla is the finest gate in the city. go where you will in tetuan, at every turn water bubbles into time-worn and artistically moulded troughs and basins, under quaint arches, tiled in blue and brown and white. in the narrow winding street-ways, between the houses, half dark, still the bubbling of water is heard, and the shining wet trough seen. as we left the city and walked down the sandy road which leads to the sea, our tents lay a quarter of a mile off, two white spots, pitched on grass just off the road, the mules picketed by them. we had a somewhat light meal at six o'clock, mohammed's chicken turning out like hammered leather. he was no cook. [illustration: our camp outside tetuan. [_to face p. ._] an arabic proverb says, "what is past is gone, and the future is distant; and to thee is the hour in which thou art." it was obviously never intended by the creator that mankind should make plans. morocco may have its drawbacks, but it is at least one of those few and blessed spots where it is waste of time to plan: life is a matter of to-day, and to-morrow?--why, to-morrow i may be myself with yesterday's seven thousand years. thus some time that evening, when, after coping unsuccessfully with the chicken, it struck r. and myself that tetuan had attractions over and above the head of tangier, we settled then and there to stay on at tetuan as long as we liked the place, though the weather looked very much like rain, not at all like camping out, and we had no clothes with us to speak of. overcoming or ignoring these difficulties, we finally decided to pay off our three men, send them back by themselves to tangier with the tents and camp outfit, write to the villa valentina, pay our bill, have our boxes packed up and sent over to us at tetuan by muleteer, and move ourselves into the spanish _fonda_ (inn) inside the city. thus were we left for the next six days with one clean collar apiece. in tangier there had been some speculation on the elasticity of the spartan wardrobes which we had brought out from england, at a moment when the dread of a vast impedimenta happened to lie strong upon us. in tetuan such panics bury themselves. the slimmest wardrobe will suffice. a country's own materials, whether home-spun of kashmir or sheep-skin coat of afghanistan, naturally meet its requirements best: deficiencies are easily supplied, and later on we lived in mufti off the backs of tetuan sheep. lying in bed in the early morning before it was light, duck were to be heard calling up the river; and, breakfast over, we strolled down to the banks, where the thick green orange-trees on the opposite side bore a crop of cow-birds, sitting like a covey of white cockatoos on the tips of the branches among the golden oranges, so thick and snowy that the tree might well have burst into abnormal flower. by nine o'clock the camp was struck, and we had burnt our ships: the last of the five mules, three men, and baggage tailed off out of sight along the road to tangier. under a cloudy sky, prophesying rain, we walked into the city to look for quarters: better, perhaps, a fonda in tetuan than a tent at the fondâk in wet weather. chapter iii difficulties of "lodgings" in morocco--a spanish fonda--a moorish tea party--poison in the cup--slaves in morocco--el doollah--moorish cemetery--ride to semsar--shopping in tetuan--provisions in the city. chapter iii this by god's grace is _el moghreb_--morocco--and here a wise man is surprised at nothing that he sees and believes nothing that he hears. it is not easy to find a lodging in morocco: there are no _dâk bungalows_--no large white english residences, with the familiar and hospitable _burra sahib_, a retinue of servants, spare horses, and a spacious bedroom at the disposal of the unexpected guest. hotels, except at tangier, are impossible for any length of time, unless to the vagaries of spanish or jewish cookery the heart can harden itself. we steeled our souls, assisted by the grateful sense of freedom from all petty society functions, which in the nature of things are unknown in a city where one vice-consul, six women missionaries, and a post-office alone represent the british flag--where there is no english doctor, no english church. tetuan met all our needs: the only question was where to live. immediately outside its walls lies a land of gardens and orchards. every moor who can afford it has a garden, wherein he cultivates grapes and fruit-trees,--a dim reflection of that paradise of his, which must be chequered with acres of shade cast by great rocks and gigantic olive-trees; which must be abundantly watered by running brooks of milk, honey, and wine; whose soil shall be flour, white as snow. the moor's garden of eden reserved for the faithful after death bespeaks abundance and repose, differing but little from a certain heaven of epicures, wherein _pâtés de fois gras_ were eaten to the sound of trumpets. somewhere in his garden outside tetuan he builds himself a garden-house, to which in the summer he migrates with his wife and slaves and the children of both, his divans, carpets, and kitchen utensils: the town house is locked up and stands empty while he spends four or five months under his vines and figs. at the time we arrived in tetuan--early december--not a garden-house but still lay empty; and naturally in their direction our longing eyes turned--an impossible desire, it was said, thereby clinching the resolve to make a superhuman effort to bring it to pass: between living in the city and a garden there could be no choice. in the meantime a spanish fonda must constitute a make-shift until that came which is laid down for those who wait. inside tetuan two hotels presented themselves. with fonda number one we could not come to terms; it was not attractive-looking: we took a high-handed line and left. fonda number two, after much haggling in spanish, agreed to take us both at the modest sum of seven-and-sixpence a day, all included. no sooner was the bargain struck than a messenger arrived post-haste from fonda number one, to say that they would take us at our own terms. their golden opportunity was lost. report said fonda number one might be a trifle cleaner, but fonda number two had the better cook: the inside man carried the day in favour of number two. [illustration: a veiled figure outside the gate. [_to face p. ._] it was one among many flat-roofed whitewashed houses in the moorish quarter, in a street barely six feet wide. there was no outlook except from the roof-top, where the washing dried: there were no windows, the rooms depending for light upon double doors opening on to the tiny tiled patio--except in our own case, where the second room allotted to us was built over the top of the street, and had two windows cut in the walls by the spanish occupants, neither of which quite shut, and provided us with an ample supply of air. the room beyond possessed dilapidated doors, which gave upon the patio. the patio was, of course, open to all the rain of heaven as well as to all the sun: it was the principal sitting-room of the family, where, downstairs, on fine days, they plucked chickens, made bread, washed, sat and received callers, did needlework and chattered; on wet days creeping disconsolately round the lake of water in the middle of the tiled floor, where the rain dropped--splash--taking refuge on one sheltered seat in company with three dogs, a cat, and a tame chicken, or retiring into the dark little rooms which surrounded the lake. the family comprised spanish parents, married daughter and husband, three unmarried sisters, a brother, and a lodger--an old spanish music-master. the fonda was run by the married daughter, a lady with a temper, who made everybody else work: her mother and one sister cooked; the second sister was busy with a trousseau and a young man; the third and prettiest--amanda--waited on us. on the whole we were not uncomfortable, in spite of the spanish element. our rooms were clean: one afternoon we found a chicken sunning itself in a patch of sunlight on the floor of one--nothing worse. dinner was sometimes, and amanda was always, lacking in certain points to a critical eye. sometimes it was a skirt, sometimes a petticoat, she wore: except on high days, it was doubtful and dependent upon chance threads and pins. all amanda's blouses were low-necked, whatever the time of day: the stains and slits and remnants of torn frills were unique. she wore her sleeves turned up, and silver bangles on her arms. amanda never buttoned her boots, and often put in an appearance with bare feet. but amanda was redeemed by her head-dress and her manners. she wound a crimson shawl gracefully over her dark head, after the fashion of a mantilla, with an effect beyond reproach. amanda had a gracious way of putting things: she bore herself with infinite dignity, and a _je-ne-sais-quoi_ which pointed to a mixed ancestry; she had well-shaped hands. at seven o'clock in the evening her knock preceded preparations for dinner, while she munched something or hummed a tune meanwhile. seas of thin soup invariably preceded a dish of shapeless masses of "soup-meat," garnished with boiled peas. the third course consisted of chicken or partridge: on less happy occasions foreign and "shudderous" dishes appeared; a peculiar jelly shell-fish was the lowest ebb--that and pork we resented. last of all, a tall glass fruit-dish would arrive, the standard sweet--_flan_ (caramel pudding). then a long pause. finally, amanda's step, with a great plate of hot toast and a tall tin coffee-pot: black coffee was the best part of the meal. a day or two after settling into the fonda we were asked to our first entertainment in a moorish house. hadj mukhtar hilalli wanted mr. bewicke and ourselves to "tea" with him. as in the case of "the duke's" house, so here, all the womenkind were hidden away on account of the consul. mohammedans are jealous and suspicious of their wives and daughters to a degree, and strongly resent, if not prevent, an englishman's going up on to the flat roof, lest he have a view of fair occupants beyond or below. nevertheless, the wives always contrive to peep out of some loophole and see all there is to be seen. hadj mukhtar hilalli received us all three alone, as a matter of course, and led us upstairs to his best room. like many others among the better class of moors, our host had a shop and himself sold groceries. at the same time his sister is the wife of one of the ministers; and as there is no respect of persons in morocco, hadj mukhtar hilalli might be called upon himself any day to fill a high official position, and be obliged to go, raising money, if he had not wherewithal to support the post, which, if a lucrative one, would soon repay the outlay. trade at tetuan, and apparently everywhere else over morocco, is not what it once was: the old flintlocks, inlaid with silver wire and lumps of pink coral, are unknown since the last gun-maker died; snuff-nuts, even slippers, do but a small business. living is more expensive than it was: it cost hadj mukhtar three shillings a day to feed himself and the whole household, he said. the room into which we went--our host leaving his yellow slippers in the doorway, and motioning us all to sit down on the divans round the walls--was hung with a silk dado, tiled in mosaic, and overlooked a good-sized patio with a running fountain. our dirty boots compared unfavourably with the hadj's clean, bare feet, which, as he sat down cross-legged on the white and embroidered cushions, were hidden underneath his voluminous garments; whereas ours, not to the manner born, contracted cramp, unless stuck out in an ungainly way. a gorgeously upholstered bed filled up one corner of the room; a gun hung on the wall. there was nothing else. three little sons of the house and mr. bewicke's soldier-servant having followed us in and seated themselves, preparations for tea--already waiting, arranged in front of the divans on four brass trays, standing on four low tables a few inches high--began. hadj mukhtar hilalli, sitting on his heels in front of his tea-table, making tea with his thin brown hands, and presiding over it all with true oriental dignity, was a veritable moses or aaron reincarnated. women and men alike mature rapidly in this country, putting on flesh and becoming matronly and aldermanic without at the same time growing lined or aged: a wealthy man of twenty-five is portly and slow of movement--the result of eastern habits coupled with the climate. hadj mukhtar hilalli, barely forty years old by his own account, had a white beard and moustache, no wrinkles, eyes of mild blue and benign expression, equally guileless and unfathomable. talking in arabic to mr. bewicke, he drew the tray close to the low divan in front of him, saw that his sons provided cushions for our backs, and proceeded to wash the green tea in a bright nickel pear-shaped teapot, with water from the great brass urn which stood over a charcoal-burner: the washed tea was then transferred into a twin teapot, which the hadj generously filled with immense lumps of sugar out of a glass dish standing on a tray by itself, stacked high with great blocks split off the cone with a hatchet. heavy with lump sugar, a handful of mint and bay leaves was also crammed into the little remaining space in the teapot, the boiling water out of the urn was turned on over all, filling up every chink, the lid shut down upon the steaming fragrant brew, and the teapot set back upon the brass tray, the centre of a ring of tiny gilt and painted glasses. the eldest son--a boy of fourteen, dressed in red, and wearing a leather belt embroidered with blue, and a fez-bag fastened thereto to match, whose head had evidently had its weekly shave that afternoon--lit a lamp underneath a little incense-burner, filling it with sticks of sweet-scented wood, till an odoriferous blue smoke rose from it. with much care he carried the burner to us, and put it inside our coats, thoroughly impregnating every thickness with warmth and odours of cedar-wood. it was taken last of all to mr. bewicke's soldier, who manipulated it correctly as a moor, putting it inside his flowing apparel, and sitting down with every fold closed in round him like a miniature tent, the burner smoking away inside. a scent-spray was then handed, with which we anointed ourselves in moorish fashion, inside our hats, up our sleeves, and round our necks. meanwhile, hadj mukhtar hilalli poured out tea with a great elevation of the teapot, raising his arm and showing greens and blues mixed to perfection underneath his _k`sa_--a white woollen or silk robe worn only by gentlemen--which, semi-transparent and gauze-like, fell in white waves over his shoulders on to the divan. under the k`sa was a long garment with wide sleeves and buttoned all down the front--a _kaftan_--of sea-green cloth, embroidered with gold. the kaftan just revealed a waistcoat of a shade of blue, with gold and green buttons and embroidery. underneath this, and above his white cotton shirt and drawers, he probably wore a woollen jacket. but greens and blues and gold were alone visible. sometimes several kaftans or several jellabs are worn one on top of the other, all colours mixed, particularly if the owner is travelling. moors are a wool-clad people for the most part, due to the wet winter climate: the men's brown woollen hooded jellabs keep out the rain more or less, and the women's white woollen haiks answer the same purpose. the hadj turned up his sleeves as he made tea, the underside of them being embroidered for this purpose. it was ready by this time, and brought us on a brass tray by the eldest son. though the little glasses are not capable of holding much, the violent sweetness and the flavour of mint prevent the uninitiated from doing justice to the regulation three cups which courtesy demands should be drunk. but it grows, even upon the european, that steaming golden-brown beverage, fresh and fragrant with sweet thymes, while something in the climate of morocco tends to make sugar acceptable after a few weeks. we supplied ourselves with sponge cake, pounds of which were piled on a brass tray in front of us: sweet biscuits, toasted nuts, almonds, and raisins abounded on the same lavish scale; while a wicker basket, like a large waste-paper basket, was full of thirty or forty round cakes of bread, several sizes larger than a bath bun, made of the finest semolina flour, flavoured with aniseed and baked a warm biscuit colour. the hadj pressed third cups upon us, but with the innate breeding of every moor understood the limited capacity born of early days in morocco. a moor is nothing if not courteous, and, whatever his real feelings, conceals them under polite speeches. he will, as somebody has said, "cut your throat _most politely, most politely_," or with profound urbanity offer you a cup of poison. our host had sipped a first cup before allowing the tea to be handed round--a custom observed to assure the guest that the teapot was free from poison, and that no deadly drink was offered us, containing seeds which should propagate a horrible disease in the intestines, destroying life sooner or later. poisoning is only too common among the moors themselves, cases occurring almost every day in the country. once, when sir john hay was having an angry discussion with a governor--mokhta--coffee was brought in. mokhta, as usual, took the cup intended for the englishman, and put it to his lips, making a noise as though sipping it, but which sounded suspiciously like blowing into it, and then offering it to sir john. not fancying the bubbled coffee, he declined, saying to mokhta, "i could not drink before you. pray keep that cup yourself," and helping himself at the same time to the second cup, which he drank. mokhta put down the cup which he had offered sir john, and did not drink it. some one in tetuan dies every year of poisoning. wives frequently kill their husbands. no two brothers, both in ministerial offices at court, would dream of sitting down and eating together without precautions beforehand, on account of _the marked pieces_ in the dish. one brother, as he dines, may invite the other, who happens to enter, to join him in the meal; but he will reply, "i have already dined." _he dare not._ meanwhile, hadj mukhtar hilalli talked away in arabic to mr. bewicke, who translated for us. he said that menebbi, the minister of war who went over to england with the last embassy, and who is practically prime minister, lost a considerable amount of influence during the short two months he was away, but that he was rapidly gaining ground, and might be said to be completely restored to favour again. menebbi is the only one of the sultan's ministers who is likely to help him to reform the government of morocco. a clever, crafty brain, the whole court under his thumb, it yet needed but an absence of eight weeks to generate in that hotbed of eastern intrigue such a tissue of false evidence and lies as nearly cost menebbi his position, if not his life. his enemies possessed the sultan's ear; every menebbi had been removed from the army; he had probably not a single friend left in morocco. with the fickleness of their race, his name was cursed at every street corner; and when spoken of, the people said, "there _is_ no menebbi." hurrying back from england, the tidings of his fall reached menebbi when he landed at mazagan: he was to be arrested. but the man they had to deal with was one of those few who make a full use of every opportunity life ever offers. from mazagan to morocco city, where the court was, a distance of a hundred and forty miles, he had a relay of mules and horses posted, and he rode without stopping. there were dead and sorry beasts left on the road that day. menebbi rode up to the cannon's mouth, so to speak: he need never have gone to morocco city, but that would have meant his sinking into private life and his banishment from court; he preferred to "play to the uttermost," and he staked life and fortune on the card he held. things in morocco city hung on an eyelash: the great man galloped in from mazagan, went straight to the palace, never paused a moment, straight to the sultan's private door, straight into the presence itself. and who shall say what menebbi said to the sultan through that night which he passed with him--what false accusations he refuted, what diplomacy he used? next day menebbi was not at prayers; he was "sick": in other words, he had tidings of a plot to kill him on his way to the mosque. however, in time he righted himself: now his enemies are under his heel, and menebbi breathes again. the hadj spoke of the great wish the sultan has to visit england--an impossibility, for in the eyes of his fanatical subjects he would be countenancing the unbelievers, and his throne would be handed over to a successor: the throne to which he succeeded, for the first time in the history of morocco, without having to fight his way to it--a fact owed to the wazeer's sagacity. keeping the death of the old sultan secret for a few days, the wazeer meantime bribed and forced the ministers to accept the young heir as sultan, hurried to fez, summoned every citizen to the mosque, had the doors locked, proclaimed the news of the sultan's death, and surprised or forced the whole mosqueful into swearing allegiance to the present ruler. so far the sultan knows only two or three places in his whole kingdom, and has practically spent his life at one--morocco city, or _marrakesh_, as the moors call it. nor would his journeys be reckoned blessings by the unfortunate country through which he passed. only able to move with an army, that army, without any commissariat or transport, feeding itself upon its march, wipes corn and food off the face of the land as a sponge wipes a slate. "where the sultan's horse treads the corn ceases to grow." he seldom travels with less than thirty thousand followers; and, supposing he is passing through a turbulent tribe, fights his way as he goes, leaving ruin and desolation behind. "they make a desert, and they call it peace." hadj mukhtar hilalli had travelled considerably farther afield than his sovereign; he knew genoa, marseilles, egypt, and of course mecca. the mussulman pilgrims passing through constantinople on their way to mecca this year are, he told us, very numerous, the sultan having ordered the fares on the massousieh company's steamers to be reduced one-half for them. he thought that about two thousand moors would be leaving tangier in the early spring for the pilgrimage, returning some three months later. neither the hadj's sons nor mr. bewicke's soldier joined in the conversation, but continued steadily to consume tea, all eyes and ears. at last the trays were removed; and there being no co-religious eye to shock, hadj mukhtar indulged in a cigarette, while we puzzled him with a few tricks of balance and reach, which pleased him quite as much as his boys: everybody tried their hands, and finally the hadj sent his eldest son for an old, heavy sword, and, squatting on the floor, showed us a clever piece of leverage with it and his thumb, which it was in vain to try and imitate. watching our failures, he produced a snuff-box, a small cocoanut-shell, ornamented with little silver and coral knobs, with a narrow ivory mouthpiece, a stopper, and an ivory pin fastened to the cocoanut-shell to stir up the snuff inside--tetuan snuff--noted for its pungent flavour. hadj mukhtar jerked the grains through the narrow mouthpiece into the hollow of the back of his thumb, where all moors lay it, then lifted his hand up to his nose. near the door hung his rosary of ninety-nine beads, reminding the pious mussulman of the ninety-nine attributes of god. each of the ninety-nine beads corresponds to the name of some holy man, and as the bead is passed along with the hand the saint's name is murmured. curious that the use of rosaries in the spanish church is said to have been borrowed first of all from the spanish moors. the eldest son of our host was, his father told us, looking forward to beginning the fast of rámadhan this year--fasting, as he was only a novice, for half the day instead of the whole of it: evidently as much importance and excitement were attached to the prospect as later on would attend the boy's marriage. this same boy of fourteen is learning to write in latin characters, for a moor a most unusual and advanced step: at present he was only wearing a little red fez cap, not having reached the age of turbans, with all their dignified symmetry. the kor[=a]n was all the literature the boy would ever know. strange that a strong and sober people should have for ages confined their studies to the kor[=a]n, an occasional arab poet, and a sacred treatise or two. there is, as i have already said, no literature, no art, no science, in morocco, and no architecture--the kor[=a]n forbidding, it is said, research or study in any line except that of religion. geography is entirely unknown. like moors in general, hadj mukhtar may have heard of london and paris, and might know the names germany and russia, besides mecca; but none of the former would have any connection or "place" in his mind, and morocco must be, he is confident, the finest country under the sun. if it were brought home to him that his country is in a decadent condition, he would reply that at least it is good enough for him as it is; and that if europeans were allowed to exploit it and to settle therein, the end would be prosperity for the western civilization, and a knuckling-under on the part of the moorish--which is true. we talked on upon one and another subject till it grew late, but before we left our host took r. and myself to see his wife, downstairs, in a smaller room. five wives are allowed by mohammed, but few moors in tetuan were rich enough to afford as many, and contented themselves with slaves. we were not impressed by the very plain, sallow-faced lady, with a black fringe and hard brown eyes, who shook hands with us, and from her likeness to the eldest boy was probably his mother. the second son was evidently by a slave: there was no mistaking that likeness--a fat, happy individual, the greatest contrast to another slave, who, though well dressed, was pale and miserable-looking. two or three other corpulent, smiling blackamoors made up the sum-total of the party in the downstairs room--most comfortable, lounging on the cushions, they looked, no mean advertisements of hadj mukhtar's "table." the principal and favourite wife possessed a noisy sewing-machine, which she proudly displayed. every moor's establishment has its slaves--so many, according to his income: in tetuan they are sold privately, and frequently exchanged one for the other, while the wives are as easily divorced. every year something like three thousand slaves come into morocco, chiefly from the soudan: a few are stolen from moorish tribes; the rest are brought in by moorish traders, who catch them in various ways, such as scattering sweetmeats, or in hard times corn, round the villages, up to neighbouring coverts, just as a poacher at home entices pheasants with raisins, then pouncing out and carrying them off. as there are no such things as moorish women-servants, negresses and slaves of various types step into the gap, and the evil of this influx of black blood is seen in the deterioration of a fine race, and the increase of the type which tends towards thick lips, low foreheads, and sensual tastes. the slavery of christians in morocco, once common, has been by treaty abolished since the day when the savage sultan mulai ismael had eleven thousand christian slaves in mequinez employed in building his walls, whose bodies, when they succumbed, were mixed in with the stones and mud of the buildings. slaves are not ill treated in the present day, though now and again one may be flogged to death as the result of fault or the malice and slander of a jealous fellow-slave: as a rule they live happily; and if a female slave bears a male child to her master, by a law in the kor[=a]n both mother and son are _ipso facto_ freed, though they continue to live on in the same house. the last thing hadj mukhtar hilalli showed us was his hummum, cunningly arranged to flank the kitchen fire at the back. a tiny room; but four of his wives and slaves could, he explained, take their bath in it at once. there was a small stone slab inside as a seat, and hot air came in by means of a pipe in one corner. the _hummum_, or turkish bath, is partly enjoined by the kor[=a]n and partly taken for its own enjoyment; it is a feature of every moorish house of any pretension, and largely used by men and women. the evening was a dark one, and we picked our way back to the fonda by the light of lanterns: it is impossible to go out at night in tetuan without carrying one; the streets are wholly unlit, and the refuse-heaps and central gutters unpleasant traps. next morning r. and i strolled out of the city in the direction of ceuta by way of the _báb-el-m`kabar_ (the gate of the tombs). just beyond this gateway congregates in the road _el doollah_ (the drove)--that is to say, the mules and donkeys belonging to any one in tetuan who has no work for them on that particular day. they are all left by their owners at this spot in the care of a tall, tattered moor, whose business in life is to look after them; and there they lie in the sandy road or lean up against the hot wall or each other, one of the saddest sights on god's earth, some of them infant two-year-olds, all of them overworked and starved. about midday the drover drives his charges off to the nearest grass--such as it is--and the ragged squad troops along the stony track without bridles and without spirit to abuse its freedom. they have none of them packs or saddles, unless their sore backs are too deeply aggravated to allow of exposure to the flies and dust; and in due time, one by one, the old or the dying drop tacitly out of the ranks; a couple of days--the scavenging dogs' work is done--and only a tangled knot of bones is kicked away from the roadside by the feet of the living generation, which have picked up the scantiest feed, and are straying back citywards again in the late afternoon, to be called for outside the báb-el-m`kabar each by its owner. el doollah had not started; and leaving them all in the road below us, we passed the little knots of countrywomen who sit by the báb-el-m`kabar selling myrtle for laying upon the graves, and wound our way uphill through the old mussulman cemetery, with its quaint domed tombs and toothed, arched doorways, cracked, decayed, and yellow with lichen, half hidden among the tangle of bushes and wild flowers on the rough slope. the older of the tombs are probably those of the first moors who fled from spain in the days of that great _trek_ back to morocco: a much later and very conspicuous dome belongs to a brave lady, who, not a hundred years ago, did her best to defend tetuan against the spaniards, fighting side by side with the moorish troops, and, in the course of the siege, accounting for half a dozen spaniards, thereby earning for herself in due course a joan of arc reputation and a public sepulchre. [illustration: a mohammedan cemetery. [_to face p. ._] the cemetery was overgrown with _ayerna_ root, one of the commonest weeds in morocco, poisonous when it is eaten raw, though it is possible, after boiling the root for ten or twelve hours, spreading it out to dry in the sun, and grinding it in a mill, to make a sort of bitter bread out of the flour, and to subsist upon that. this the poor do to a great extent, whenever corn runs short and they have nothing but roots and grasses to fall back upon: their pale yellow faces and emaciated bodies tell a tale of the ayerna root. we grubbed some up with a little difficulty in the stiff clay soil with nothing but sticks to help. fifteen inches down we found the root, a small whitish bulb, the size of a bluebell root. there is much desolation about the old cemetery, with its crumbling ruins; but the sun struck a key-note of splendour, and turned the lichened stones into nuggets of gold. a black raven sat on a grey rock above us and croaked; below lay the white city--white beyond all english ideas of whiteness. two tall minarets, with simple straight lines, only a mosaic of green tiling let into their flat faces, cut the peaks of the mountains beyond. at a quarter past twelve a little white flag slowly mounted to the top of each mosque; an infinitesimally small black figure appeared against the sky; then leaning over the parapet and looking down upon the humming city, a cry broke from the figure, and was carried over to us upon the wind--a cry which rose and fell, most musical, most sonorous: "allah ho akbar--allah ho akbar." the black dot moved round the parapet, and east and west and north and south chanted the great summons to the faithful to prayer. and then the little white flag was hauled down. on the other side of the river the neutral-coloured villages could be picked out by their white saint-houses. morocco is stuck as full of saints' tombs--fuller--than england of dissenting chapels. they stud the land. moors rid themselves of much valuable energy in the erection, by countless thousands, of tombs to the memory of the eccentric or pious dead; and distances are measured, tracks marked, not from church to church as in spain, nor from village to village as in england, but from saint-house to saint-house, each of which is village-green, club, or public-house rolled into one, where the men gossip, the pious read, travellers halt, offerings are brought the dead saint, and sick children arrive to be healed--all at a little whitewashed building with a dome like an oven outside, and a horse-shoe arch, an olive- or a fig- or a palm-tree, a flag-staff hung with morsels of rag, and often a spring of water. at four cross-tracks, instead of sign-posts, heaps of stones, cairns, are to be found, placed in such a way as to indicate the direction in which the next saint's tomb lies. a saint-house or two spot the green plain below the cemetery, which merges into the seven miles of flats stretching from the city to the sea, the haunt of wild duck, plover, and snipe, among wastes of coarse grass, marsh, and red tangle. coils of grey river lie upon the flats: the very flatness over which the stream snakes is at once most strong--serene. as we walked down the hillside, a brown figure upon a flat-topped tomb was silhouetted against the plain: he raised himself, and then again prostrated his body to the earth, his face set to the distant belt of blue sea, worshipping towards mecca. that afternoon we visited semsar, a village two or three hours' ride from tetuan, up in the mountains to the west. r. had a sedate brown mule with no idea of exerting himself: my mount was a clever little grey, nervous and rather handy with his heels, nearly kicking me more than once when i dismounted or mounted carelessly. we rode, as usual, on the high-peaked moorish saddles, covered with scarlet cloth, such as every moor uses--the stirrup-leathers of twisted scarlet silk, several thick saddle-cloths underneath, the girths never drawn, the saddle only kept from slipping over head or tail by scarlet britching and breastplate. it is impossible to mount unless the stirrup is held. after repeating the sacramental word "b`ism allah" (a moor mounts and dismounts in the name of god), with a man at his stirrups, he sinks without an effort into his saddle, amidst a furbelow of white robes, which he has afterwards arranged carefully for him. possibly for this reason he gets on and off as seldom as possible, hugging the convenient maxim, common among the moors, that mounting and dismounting fatigue an animal more than carrying a burden. he rides with his knees up to his chin: he is a natural horseman, and looks at home in his practically girthless and quite shapeless saddle, which must have given him a pang, if ever he galloped for his life in front of his enemies, and reflected that his safety was dependent upon the breastplate. a man, before now, has, as he rode, unwound his waistcloth, and twisted it round his horse's neck, for further security against the saddle's slipping back. mr. bewicke and his soldier rode with us: the latter a dark, lean-faced, unwholesome-looking man, unable, like so many of his countrymen, to grow any hair on his face--an obsequious individual too, inspiring little trust; below his long blue cloak he wore brown riding-boots, embroidered with orange, and fastening up the back with orange-thread buttons. my little grey bustled along; but once or twice, when the road fell away into a steep drop, his weak hind legs gave under him, and he "sat down": we soon learnt the effect which merely shaking the feet in the great angular stirrups has on mules whose sides have often been in touch with the sharp points, and jogged forward wherever the bad road allowed. we had left the city by another of its six gates--the _báb-el-toot_ (mulberry gate), the old name pointing back to an energetic past, when mulberries, silk-worms, and silk-weaving flourished around tetuan--when the cultivation of sugar-cane, cotton, and rice in morocco was more than a memory. following for a time the road to tangier, we branched off to the right, and took a rough path winding upwards, passing a spring where women wash clothes, three parts walled in, to prevent their being seen. a little higher up and one of the countless saints' tombs came in sight--better known in this case as the robbers' tower, where brigands congregate at sunset, and from an excellent coign of vantage keep a look-out on the tangier road, to drop on any unfortunate so foolhardy as to be on it late in the day. after dark no moor from tetuan would walk near this saint-house. only a few weeks after this very ride a man was murdered on the tangier road, why or wherefore no one knew, except that his body was found, brought into tetuan, and buried without further investigation, since his relatives were neither rich nor powerful enough to institute a search and demand compensation. robbery in morocco is almost sanctioned by providence; it is made so simple. the lonely tracks, the absence of police, the inconveniences of travelling, and the innumerable wells scattered over the country, almost sunk for the reception of inconvenient bodies--one and all tempt a man to turn brigand; and yet europeans are seldom attacked, in view of the fine imposed upon the tribe in whose territory a crime is committed. thus the borders, where several tribes meet, are always unsafe country, one tribe disposing of bodies which they have done to death by depositing them in the territory of the next tribe. but even in "christian-ridden" tangier a german was knifed three years ago walking home, as was his custom, at dusk. he happened to have no money on him. his murderer was given up to justice--that is, the basha of tangier said some one must die, and together with the fine the tribe outside tangier produced a man, who was duly executed, though whether he was the murderer. . . . . . meanwhile, we were leaving the millet-fields behind us--stubbles, an occasional stalk three feet high, no lying for birds--and were in a country of wild lavender and stunted bushes: these consisted chiefly of cistus or else palmetto, a little dwarf palm, the fruit of which is eaten by goats, and the root by natives as a vegetable, while its fibrous leaves make rope and baskets and a hundred things. a bleak undulating country, which ran up into rocky blue gorges and grey peaks on the right hand. the path was almost blocked at one point by an immense cairn on the top of a ridge--a holy pile, upon which the devout moor in passing casts a stone, because from this spot the mountain can be made out on which the venerated shrine of mulai abdesalam lies, in beni anos, the goal of thousands of pilgrims each year. though it is within a day's ride of tangier, the country for miles around is forbidden to any european, and two englishmen only have penetrated into the sacred city of shesháwan, which lies in the same district. mr. walter b. harris and mr. somers, at different times, got inside, but only at sunset, and after lying in hiding all night had to flee for their lives at dawn. gradually we reached wilder and more rocky country, recalling scotland as far as the open moorland went. if fir-trees were planted on the sheltered slopes, the fir-pins should, in conjunction with the natural soil, form land capable of growing vines--an idle dream in the morocco of to-day. between two hills in front of us towered a cliff of rocky red limestone, which might once have formed the bed of some vast stream. semsar lay where the waters should have struck the rock beneath as they fell: a more sheltered village could not be, facing south-east. the cliff above is still riddled with the remains of an old silver-mine, worked years ago by the portuguese: the ladders and scaffolding inside have fallen to pieces, and after penetrating along dark tunnels on hands and knees for a certain distance an open shaft intervenes, and further exploration is impossible. semsar, nestled into its crevice, takes more or less the local brown; but among the thatched huts, rising one above the other like an uneven pile of mud terraces, a few walls were whitewashed, and of course a white village mosque stood guard over all on the top of a hillock. there is something a trifle "animal" in these villages, rough clusters of bee's-comb or ant-heaps or beavers' lodgings as they might be, assuming exactly the shade of their surroundings, as nests the colour of their hiding-places, or as the kh[=a]ki-coloured sand-lizard, desert-lark, and sand-grouse of the great sahara take on the yellow-ochre tone of that desert. a friend belonging to mr. bewicke's soldier had ridden out behind us. he owned a garden at hand, and asked if we would go in and look at it. we stooped low under a white stone doorway, an imposing structure, invariably the entrance to every garden: the door generally painted reckitt's blue, and kept locked with a key eight inches long, while on each side of the gateway the cane fence is tumbling to pieces and offering useful gaps to marauders--a curious inversion of the rule in spain, where to this day they bar the window heavily and leave the door open. though to all appearance the owner was a hard-working moor, the garden at any rate bore no great signs of expenditure of labour. we found ourselves in an overgrown wilderness of orange-trees, peaches, pears, figs, plums, damsons, cherries, white mulberries, quinces, jasmine, all overgrown and stabbed by the interloping prickly pear--a good fruit, too, in its way, and a "useful beast" as a hedge. half of his oranges were always stolen, the owner said; the remaining half brought him in from sixty to ninety shillings a year, selling perhaps at a shilling or two the thousand. he had evidently not the capital to get the half of what such fruitful soil could give with gibraltar at hand for export, nor the means of securing to himself any money he made; and it is poor work putting money into the hands of the nearest extortionate sheikh. yet his garden was, and is to every moor, a source of great satisfaction and content: truly a field of the slothful, a garden where the mystic finds rest and heart's ease, and the two things which appeal most to sun-baked men--shade and water. it is enough in such a spot to drowse away the sunny hours amidst the hum of bees, the rattle of the tree-beetle; to muse upon some book of whose drift only a faint idea is intelligible, content to leave its problems in the limbo of the insoluble, where most of life's questions seethe harmlessly enough; then, turning, give thanks to allah, who has made gardens for mankind, and doze again. farther on the path led us across streams banked with maiden-hair fern like rank grass. water had worn the rock into grotesque shapes, a cavernous arch in one place, the banks, like a tunnel, almost meeting over our heads in another. immense blocks of stone barred the way; it was not easy riding, but the mules climbed up and down rocky staircases with much tact, while we sat holding our breath. over one of these obstructions the breastplate of my saddle, which had only been fastened to begin with by three stitches of string, burst, and i found myself almost over the grey's tail: such a common occurrence that no moor goes out without string and packing-needle handy; but this was past mending on the road, and i changed on to the soldier's mule, whose top-heavy saddle was no fit at all, and, shifting all over its back, required careful balance on the rider's part. the road was only a few feet wide, and so overgrown that, as we jogged one after the other, trying to dodge grey arms of fig-trees, lying on the mules' necks under dark masses of foliage which shut out half the light, hatless, the stiffest bullfinch at home would have been ears of corn compared with what we went through. at last, however, it came to an end, and the trail opened out into the village of semsar. nobody was to be seen; dogs barked as usual; some kids bleated inside a hut. we rode by the crazy hovels; a woman carrying water emerged, and a boy with a baby. beyond the last brown erection we came to a saint's tomb. this meant the village green without any "green." two or three country people sat in the usual meeting-place among trodden-down weeds, talking and smoking their long pipes, congregated round one busy man, who was chopping a log into a plough with an axe. around the tomb was a group of olive-trees, preserved leaf and stick and all, not a branch even of dead wood off the ground removed, by reason of the sanctity of the spot. however small a grove, it would otherwise have been cut down, as affording cover to robbers and _ginns_ (evil spirits). thanks to saints' tombs the traveller in morocco still meets with clumps and occasional woods of olives. the sunshine glowed on their hoary twisted branches, and flecked the gnarled trunks; the grey foliage cast patches of dense shadow on the brown earth under the mammoths, whose broken lines and odd elbows supported such masses of quiet colour and solemn shade. we wound our way to the left among the huts. of any road between them there was none; the mules could barely climb over some of the boulders among the refuse. once quit of the "green," we saw no one again, and got much mixed as to direction. finally, we struck a path with a descent into a pool and below a fig tree, which, having made ourselves small, we circumvented, and discovered that it meandered in time to the outside of the village. following, we wound southwards by a gorge along a rocky stream, which has the reputation of rising suddenly after rain, and not long ago drowned three mules. stepping-stones are not provided in morocco, and it is generally a case of plunging through a stream to reach the opposite side. near a city with good fortune a jew may pass, the chance may be worth waiting for; but no mohammedan moor would carry an infidel across on his superior back. in time a different path led us back to tetuan, and we rode in by the mulberry gate at sunset, as the mueddzin was calling upon true believers to worship. on fine days we made many such excursions, and exploited the country for miles round. showery and doubtful days were devoted to the city and shopping. shopping in a foreign city tends towards the accumulation of white elephants, which, safely landed in england, work havoc in an english home. long flint guns from the riff, and old blue dishes from fez, and orange-striped rugs from rabat look strangely out of place with wall-papers and oil paintings. the east will never sit down with the west, and the adjuncts of either are bound to "fight." and yet we shopped. there are fewer more interesting ways of studying the outside life of the people; a little gossip and less reliable information are all thrown in to the bargain. the little tetuan shops are a species of club, for each moor has certain shops at which he habitually sits and may be found with more or less certainty. while the owner and his goods remain inside the shop, there is room for two people outside on the sill or doorstep, and a couple of fat leather cushions are provided for them. even mr. bewicke was in the habit of sitting every day at hadj mukhtar hilalli's shop and hearing the news, between four and seven o'clock every evening. [illustration: out shopping. [_to face p. ._] he interpreted for us in our early days. we spent a whole morning buying _humbells_ (striped carpets) at a shop where the owner was sitting on the floor playing chess with a friend and drinking green tea. all over tetuan draughts and chess are played constantly on little boards, either on the doorstep or inside the shop. the game had its origin, like bridge and polo, eastwards of england, and was introduced into europe after the crusades, together with baths and other civilized habits. our shopman looked exceedingly bored at the interruption. however, after much bargaining, we bought a humbell, having to point to everything we wished to buy, for no moor likes a christian to come inside his shop, because of his dirty boots. a moor is either in a pair of clean yellow slippers, or else they are on the doorsill, and his feet are bare: he tosses all his silks, towels, embroideries, carpets, on the floor, and sits among them, while the purchaser stands outside, points to the shelves and heap, and trusts to the owner's divining which particular silk handkerchief is wanted. in another shop we found a second humbell, chiefly black and orange, the property of a taciturn individual in a snow-white _selham_ (hooded cloak), a turban to match, with scarlet peak, a dark blue garment underneath the selham, and a complexion like cream and roses. he lay at full length on a pile of many carpets. we stopped in front of the shop. neither rising, bowing, nor bustling about to show off his goods, the white figure lay still, looking dreamily through and beyond us. we were bores. in reply to a question of price, a long sum was murmured. at last we expressed a decided wish to inspect the humbell, and, slowly rising, he condescended to lift it from a shelf, his looks suggesting that he would prefer being left alone. again we asked his lowest price. twenty-one shillings. we offered sixteen. without deigning to answer, he solemnly folded up the humbell and put it away, then folded one by one the goods which littered the floor, and stacked them above the humbell on the same shelf. still standing in front of the shop, we repeated our offer of sixteen shillings. he shook his head decidedly, made a deprecating gesture, and prepared to sink again on his couch. mr. bewicke forbade us to offer more; we walked away. a voice said in arabic, "it is yours," and the humbell was thrown after us; the sixteen shillings were received with a sigh as the shopkeeper resumed his couch. tetuan makes many artistic "towels," which form the ordinary dress of the countrywomen underneath their old enfolding yellowish-white woollen haiks; but for quite the majority a towel as skirt and a towel as cape are sufficient for all purposes. there is the rare addition of a pair of cotton drawers. the strong substance and fast scarlet dyes make these towels no mean substitutes for curtains, except that, like native goods in general, they seldom quite match, and distract the soul which demands "pairs" in all and everything. a jew we visited in the jews' quarter had a fine carpet for sale, made farther south, something like a persian, the ground whitish, with harmonious reds and greens. for a long time we sat and tried to bargain in his odd little den up a dilapidated staircase and nearly pitch dark: he wanted £ . the pattern was a little small. we came away without it. some of the old _kaftans_ (robes of coloured cloth or satin or silk brocade, embroidered with gold or silver, buttoned down the front and with wide sleeves) were well worth buying: none are made like them nowadays, for common material is used; unfortunately the best are often in tatters. we visited the slipper market, and, sitting on the doorstep of one of the shops, gave directions for two pairs--blue velvet embroidered with gold, and milk-coloured leather embroidered with green. size, price, and colour were duly discussed; rain came on, we sat on the doorsill sheltering, and the basha--tetuan's governor--was criticised. the slipper-maker had not a good word for him. to begin with, it seems he has no money, is of no family, and aristocratic tetuan refuses to "hob-nob" with him. he dislikes tetuan after fez, whence he was transferred, and where he made more money. the other day a neighbouring tribe sent him a present of so many dollars. at the same time they owed him certain taxes, in lieu of which he accepted the money, but pointed out that the present must follow in due course. none ever arrived, and the basha sent his brother-in-law and a soldier to the tribesmen to ask an explanation of its non-appearance. the brother-in-law was tactless, incensed the tribesmen, and provoked them to bastinado him, whereupon the soldier lost his head, and fired his gun off into the air. he was promptly disembowelled. the brother-in-law returned to the basha, stiff, but alive; and the country people give it as their verdict that the basha is a rapacious man. they threaten that they will no longer bring their produce into tetuan to market, but will hold their own markets at some place chosen by themselves out in the country, and tetuan shall come out to buy. such a proceeding would be most inconvenient; for tetuan is dependent for all its supplies on the country people, who hold their markets on sundays, wednesdays, and fridays in the feddan, where they sit upon the ground packed in hundreds, their chickens, eggs, butter, and produce in general in their laps and at their feet. their beef and mutton are but second-rate, and the shapeless lumps of lean, tough meat take double as long as an english joint to cook, and make but a poor show in the end, hacked by the unskilful butchers past all recognition. goat and fish are to be had, sometimes partridges, hares, and rabbits, occasionally a haunch of wild boar. fish came in on certain days when the wind was favourable: there was then a rush on the fish market, and almost a free fight over the great panniers full of shining silvery sardines, and over the bodies of the sellers seated on the ground. the successful carried off a handful each, and the cafés and fish shops were soon frying sardines for dear life, while the little streets were thick with the steam of native oil and butter. some big fish, four and five feet long, came into market sometimes, and a small boy would be hired by a purchaser to carry one home across his shoulder, its great head hanging down behind, and underneath a pair of thin brown legs like little sticks hurrying along the street. bread in morocco is "passing heavy," flavoured with aniseed and full of grit. vegetables are to be had in abundance. the slippers, which had been promised in three days, appeared in three weeks. whenever we passed the shop we asked after them: always the same answer--_m[=a]nana_ (to-morrow). "no, there was no butter to be had to-day, but _m[=a]nana_." "no, the pillows were not finished yet, but _m[=a]nana_." "the boots left to be soled were not ready, but _m[=a]nana_." tetuan lives upon _m[=a]nana_: it is the reincarnation of jam yesterday, and jam to-morrow, but never jam to-day. equally exasperating was the habit of every shopkeeper of locking up his shop and going off to pray or eat or chat. if a shop had to be revisited and purchases exchanged, the owner was invariably out, and the door fastened with lock and key. at . p.m. nobody could ever be found, but was presumably at the mosque. again and again we visited the same shop: one day the owner was at a friend's shop, the next at home, and so on. we gave him up, to see his sleek cross-legged figure seated inside the little cupboard the very next time we passed. [illustration: shops in tetuan. [_to face p. ._] walking by a saint-house on the outskirts of the city, devout and impoverished women were often to be seen there, visiting the shrine and carrying with them small vessels of food, which they placed on the ground for the spirit of the holy man to eat. the window of the shrine was tied with a hundred scraps of rag and dead flowers, bits of wood, and paper and oddments of all sorts. empty earthenware bowls later on, and pariah dogs skulking around, licking their lips, told a tale; but if asked if they really thought their saint would come up out of his grave and eat the food prepared for him, it was open to the mussulman to answer the christian, "and do you really believe that your dead friends come and smell the flowers you plant on their graves?" small-pox kills a great many moors, and an incredible number are marked by the disease. it is looked upon much as measles are in england: cases are never isolated, and children are all expected to have it. each year it is prevalent, and people may be passed in the street with it out upon them; but every four years it breaks out seriously, and a large percentage of the population dies. last of all, in our shopping days a few things we bought by auction. no auctioneer is employed as in european countries, but the owner and seller himself perambulates the street or courtyard with his goods--a mule, or a frying-pan, or a carpet--calling out each successive bid which he receives on his article, pushing his way and jostling the motley mob of market people, peasants and loungers, silks and rags, until he has got his price, and hands over to its new owner his late possession. chapter iv the fast of rÁmadhan--mohammed--his life and influence--the flood at saffi--a walk outside tetuan--the french consul's garden-house--jews in morocco--european protection. chapter iv manage with bread and butter till god brings the jam. _old moorish proverb._ we had not been long at the fonda before the fast of rámadhan began. rámadhan, ordained by mohammed, takes place in the ninth month of every mohammedan year, and lasts for twenty-eight days, during which time the faithful fast from dawn, when it is light enough to distinguish between a black and white thread, to sunset. it alters by a few days every year according to the moon, and when it falls during summer in scorching hot countries the agonies of thirst endured mean a penance indeed. rámadhan begins when the new moon is first seen. tidings were sent from tangier to say that it had been observed there, which tidings tetuan handed on to the farthest mountain villages: a gun was fired from the kasbah at sunset, horns were sounded, and rámadhan began. it sometimes happens that tetuan does not see the new moon till the day after tangier has seen it at the beginning of the fast, in which case the tetuan people are guilty of "eating the head of rámadhan": this year it was not so. during the twenty-eight days of the fast, every night, or rather every early morning at a.m., the householder was awakened by the crashing of his knocker on his door and a shout bidding him "rise and eat": the mueddzin at the same time from the top of the mosque called the hour of prayer, and long brass horns brayed to the same effect. the month was almost over before we had learnt to sleep through it all. as the fonda was in the moorish quarter our door was not exempt. far away up the street the knockers clanked, nearer and nearer every moment, then the man's footsteps, then our own knocker sounded like a sledge-hammer, and "rise and eat" followed: the man went on to the next door, and back again shortly up the opposite side of the street. and every mussulman arose in the dark and had a large meal. again at sunrise the big gun boomed from the kasbah, the concussion shaking our ill-built room, and we woke once more. [illustration: a cluster of country women. [_to face p. ._] no doubt the original motive of fasting and abstinence in the old testament was the promotion of sanitary conditions. it is not good to eat pig in hot countries: thus pork was "unclean," and is to-day in morocco. nor is the consumption of much spirituous liquor wise when the thermometer marks a hundred and one: hence the kor[=a]n forbids the use of strong drinks. the same motive underlies the fast, which rests and relieves systems over-fattened and little exercised. but the "all or nothing" theory which governs the uneducated and knows no moderation runs a benefit into an abuse. rámadhan had its disadvantages. tetuan was revelling at night and in a sodden sleep through the day; work was slipshod and at sixes and sevens; men were irritable and quarrelsome; every one looked indisposed; and the excuse for it all was always rámadhan. worst of all, the countrywomen still tramped four and five hours into market with loads, and children a month old, only half nourished at the time of the fast. but rámadhan came to an end at last: morocco breathed again. the day before the fast was over everybody was smiling, and tetuan had but one hope, that the new moon would be seen that night, and thus the month of penance come to an end. after the letter from tangier had been received next morning, which said that the new moon had been seen there, the gun from the fort thundered, the basha went in gorgeous state to the _jama-el-kebeer_ (big mosque) on a white mule, all caparisoned in blue, and read aloud the letter, the city was uproarious, and the mountains echoed again, for soldiers were sent post-haste up the valleys, and fired all day at intervals to notify to the fathermost villages that rámadhan was over. and the next day! the first day of the _aid-el-sereer_ (little feast)! everybody was in shining white, if not new, apparel, and all tetuan was abroad. that among a people clad so largely in white and in gorgeous colours means a great deal, and the streets of tetuan might have competed with the park on the sunday before ascot. the moorish crowd was almost entirely a male one, dressed like peacocks: satins embroidered with gold and silver prevailed. and if the snowy haiks and turbans and the resplendent shades of the kaftans were the first point about the feast, the sweetmeat stalls were the second. a moor is a born sweet-tooth, and at every corner of the streets a board was stacked with creamy mixtures in which walnuts were embedded, with generously browned toffee full of almonds, with carmine-coloured sticks, with magenta squares of sweet peppermint, with blocks of nougat inches thick. and the joys of the feast seemed amply to compensate for the fast. mohammed ordained many minor feasts and fasts. rámadhan stands out chief of the one: _aid-el-kebeer_ (great feast), falling two months and six days afterwards, is chief of the other. the three reforms which mohammed instituted were temperance, cleanliness, and monotheism, at a time when reform was badly needed. he was born in mecca five hundred and seventy years after christ, an arab of the tribe of beni has`sim. christianity was not unknown around him in his day. always somewhat of a visionary and introspective turn of mind, when he was about forty years old he became deeply interested in the subject of religion. living in the imaginative east, in a hotbed of mysticism and superstition, it was easy for him to conceive himself a chosen vessel of the almighty, and to assume by degrees the rôle of prophet, in the honest belief that the words he uttered came direct from that god whose mouthpiece he conceived himself to be. a small band of followers by degrees collected round him, and in the ordinary course of events his end would have been that of a saint with a tombstone white; but, added to the saint's fanaticisms, mohammed possessed the talents of a leader, and the ambition which accompanies those talents. men and more men were attracted to him; he instituted among them a ceremonial of prayer, feasts, and fasts, and built a mosque at medina, in which they worshipped. persecution from their fellow-countrymen followed as a matter of course, and mohammed's disciples, who began to call themselves mohammedans, turned to him as their chief. the one "able man," he naturally assumed the position of a theocratic ruler, and led them against their enemies; while the words he spoke were committed to memory, constituting later on the kor[=a]n. as a general mohammed was successful: battle after battle was fought and won, reverses were amply compensated for, and men flocked to his standard, while deputations from surrounding tribes poured in upon him, acknowledging his supremacy, and asking for instruction in his creed. that creed was admirably adapted to suit the manners, opinions, and vices of the east: it was extraordinarily simple, it proposed but few truths in which belief was necessary, and it laid no severe restraints upon the natural desires of men; above all, its warlike tendencies captivated the men of its day, and war, which at first had been necessary in self-defence, was still carried on, and gradually came to be looked upon by mohammed and his followers as a lawful means towards spreading their religion. in the name of a _holy war_ the conquerors offered their defeated enemies the option of death or embracing the new religion, while the women and children taken in battle were sold as slaves, after the manner of the time. and the prophet's influence deepened and extended. meanwhile, his sayings, or "the kor[=a]n," were written down from time to time by one or other of his followers, on palm leaves, on stone tablets, on the shoulder-plates of goats and camels, and even tattooed on men's breasts; while his ritual was strictly carried out--prayer with absolution, frequent washing, fasting, almsgiving, the pilgrimage to mecca, and the recital of the formula "there is no god but god, and mohammed is his prophet." prayer was offered up five times a day, as now, by every true believer--at sunrise, at midday, at three in the afternoon, at sunset, and two hours after sunset: the _adzan_ (call to prayers) was chanted at each time by the mueddzin from the minarets of the mosques. the first thing in the morning at sunrise the call ran, "god is great; god is great. mohammed is his prophet. prayer is better than sleep. come to prayer; come to prayer." the believer, obeying the summons, washes, enters the mosque, and repeats from four to eight short prayers, with genuflections between each. mohammed strictly obeyed the forms of his doctrine, and himself performed the yearly pilgrimage to mecca and the ceremonies round the k[=a]aba. he was familiar with at least part of the gospels, but his knowledge was possibly scant and distorted: he was unfriendly towards christians. for the old testament he had a profound respect. as far as can be gathered he was a sober and meditative man: he sought neither state nor riches for himself, when either might have been his for the asking. he looked upon women from a point of view not unlike the characters in the old testament--a distinctly eastern one. he possessed five wives, and probably concubines--bondwomen in much the same position as hagar of old. mohammed instituted the veiling of women, with corresponding restrictions on domestic intercourse, as a check upon undue sexual licence--the curse of hot climates. there is no reason to believe that mohammed was not honest in the conviction that his mission was divine, and that, if he countenanced vindictive revenge, rapine, and lust as a means towards the furtherance of his teaching, he justified the act in his own mind by what he believed to be revelations from a spirit other than his own. a great character has perforce its great faults, and the courage and ambition which made so mighty a leader were naturally enough the rock upon which that leader split, blinding his eyes and distorting his point of view, leading him into compromise and error. but though self-deceived and fanatical, it is improbable that mohammed was insincere. by the spirit of his day he must be judged. his day believed in him. he died early in the seventh century, sixty-three years old, saying, "verily i have fulfilled my mission. i have left that amongst you, a plain command, the book of god, and manifest ordinances, which, if ye hold fast, ye shall never go astray." within two years of his death the mohammedan armies had overrun syria; egypt was in their possession, and the whole northern coast of africa. the scraps which contained in writing the sayings of the dead prophet were all collected by his chief amanuensis: his followers appointed three judges to overlook the work. the new collection was written in mohammed's own pure meccan dialect, and every spurious copy was burnt. so carefully was this done that there is but one and the same kor[=a]n throughout the vast mohammedan world. mohammedanism satisfied the east for two reasons: first, because it was a warlike religion, and therefore appealed to warlike tribes; secondly, because, deeply underlying it, was the strong, calm spirit of fatalism, that world-old foundation-stone on which many a man has come to anchor. the very word mussulman means, "one who has surrendered himself and his will to god." islam is the belief in one god, one prophet (mohammed), the immortality of the soul, the resurrection of the dead, the day of judgment, angels, a devil. there are no subtle intricacies in such a creed, no mysterious contradictions to puzzle the uneducated mind; it amply satisfies a simple people; and probably no other dogma makes so many converts. in morocco to-day the mohammedan religion is interwoven with the whole fabric of life. to the moor allah is always present, is behind every decree of the sultan, and enters into the smallest detail of his own private life to such a degree that barely a single action is performed without invoking the sacred name. religion is, according to the temper of the individual moor, "a passion, or a persuasion, or an excuse, but never a check": for a man may commit any sin under heaven, and "allah is merciful; mohammed is his prophet; all will be forgiven." and this is not hypocritical: the larger soul includes the smaller--that is all. it follows as a natural sequence that, because allah is as much part of a moor's life as the air he breathes, he is forgotten. the repetition of words bulks so largely in mohammedanism, that, as with the jews of old, the letter of the law has killed the spirit. the evil of mohammed's religion lies in its essential antagonism towards progress and civilization: scientific investigation is forbidden; a proverb runs, "only fools and the very young speak the truth." thus mohammedanism will never advance or regenerate morocco; for these tenets are government policy. at the same time there is in mohammedan society a certain negative virtue which contrasts strongly with the gross immorality existing in christian countries. the conditions of what is lawful for a mohammedan are wide enough to content, and extremes offer no temptation. polygamy, divorce, and slavery are all allowed, and war upon unbelievers is enjoined as a duty. and yet "social evils" and the lowest depths to which humanity falls are almost unknown in morocco; while what is held to be sin is rigorously punished--adultery by stoning (a father has no hesitation in shooting his daughter himself), robbery by mutilation, and so on. unlike many christian churches, a moorish mosque is never closed: the sanctuary is always open. it is council-chamber, meeting-place, and for travellers at night resting-place. there are no priests in the european sense; but the _basha_ (governor) or the _kadi_ (judge) reads prayers on fridays, a sermon follows, and letters or decrees from the sultan are given out in the mosque after service. the treatment of mohammedan women, against which so much has been written, is after all oriental, and nothing more. the kor[=a]n speaks of woman as an inferior being, an incomplete creation, needing no education, to be rigorously and jealously guarded all her life, and who after death may or may not be admitted into the mohammedan heaven. her function, if rich, is to bear children, and to be treated like a petted lap-dog: if poor, to work as a labourer. but interrogate the wife of a rich moor on the subject, and she will not have the slightest wish to educate herself, but will affirm emphatically, "we have children and enough to eat. why should we want to learn anything?" it is manifestly absurd to compare mohammedanism with christianity, which are each the outcome of a distinct race, divided by that greatest barrier--a racial gulf. christianity, it must be confessed, bearing in mind the christian renegades with whom the moor has traded, is looked upon by him for the most part as a thing beneath contempt. it had five hundred years, before mohammed was born, in which to impress itself on the east. it signally failed. and yet only a few years after mohammed's death his religion had taken by storm egypt, turkey, arabia, persia, turkestan, parts of india, the malay peninsula, the north coast of africa, and parts of china, introducing monotheism, and impressing temperance and cleanliness on uncivilized millions, but never advancing beyond that point. it is borne in upon one that, in spite of missionary effort, morocco will change its religion for that of christianity when, as its own proverb says, "the charcoal takes root and the salt buds." the east, when it adopts other tenets, will exchange its own for a wider and a more universal cult than that which modern sects and parties are endeavouring and failing to introduce to-day. while we were in our small quarters at the fonda, the weather by no means came up to the high standard it is said to reach in december. a few sunny days, when we could bask out of doors, were grudgingly sandwiched between many wet ones, and again and again the rámadhan sunrise gun awoke us to gouts of almost tropical rain, a fiery sunrise followed by an hour's brilliant sunshine, the herald of a shamelessly distorted april day. the little gutters down the middle of the streets ran like torrents, carrying off chickens' heads and cabbage-stalks; hail scoured the pebbles; outside the city "the dry land was over your boots"; the road to the sea was impassable, and the rivers between tangier and tetuan were unfordable; snow lay in patches on the mountains; half the vale was inundated; the river could be heard a mile away; both our windows leaked; and down in the little patio, where the family sat, the waters were out. [illustration: _photo by a. cavilla, tangier._] a typical moorish street. [_to face p. ._] from the west coast at saffi terrible reports arrived of the havoc the weather had made of the city. the lowest barometer ever seen had preceded sheets of rain, and a solid _hamla_ (flood) had entered the gates from the valley above, filling the narrow streets in a few moments to a depth of seven and eight feet, and carrying everything before it: men, women, children, and cattle were swept in a torrent through the water-gate out to sea, sometimes a hand stretched out above the eddies. then the gate became blocked with floating _debris_ and bodies, and the flood rose to ten feet in the principal street. the townspeople who survived took refuge on their roofs. the vice-governor was drowned. houses, shops, mills, and mosques were gutted as if by fire; furniture and household goods were ruined; the saffi shopkeepers were beggared. for many weeks after the survivors starved upon roots, in spite of a subscription raised in tangier to relieve them. the rain apparently was something like a waterspout. happily tetuan was exempt from waterspouts, and on days when the rain gave over for a time we rode, or, picking our way along the muddy streets, drank tea with some moor. one dull afternoon we sampled the state of the roads outside, r. on a donkey, and mr. bewicke and myself on foot. walking out by the gate of the tombs, we bore to the left, and dived into the narrowest of narrow lanes, shut in with tall cane fences and high mud-banks crowned with prickly pear, the shape of whose fat, fleshy leaves recalls moles' paws. the donkey was an unusually large one, and its pack rolled more than packs in general: before we saw the last of tetuan its rider had many a fall off her unsteady perch; and if there is truth in the moorish saying that "one does not become a horseman till one is broken," r. may claim to have qualified. it shied and bucked and came on its nose over rocks; but this time mr. bewicke's boy, mohr, directed its ways, and thoroughly enjoyed cudgelling it along with a stick, helped by its rider's switch, cut from a quince-tree, which often as not hit mohr instead of the ass. by-and-by we met a countryman, his wife, and a donkey. the woman, who wore little except two striped towels, and a handkerchief round her head, staggered along under a great load of faggots. she was stunted and wrinkled, removed mentally but few degrees from the three-year-old weather-beaten donkey which minced along in front of her, also loaded with faggots. the woman had strips of rough leather bandaged round her legs to protect them from thorns. her feet were bare. her husband sauntered last of all, presumably looking after the donkey: he had no load. another time the donkey also might be exempt, while the woman was still burdened; and the man, when asked why, if he would not carry the load himself, he did not at least put it upon the donkey, would reply, "because it is too heavy for the ass." a little farther on and a magnificent riffi passed us, walking along at a smart pace into the city, his face "old oak" colour, framed in a turban of dark red-brown strings of wool. he wore a chocolate-coloured jellab, embroidered at the edge with white, and sewn with tufts of red, violet, yellow, and green-coloured silks: a tall, wiry fellow, with a back like a ram-rod, a thin face, and keen, defiant eyes. the light glittered on his long, brass-plated riffi gun: a red leather pouch full of bullets hung at his side. he was a great contrast to the labourer who passed us afterwards, also bound for the city--an old and grizzled monkey-faced man, with his head tied round with a ragged red cloth gun-case. his jellab hung in tatters, but he also carried a gun, and by a string a brace of partridges and a wild duck, which "bag," after some bargaining, became ours for the sum of one-and-sixpence. among the brown jellabs and varied turbans european clothes were forcibly out of their place: a people like the moors, childlike, patriarchal, whose lives embody one of the oldest and perhaps best ideas of a simple existence, may well hate the sight, on the face of their select country, of prosaic tailoring and hideous head-gear. the traveller in his boots, where boots are things unknown, passes the muffled women with their silent gait, the picturesque ruffians with their swinging stride, and is unable to help feeling not at home and something of a blot on the landscape. the lane we wandered up had been, and was still in places, a watercourse, and we struggled along the steep chasms gouged out of the soft soil, and clambered over rocks which had withstood the torrent. by-and-by a red door intervened on our left, fitted into an imposing whitewashed arched gateway, with a mounting-block on each side, and the great brass ring-shaped knocker in the middle of the door which the moors have left all over spain--the garden-house of the french consul. in another four months, when all aristocratic tetuan would migrate in a body into their "summer-houses," and by their mutual presence reassure each other as to their safety, the consul would move out of the city: at present he would look on such a step as sheer madness. an old negro slave, with a beard like cotton-wool, was at work in the garden, and, opening the door, let us in to look round. a wide gravel path led up to the dazzling walls of the house, spotless as a sheet of glazed cream-laid note-paper, the window-frames and door picked out with reckitt's blue. a white railing in front edged the terrace, the steps of which were tanned by the damp salt air a fine rusty ochre. the house inside was built on the invariable moorish lines--kitchen and inferior rooms on the ground floor, one great lofty room above, and the flat roof over all. a garden-room flanked the house on the south-east, the front open to the garden, pillared and arched with the old white plastered "horse-shoe." in underneath the arches were shade and cool tiling, and outside more tiled ground suggested steaming brews of fragrant green tea, tiny glasses, low tables, and long divans spread under the sky. it was a grey day, and height beyond height on into the riff country was cloud-capped, while _shar d'jebel_ (the hair of the mountain, as the moors call snow) whitened a few furrowed peaks. the flats lay below to the left, and a horizontal blue pencil line was scored beyond them. cow-birds stalked about the garden among some new vines which the old negro was putting in. we sat down on the terrace, looking at the view, and the silence of the place was above all things most striking. a cavalcade of mules tailed away in the distance in single file along the faint track to the sea; the packed white city lay to the right, but no voices reached us; here cart-wheels, railway-trains, threshing-machines, and busy farm life were not. it would have been hard to age and wrinkle in such a spot--adam and eve might have felt at home. it was also a weedy one, this paradise: a tangle of greenery spread underneath the oranges, hanging like yellow trimming on a green fabric, choking the vines and a few scarlet geraniums. labour, in such indolent and self-possessed acres, was a crude and gauche idea. the greybeard with the marmoset face and leathern apron let us out at the red door: he had a history. his master, a prosperous moor, once offered to free him: the old slave refused the offer, on the score that he was quite content as he was. however, his master urged him to accept, and he was eventually given his freedom. but later on the master lost all his money, and ruin was before him. his old slave came back. "see here, my master; here am i. take me; sell me"; and he finally persuaded the man to sell him. he seemed contented enough as the property of the french consul, who is a moor. we passed a party of closely veiled women, as we strolled citywards, taking advantage of a break in the wet weather to visit their gardens, carrying a great key, and accompanied by two or three ink-black slaves, fine upstanding women, well fed and clothed, looking good-tempered to a fault, whose children, by the same husband and master, would rank equally with those of the wives. mohammedan women, though veiled and supervised, have at least their gardens to saunter out to and visit when the tracks allow. jewesses in morocco deserve infinitely more pity. their one recreation seemed to consist in walking as far as the jewish cemetery, ten minutes outside the gate of the tombs, and attending to the gravestones of their friends. the cemetery is gradually absorbing one side of a rough red-earthed hill; it has no fence of any description round it, and the flat pale-blue and white tombstones spread over the ground look in the distance like so much washing out to dry. the stones are all alike, oblong lozenges, inscribed in hebrew. here, especially on fridays, the women's day, jewesses congregate, flocking along the cemetery road--the mourners in ponderous black skirts, vast breadths of crimson silk let into the fronts and embroidered with gold, white shawls over head and forehead, a yellow sash-end edged with red appearing behind, and completing their mourning. some of the shawls are family heirlooms, and only parted with for five-pound notes. loud checks and gaudy colours adorn the rahels, donahs, zulicas, and miriams not in mourning, as well as the white shawls; and the procession troops to the cemetery, sallow, sad-eyed daughters of jacob, talking a mixture of arabic and spanish, with a few english and shillah words thrown in. of all life's unfortunates, the jew in morocco was once, next to the negro in the west indies, the most persecuted and degraded of god's creatures. in tangier and the seaport towns, where the christian representatives countenance and support him, the jew, subject to certain restrictions, is in the present day a flourishing member of the community; but in the interior his fate is still a hard one. there is a jewish tradition that when shalmaneser, king of assyria, conquered the israelites, the tribe of naphthali took refuge in the interior of africa, and spread to morocco. jewish tombstones are certainly to be found dating as far back as twelve hundred years, and one synagogue possesses fragments of the old testament written on parchment, while there is a population of from four to five thousand jews in the atlas mountains who have lived there since time immemorial. perhaps the wandering jew merely drifted into morocco just as he drifts all over the universe, and he would have taken refuge in north africa more particularly when spanish persecution became intolerable. once in morocco, the moors permitted the jews to remain because they were useful to them; but upon certain conditions. they are confined to a certain quarter of the city--the jews' quarter, the ghetto in fact--which is shut and locked by a gate at sunset, barring them from the outer world. in their own quarter they may do as they like, except ride a horse; the horse is considered too noble an animal to be ridden by the jew: outside they may not ride at all, not even a mule, but are obliged to trudge barefoot through the slush of the rest of the city, summer and winter. they are compelled to wear one costume--a long black gabardine and a black skull-cap. few jewesses care to leave their quarters by themselves, for fear of insult. no synagogues or public places of worship are allowed them, and they must address moors as _sidi_, or "my lord." but these customs are fast dying out. there is one which universally obtains: the jews' quarter is known as the _mellah_; mellah means "salt" in arabic,--the jews are compelled to salt the heads of conquered tribes killed in battle, and of criminals, which are afterwards nailed on the city walls as trophies and warnings. in tetuan the jews are influential and well treated: many of them wear european clothes. on saturday--the jewish sabbath--a young masher (a mordejai, or baruch, or isaac) would boast a pair of brand-new yellow shoes and white socks, but wear at the same time a dove-coloured gabardine down to his heels and a mauve sash round his waist. claret-coloured gabardines were fashionable, and a black skull-cap inevitable. though tetuan was lax and liberal in its treatment of the israelites, wealthy families of whom it possessed, the mellah was at once the noisiest and filthiest quarter of the city, teeming with children (unlike the moorish quarters, where there are few), who played and fought, laughed and cried, by fifties down the three principal arteries of the quarter, whose few feet of walking-space were lined with small and dirty greengrocers' and butchers' shops, their stock-in-trade encrusted with flies. on hot days the mellah stank; on wet it was deep in black slime. once upon a time it ran close to the jama-el-kebeer; and when a hundred years ago the sultan who had built the big mosque sent his envoy to examine it, all was approved of except the proximity of the jews' quarter. "can a mosque be admired near jews?" was speedily answered by the tetuanites, who turned the israelites neck and crop out of house and home, giving them another piece of ground walled in and sufficiently removed. the sons of abraham are only tolerated all the world over. as a nation, moors loathe them. to a pig, which they count "unclean," they give the epithet of _jew_: out pig-sticking, when the pig breaks, the beaters shout, "the jew! the jew!" to begin with, having forced his presence on an unwilling people, the jew retains his own exclusiveness, neither marries a moor nor eats with a moor, nor treats him as anything else except unclean. not only this, but by unscrupulous cunning jews contrive to exercise a maddening oppression over a people with whom they have chosen to cast in their lot, swindling, extorting money, and playing a hundred low tricks upon the very race on the produce of whose labour they live: at the same time their exasperating patience and cringing humility, court contempt and insult. [illustration: _photo by a. cavilla, tangier._] a street in the jews' quarter, tetuan. [_to face p. ._] the poorest moor in tetuan is a gentleman: the richest jew is not. but he has his good points: a great sense of brotherhood, a strong bond of freemasonry among the jewish nation, undaunted energy, and an unshaken faith in their religion are all admirable points in themselves. energy in tetuan was concentrated in the mellah. the best workmen were all jews. a hundred things were sold by them which no moor made. thus in their ghetto live the chosen people, the separate people, of strange and ancient customs,--leaving the hair uncut for a year after a relative's death, sitting on the floor, and not on a chair, for a week after; twisting a pocket-handkerchief round the waist on the sabbath in order to save "the work" of carrying it; slitting the button-hole of the waistcoat in time of distress instead of "rending the garment"; eating _adafina_ on the sabbath, an indigestible dish of hard-boiled eggs, meat, and potatoes prepared overnight and left on the fire till next morning. there is no end to ceremonials throughout a jew's life: the first at his circumcision, the next when his hair is cut for the first time, the next when he goes to the synagogue for the first time, and so on. when a jew was buried in tetuan, the uncoffined body, wrapped in sheets on a wooden bier, might only be borne out of the city by the _báb-el-je'f_, literally the gate of the unclean dead--that is, the jews' gate. the mourners howled and the male relatives cried aloud; friends followed, talking and smoking cigarettes. it happened sometimes that the grave was not ready when the cortège reached the cemetery, and that the party would sit down on the hillside while it was lengthened and deepened; from time to time the body would be measured with a walking-stick, and the result compared with the grave. it is impossible to write about the jews and omit one certain point. before the traveller has lived a week in morocco he begins to hear of _protection_, and he carries with him vague words--"protected jews" and "protected moors"--which one sentence can explain. _protection_ means that a european living in morocco, a portuguese, a frenchman, an englishman--it matters not--has it in his power to make the jew or the moor desiring protection a nominal citizen of that country, portugal or france or what not, and can allow him the rights of a citizen and the protection of the same; while it follows that the sultan and the moorish government have no more power to touch him than they have to touch a french or an english subject, the protected jew or moor being outside their jurisdiction, and only answerable to the consul of that country which has given him protection, whether germany, france, or any other. the advantage of protection is to guarantee thereby the safety of property. it was instituted a hundred years and more ago, to obviate the difficulties and dangers incurred by europeans in trading with jews and moors in a country so badly governed as morocco. supposing that a european went into partnership and traded with a jew or a moor who was unprotected, in course of time, when the jew or moor became rich, the moorish government would hear of it, and set to work systematically to bleed him. naturally the european partner would lose money in the general robbery. therefore _protection_. there is scarcely a jew of property in morocco who is not protected, and there are hundreds and hundreds of protected moors; but though many moors have enjoyed security for themselves and their belongings by this means, others less fortunate, more especially some years ago, have only escaped the talons of moorish despotism to fall into the clutches of european swindlers, adventurers who have dared--themselves somewhat beyond the reach of their own home government--to fleece the unsuspecting mohammedan, bribing some basha to imprison him for the rest of his days. a european consul has before now "sold" his moorish protected partner--that is, he tells him that, if he does not produce so much money within a certain time, protection will be withdrawn. the wiser course for the moor is to pay the sum. if protection is withdrawn, the moorish government and the european blackleg will divide his worldly goods between them. such risks are minimized every year, and protection is greatly sought after by moors and jews. from the french they get it easily enough. the system is a bad one: that it prevails at all is a proof of the corruption of the moorish government. chapter v plans for christmas at gibraltar--a rough night--the steamer which would not wait--an ignominious return to tetuan--a rascally jew--the aborigines and the present occupants of morocco--the sultan, court, government, and moorish army. chapter v why curse? _mektub._ (it is written.) in spite of the attentions of amanda, as december drew on and the weather showed no signs of clearing, we began to hanker after a week at gibraltar, which should combine christmas and the purchase of camp outfit for use when the rains passed over. it was not difficult to tear ourselves away from the fonda; for it became less easy to tolerate the proximity of the old spanish band-master, with his bad tobacco and long-winded stories; nor were our landlady and family over-refined. we had not come to morocco to live amongst the scum of spain: could tetuan be swept clean of the spanish element, it were better for it. in fine, amusing and even interesting though our quarters had been for the time, circumstances pointed towards a move into others, the interval being spent in a run across to gibraltar. the steamers which call at martine, down on the seashore, and bring goods to be carted up to tetuan, six miles inland, are as mysterious as they are rare. one is supposed to call on alternate tuesdays, weather permitting; another occasionally calls in the intervening weeks; none come direct from gibraltar, though all are supposed to go straight back there after touching at ceuta. but there are many buts. worst of all, the river at martine has formed a bar, and martine is a "bar port": this prevents landing in a strong wind. we pinned our faith upon the tuesday boat, not realizing its uncertainty; for if the boat had not enough cargo on board to make it worth while her calling, or if she had too much and time was short, or if the weather was bad, she had no hesitation in missing martine and tetuan out of that fortnight's round altogether. we did not want to ride forty-four miles to tangier with the "roads" in the state they were, even if it had been practicable; nor almost as far and a worse track to ceuta: either would have meant sleeping a night in the fondâk up in the hills, or in a spanish lodging-house of doubtful repute: therefore we planned to go by boat from martine, engaged rooms for a week in gibraltar beforehand, and, with the optimism born of ignorance, doubted not but that we should get away on the steamer. packing up overnight and breakfasting at eight, we were soon ready to mount our mules and ride down to the shore to catch our boat. it was a matter of two and a half hours from tetuan down to martine: the track need not be described--this speaks for itself. our luggage, tied with complicated rope-knots, was judiciously balanced upon one mule, and we had said good-bye to amanda and family when a message arrived from the steamships agency to say that the steamer was not in. after taking counsel, however, the luggage was dispatched down to martine; a muleteer badly marked with small-pox climbed on the top of our worldly goods, and the mule jogged off: we would follow when the steamer was sighted. [illustration: refuse going out of tetuan. [_to face p. ._] walking into the feddan in search of information about her, every moor or jew only replied with shrugged shoulders and extended palms. who could tell? she might come in at eleven, she might not. "ift shallah" (allah will show). as she had two hundred and forty tons of cargo to unload, the agents thought she might stay till the following day before starting for gibraltar: on the other hand, the previous night had been a rough one, and it was quite possible she had passed martine altogether, and did not intend to call for another fortnight. it was a sunny morning: there was nothing to be said but "mektub" (it is written), and nothing to be done except sit in the sun and await events, after the fashion of the brown figures in jellabs also sitting in the sun against the south wall of the feddan where it is highest and nearly always dusty. wandering up and down, spaniards were to be seen in one café shuffling filthy cards and drinking spirits, while in another, behind a great vine which held in its arms a rustic trellis porch and seats, moors lay on their elbows, tumblers of tea swimming in mint in front of them and long kif-pipes. a riffi sat on a stool in the sun, leaning against the vine, nursing his gun; his single long black lock fell down by his ear, glossy and tied in a knot at the end. next door a gunsmith was at work in his little shop sand-papering a gun-stock: a sheep was penned inside against the great feast, and more sheep in the grocer's beyond. on the opposite side of the great square a jew was selling enamel ware to one of the five lady missionaries. then meat came hurrying by, just killed outside the mulberry gate and still warm. red-and-white shapeless carcases were balanced on a donkey's back, kept steady by a sanguinary moor who sloped along behind: the donkey knew its own way well, across the wide feddan, down a narrow street, and into the meat market. thither hurried the lady missionary to buy a joint. if cooked before it has time to get cold the meat is tender, otherwise it must be hung. it did not seem long before the bell on the top of the spanish consulate rang out twelve o'clock. there was no sign of any steamer--the steamships agent had given her up; and not wishing our luggage to lie on the beach all night--for gumption was not one of the characteristics written on our pock-marked boy's face--we sent a messenger off on the two hours and a half ride down to martine to summon him back. about one o'clock, just as we were sitting down to lunch in mr. bewicke's room, the news arrived that the steamer was signalled. all doubt was at an end: we lunched complacently, allowed time for coffee and a button-hole out of the garden, mounted the mules, mr. bewicke his white pony; the gardener, madunnah, following behind on foot, carrying our sticks and umbrellas, which burden was increased half-way through the city by a bracket, but lately coloured in garish tones, vermilion prevailing--it bled somewhat, but was to serve as a christmas present at gibraltar. over the cobbles, under the gate of wisdom, out on to the sandy track, and along the sea road we rode, the mules refusing at first to pass some sacks of grain which lay in the middle of the path waiting to go down to the beach. there is a gate tax on every loaded animal which passes under the gate of wisdom, to avoid which the sacks are carried just out of the city on men's backs, set down, and picked up in time by mules. the first mile or so was not worse going than usual. coming from the right by a trail which led across the river, a string of women bore towards us, bringing wood into the city from villages miles away--scrub off the mountain-side. their rough heads were bound round with weather-stained coloured handkerchiefs: listless eyes looked straight out from under lined foreheads. on each side of their doubled-up backs protruded rough wood-ends--these kept in place by a rope over the shoulder, grasped in knotted hands above copper-coloured muscular arms. the bit of towelling round the loins, brushed by the wind, left bare a species of knees and legs, carved by two thousand years of toil into humanized norman piers, buttressed with muscle, in which ankles have no lot nor part, which have carried and still carry unreasonable loads from childhood to the grave. these women walked in single file, as do the mules and donkeys. and this is partly due to the space which the wide bundles take up on each side, partly to bad paths, and partly to entire lack of initiative. why should they strike out a line of their own, these "cattle" and "beasts of burden," as they call themselves? the old way comes easier. thus life has moved across morocco, without deviation, down immeasurable years, and moves so to-day, along innumerable trails worn afresh by bare feet after every rain-storm, footprint into footprint, padded hard and smooth, narrow and polished. the flats, after so much wet weather, were under water, and the lower down the road dropped, the deeper the country grew. our mules struggled along at a slow walk, and we constantly diverged off the track, circling to this side or the other whenever a field looked an improvement upon our muddy quagmire, generally to find that it was very little better and sometimes worse. about half-way we met our luggage and messenger. the pock-marked boy had taken our effects to the shore, had found no steamer, waited a short time, then calculated that he would be late getting back to the city, and ran risks of robbers, to say nothing of _ginns_ (spirits) lurking in the wells by the road, so turned his face homewards. we were in total ignorance, and so of course was he, all this time as to the movements of the steamer: once out of the city, the level of the road is such that nothing can be seen of the sea until a couple of hours' riding, lands people right on the beach itself. with every hope that she still lay at anchor, we turned our "pock-mark" round, and the poor mule faced the bad road down to martine for the second time that day. madunnah handed over the bracket to crown our baggage, and plodded bravely on, often well up to his bare knees in mud and water. a brace of duck forged across the sky above our heads; some plover called and called again mournfully, wheeling above the irresponsive marshes and brown fallows; a string of mules moved like mites over a cheese in the sandy distance. we passed the wad-el-martine in heavy flood, its yellow yeasty depths swirling between the soft red banks. at last a couple of stone bridges came into sight, isolated in a waste of water, remnants of the old portuguese road, and in normal times affording a dry path over two dykes. we plunged through unseen holes and among stony pitfalls up to the lonely landmarks and dry ground for a few yards; then more floods; but after that the last mile or two became easy enough, the land rose, and dry sandy dunes, with tough bents flattened in the wind, conduced towards a jog, almost a canter. goats, picking up a bare living, scattered as we hurried along, past the white customs house and an old wharf on the river, away to the beach. behind us the mountains were black and purple, heavy rain-clouds were gathering, and directly we topped the crest of the sandy shore a strong east wind met us full in the teeth straight off the sea. but there as large as life lay the steamer, a long way out, on account of the bar and the wind, with a choppy sea running between. a cargo-boat was vainly trying to cross the bar, towed by a long green boat which six moors were rowing. she made no headway, shipped water which deluged the cargo, and seemed half aground on the bar. no other boat or boatmen seemed to be available: the steamer was not within hail. certainly there were three more cargo-boats lying in shelter in a corner of the river-estuary a little way off the land, but some men in one of them seemed half asleep--at any rate, they were out of our reach, and deaf to our shouts and gesticulations to the effect that we wanted to be rowed on board the steamer. we waited and waited; madunnah yelled himself hoarse; but the cargo-boat still rolled on the bar, lashed by the waves, and the men still strained at their oars and paid no heed to our cries. twice we thought they meant coming to our signals, but each time they were only trying fresh manoeuvres. rain came on, a sharp easterly scud; the pock-marked boy drew his jellab over his head; the mules turned their backs to the squall; but madunnah still stood at the edge of the waves, gesticulating wildly with our sticks and umbrellas at the impassive rowers. sunset was upon us. at a fire of driftwood on the beach a short distance off r. and i tried to warm ourselves. suddenly the long green boat left the cargo and pulled towards us: the sea was rising, and looked anything but encouraging; breakers were showing their white teeth on the bar; but the green boat drew nearer and came in at last, or nearly so--for she stopped short off the shore, and, half aground, lost her rudder. still none of the crew paid the faintest attention as we hailed them in arabic, english, and spanish across the few yards of water which put them just out of our reach. they had something else to do except attend to three mad britishers--let them rave. the cargo-boat, deserted by the long green boat, had stuck worse than ever: darkness was coming on, and she was in a bad case. the men in the "long green" roused the half-sleeping moors in the companion boat, and it was evident that both meant going out together to tow the belated cargo in. our voices carried less as the wind rose, and it was evident even to madunnah that words were wasted. the rain drove in torrents; it was bitterly cold, and growing darker every moment; as the two boats turned their heads towards the wave-swept cargo we realized that it was night, that all chance of getting on board was at an end for that day at least, and we set our backs to the sea. there still remained one alternative and a last chance of getting to gibraltar for christmas day: the steamer might not leave till the following morning, and, taking shelter for the night in the customs house on the beach, we ought to be able to get on board at daybreak. we turned off to the left through blinding gushes of rain, and headed for this refuge. [illustration: a moorish prison gate. [_to face p. ._] the customs house was much like a caravanserai: an open space in the middle was enclosed by sheds for mules and asses; a rough stair led to the living-rooms, above the sheds, which opened on to a flat white roof. we stumbled up on to the roof; then in under a low doorway into a little wooden lean-to, where an old jew caretaker was living. the rest of the place was given over to a family of israelites, who had come down to "the seaside" from tetuan for change of air. much to our relief, the old jew caretaker assured us that the steamer would be landing cargo till noon on the following day: he offered us everything he had in his power for that night, and promised to see us off in a boat the next day. committing us to his care, mr. bewicke left us and rode back to tetuan with the mules and madunnah; our baggage was stowed away under shelter; and the old jew, finding a light and improvising two seats out of boxes and matting, sat us down at his little table, with a bit of frayed linoleum on it and a glass. the roof leaked and the rain beat on to the linoleum, but we were in snug quarters after the beach, and our friendly host began boiling up a great black kettle in a tiny inner room, assisted by a moor. he was very rheumatic, the old man, also very deaf, and martine must have been a damp spot for him (the river and marshes close at hand, and east or west wind, both of them heavy with moisture--nothing would dry, hung out in the air at tetuan); nor were his quarters rain-proof. he hobbled backwards and forwards, muffled up in a worn grey handkerchief, with a fortnight's white stubble on his chin, and an aged greenish overcoat down to his slippers. from the recesses of a bunk in the next shelter, where he slept, he produced some pink china cups; then returned with a plate of bread, hardened to the consistency of biscuit, and smelling strongly of aniseed. after that he made tea in a little brown earthenware teapot--sweet green tea with mint--and we soon thawed under a succession of cups. still he stumbled about, hunting out of a cupboard a small basket of eggs, and in the next room a great stirring and beating-up followed. by-and-by the moor who had been assisting him appeared with an omelette; it was dark brown, mixed thick with aniseed, chopped ham, and parsley; nor was it easy to dispose of it. our kind host ended up by pressing gin on us. warmed and fed, but unfortunately unable to sustain a conversation with him either in arabic or spanish, and having exhausted the few words at our command, the next best thing was to make ourselves comfortable for the night. lighting a candle, the old jew paddled across the wet roof, and we followed him, dimly distinguishing beasts feeding in the stalls down below, to a small room on the far side, where some sort of preparation had been made for us: a rug was spread on the stone floor, and a bedstead had a blanket laid upon it, while our baggage was piled in a corner. putting on overcoats and rugs, we sat down on one of our trunks--it is unwise to place confidence in unknown beds in morocco; but when, driven by sheer weariness, we lay down as we were on the blanket, we slept unmolested. a jew on the other side of a thin partition which did not reach the ceiling, snored heavily and awoke us at intervals. about six next morning, what sounded very like the steamer's whistle blew repeatedly, but we paid little attention to it, the old jew and mr. bewicke having both assured us the boat would leave about twelve o'clock. morning had dawned when we burst open the wooden shutters of a little window much swelled with damp, and looked out across the sand-dunes at the sea. there lay the black hull of the steamer at anchor: the wind of the night before had dropped; a flaring sunrise and stormy sky lowered behind the riff mountains, which were black. dressing was short work. the moor handed us in at the door a tin basin of water, and in a short time we were ready for the next move. at that point r. craned up to look out of the high window. when she spoke, i could hardly believe her words. . . . _the steamer had weighed anchor and was moving._ there was no mistaking it: the black hull had swung round, and was making for the open sea, with a flag of smoke trailing behind her; and away she went to gibraltar. we rushed out upon the flat roof and up a rotten ladder minus three rungs--all unheeding--which gave access to the roof above our room, gaining nothing thereby except a panoramic view, with the departing boat in the middle distance. already she stood well out to sea: the customs house was a quarter of a mile from the beach: there was nothing to be done: to blame our kind old host would have been as ungrateful as it was useless, and regrets were equally unavailing. true it is that the wise man fends for himself and makes no arrangements second-hand in morocco, where every one is _casual_ and every plan is _casual_. had we found out when the ship's papers were going on board, and arranged with the agent to call us and take us in his boat, we should have eaten plum pudding in gibraltar. apparently the steamer had been signalling for the last hour to the effect that she was going, that the weather was bad and the sea rough outside, and that she would not venture to stay and dispatch her cargo--none of which facts the deaf and decrepit old jew had grasped. he hobbled out, and would hardly believe his eyes. we sat down to some weak green tea and the same dry aniseed-flavoured bread as the night before, and, thus fortified, reviewed our course of action, which had few complications, there being no other steamer before christmas, and the ride to ceuta or tangier barred by reason of the flooded streams and general state of the country. the "open road" pointed towards tetuan and our old quarters in the spanish fonda, of which we had taken only the day before such joyful leave. it was inevitable, that next move; and should be made quickly, to judge by the look of the weather--the clouds were growing lower and blacker every half-hour. animals were a difficulty--our mules had gone back to the city the night before; but it would have been hard work wading across the flooded acres for seven miles; and there was our luggage. eventually we raised a seedy little rat of a pony, which r. rode; a ragged donkey, on which half our goods was balanced; while the other half went on a mule, with me on the top of all. we turned our backs on the hospitable white customs house and the ill-favoured sea with a muttered imprecation. in tetuan a wealthy man was building a house. it was at a standstill for want of plaster. the plaster had already come in on the steamer _three_ times, and three times she had gone away without unloading it. the boat we had lost had made a fourth endeavour, and we learnt afterwards that mr. n----'s ill-fated plaster had formed the cargo in the wave-washed boat of the evening before. wet through, it set as hard as a stone in the sacks, and was useless: it lay like rocks on the beach. the bar at martine has been tolerated for unknown ages: there is no reason to think that the moor will rouse himself into making an effort and trying to facilitate the landing of passengers and cargo. we left upon our right as we rode along, some hundreds of yards from the sea, the remains of what years upon years ago was a fort, built somewhat as forts will be built in the near future--with a view to concealment. the outside wall facing the mediterranean was crescent-shaped, and but four feet high at most, the sand sloping up nearly to the top, and overgrown with vegetation, so that little or no fort showed at all. there were a few loop-holes, through which men could shoot from the inside lying down; there was a well in the centre of the fort, and a small bomb-proof building, with an arched roof many feet thick, where powder had been kept. a primitive construction, this harmless-looking little crescent facing the sea--once upon a time bristling with dare-devil moors and their long guns. half-way to tetuan we passed _the_ cart, the first and last i saw in the place: its antediluvian body was set on two demented wheels, which rolled out of the upright like a tipsy sailor. the cart was government property: five mules of different sizes, drew it up in a string from the sea to the city, through the quagmire, laden with flour and kerosene oil and stores of all descriptions, a couple of moors toiling alongside. r.'s "rat" was not too surefooted, and some of the floods were deep: once it came on its nose, but a second time sat down in a hole in the middle of a sheet of water, leaving nothing for its rider but to slip off and wade out, walking afterwards wherever the track allowed, to raise a little circulation underneath drenched clothes. a certain melancholy possessed the flats as well as our vexed selves that stormy and ill-fortuned morning. in places the tops of the grass-blades alone showed in a green watery waste, except where tall dark rushes made a heavier mass, or where the tufts of red-brown tangle lay in warm lines. the sea behind us was an angry purple; the riff mountains were steel-blue; the nearer hills now black, now gold in fitful sun-gleams, now crossed by a rainbow. only in the north there was a great break, and a light like brass, behind ape's hill. tradition has it that a subterranean passage leads thence underneath the straits to the rock of gibraltar, and is used by the monkeys as a means of transit from africa to europe. our miserable beasts were several hours toiling up to tetuan: the rain came on, and with the wind straight off the snows it was as cold a ride as i remember. the next morning we went to the french steamship company's office for the purpose of recovering our passage money from the agent, who had insisted upon our buying tickets beforehand. this fat, greasy tangier jew, of no chin, and flabby, suet-pudding face, flatly refused in plausible french to return us our cash, gesticulating, contradicting himself, pretending to misunderstand us, all in the same breath, and needing nothing so much as a good kicking. since the money would only go into his own pocket, we fought the point, and, after being most insolent, he was obliged to promise that if the french consular agent in tetuan judged it right, he would hand over the money. to the french consular agent we went: a moor, whose office was in the french post office--a solemn, dignified man in a flowing blue jellab, over the same in white, both hoods drawn up over his head, showing a long olive face of the true arab type, black eyes, black beard and moustache. he wore white socks and yellow slippers--a most courteous individual. on hearing our case, he simply sent for the steamships company agent, and told him to hand over the money. we sat and waited with mr. bewicke, who was interpreting for us. presently a step, and, much out of breath, the plausible jew himself arrived, in a long great coat and billy-cock. he took a seat, and stated his case in arabic to the french consular agent. there could have been no greater contrast than between the vulgar excited israelite and the stately mohammedan. the moor sat with folded arms: occasionally he raised one hand to emphasize a quiet monosyllable. but alas for the steadfastness of his race! perhaps he disliked being mixed up in the matter. at any rate, having said that the money was to be refunded, he allowed the jew to argue the point, and, we gathered, was telling him finally that the whole question had better be referred to the company itself--a dim and visionary steamships company on the other side of the mediterranean: it augured badly for us. but at this point r. spoke in french, and reminded the jew that he had promised to refund the money if the french consul so judged, that the consul had given judgment, and that if the jew still refused he was no longer a man of his word. strange to say, this quickened a dormant conscience underneath all the dishonesty, or it pricked the jew's pride; at any rate, after a torrent of protestations, from his tight waistcoat-pocket he produced a pile of dollars, and handed them over to us. the money had taken an hour to draw: as far as actual value went it was not worth it. the french consular agent, the dignified moor, had to all intents and purposes failed us at the critical moment, since he would not exert his lawful authority over a french-protected jew. but a moor's faults may be summed up in one word--_weak_. as in the above instance, refusing to face circumstances or to follow one definite line of action to the end, he invariably acts on the principle of "going roundabout." in the course of time evasion has come to appear to him the best line to pursue, and he has sunk like a stone into a slough of compromise, a tarn of apathy. such weakness, incompatible with moorish fanaticism and courage, is due probably to tyranny. living under a tyrannical government and religion, both of which, welded together, form the one dominant factor of his life, the moor is afraid of each, and stands in dread of the ruin it is in their power to work in his life. not only this, but he lives in fear of his countrymen and their long guns, of his wives and their poisons, of evil spirits. morocco, as has been said, accepted mohammedanism of necessity, not from choice, at the hands of the conquering arabs, and it is accepted to-day, as the corrupt government is accepted, with a shrug of the shoulders and "what god wills cannot but be." weakened by blind submission, and at the same time holding nothing for which they have fought or wrought--no truths made adamant in the furnace of persecution, no magna charta won on the sword-point of patriotism, all of which are so much tonic and discipline to a nation, breeding grit, developing backbone--the moorish people are paralyzed by a despotism which allows no originality of thought and action; they are no longer capable of "running straight," but, suave and polite to a fault, lack that species of courage which conduces towards plain-speaking. after all, who and what are to blame except the people themselves? one writer curses the religion, another curses the government. _cui bono?_ climate and the fertility of soil may have influenced the races called moorish, but the moor himself is alone responsible for his government and his religion. [illustration: _photo by a. cavilla, tangier._] a peep of tetuan. [_to face p. ._] historians from time to time have had something to say about these tribes, and tradition boasts a legion tales respecting them; but the most able writer upon morocco in old times was leo africanus, a moor himself, who, when all his countrymen were expelled from spain in , fled to fez. twenty-five years later he was captured by christian pirates and taken to rome. he became a christian, and he published his great and reliable history about the time that henry viii. was successful in flanders and scotland, when wolsey obtained a cardinal's hat, and catherine of arragon had not been ousted by anne boleyn. the aborigines of morocco were without doubt berbers, and to-day berbers occupy four-fifths of the country, in spite of the invasions of other nations. first on the list of the invaders came the phoenicians, the earliest civilizing agency. the romans followed eighty years after cæsar had landed in britain, and annexed morocco, christianizing its people. next to invade the country were the vandals, who turned out the romans, remained among the berbers for over a hundred years, leaving red hair and blue eyes behind them. then six hundred and ninety-eight years after the birth of christ the deluge of mohammedan conquest burst over morocco, and hordes of arabs, burning with a fanatical missionary spirit, swept over the land. at the end of eleven years the resistance of the berbers was overcome, and they adopted mohammedanism as lightly as they had adopted christianity under the roman rule. about two years afterwards a body of them crossed over into spain under the one-eyed chieftain tarik, and laid the foundation of the moorish supremacy in europe. thither this band of pioneer berbers was followed by the arabs: the two races mingled and built up together an empire in spain said to surpass all its contemporaries in learning and refinement. the spanish named them indiscriminately _mauros_, and _moors_ they have been ever since; but the name moor can be traced back as far as a.d., when pliny and strabo speak of the _maurusii_ and _mauri_. a reflection of their empire's greatness shone even in morocco itself: libraries and universities were founded in fez and morocco city. but at the same time the benighted country knew no settled peace; it was torn with civil war between the arab and berber tribes, until the berbers finally mastered the arabs, and forced them to confine themselves to certain districts. meanwhile, in spain the moorish empire, which for seven hundred years had remained firmly established, keeping alive greek philosophy, building the alhambra and making an indelible impression upon the spanish nation, crumbled and fell, or, more properly speaking, was expelled from spain after a year of bitter persecution. thousands of moorish refugees flocked back across the straits to the land of their progenitors, and settled in tetuan, tangier, and the cities on the coast, buoyed up with the lingering hope of returning, when fickle fortune smiled again, to the glories of their old houses in granada, and to that land which had chosen to cast them out. as may be imagined, the government of morocco soon fell into their more capable hands: they amalgamated more or less with the arabs and berbers--their own kith and kin--and the country became known to europe as morocco. in due time a certain moor, a _shar[=i]f_--that is, a direct descendant of the prophet mohammed--as head of the mohammedan church, gradually united under himself arabs and berbers alike, and was acknowledged as their feudal lord, religious chief, and sultan. the present sultan is of the same holy line: hence his title of _shar[=i]fian majesty_. a berber and an arab may easily be distinguished from each other. berbers, taken as a whole, have square frames, high cheek-bones, small eyes, and are great walkers, not horsemen. the mountains are to them what the plains are to the arabs, and they prefer an agricultural life to any other. leo africanus describes them, and his picture in all essentials holds good to-day: "they are strong, terrible, robust men, who fear neither cold nor snow; their dress a tunic of wool over bare flesh, and above the tunic a mantle, round their legs twisted thongs, never anything on the head. they rear sheep, mules, and asses; and they are the greatest thieves, traitors, and assassins in the world." from personal experience let this ryder be added: that they make good servants, faithful up to a certain point, to be trusted up to a certain point; but they are rascals. in tetuan many more berbers are to be met with than arabs: the riff tribe is berber, and tetuan is full of riffis. until the last thirty years the berbers owned only a nominal allegiance to the sultan; to-day he could pass through little of their territory without an army at his back, and into the riff country he has never been at all. among the berbers there is plenty of throat-cutting as a legal punishment, and murder on the score of private vengeance, while government oppression is rampant. as for travellers journeying across their country, only certain "roads" are "open" and safe: a christian, with proper precaution, is seldom attacked on the way to fez or morocco city--a jew occasionally. off the beaten track and anywhere in the riff country his life would not be worth a _flus_ (small copper coin). the arabs have given the berbers a name of their own--_shillah_, which means "outcast," referring back to the days when they drove them out of the plains up into the mountains; and it has stuck to them ever since. travellers descant upon _the noble shillah race_. the dialect which they speak is called shillah: the riffis at tetuan spoke shillah among themselves, but soon picked up arabic of a sort, and a little spanish. the arab differs in every respect from the berber. one of the finest types among mankind, he has a tall, spare frame, aquiline nose, fine eyes. he is kind, hospitable, dignified, abstemious, a poet, a gentleman, and a horseman. he is capable of great things, and of all orientals has most impressed himself upon the world. at the same time he is too often treacherous and blood-thirsty, inclined to be sensual and inquisitive. perhaps his faults have led to the extolling of the noble shillah race at the arab's expense. on this subject mr. cunninghame graham writes, that certain travellers in morocco must have "been humiliated at finding in the arabs a finer type than their own, and have turned to the shillah race with the relief that the earthen teapot must find when taken away from the drawing-room companionship of dresden china and put back again on the kitchen dresser." for myself "earthen teapot" and "dresden china" have both much fascination. i would trust either just as far as i could see him. thus morocco is populated by two antipathetic races, who neither singly nor jointly have or can consolidate it into a thriving empire. the arab cared only to convert a conquered people to mohammedanism and to push his individual fortune, heedless of assimilating individuals into one nation, as did the romans. great arab chiefs there have been, but never a patriot. with the fatalistic spirit of the east, and a tendency to see life only from the personal standpoint, it followed that, when a holy war no longer fired the wandering and independent shepherds to fight and forced them to obey, they became "slack," remained stationary, or retrograded. the arab would not advance civilization in morocco, nor would the wild and lawless berber; the moorish refugees from spain had sadly degenerated; to crown all, civil war led to the destruction of the libraries and universities in fez and morocco city, and education was no more. ignorance begat worse government; decline and poverty followed one after the other. corruption among the rulers spread downwards and ran through the country, until the whole body politic was unsound, and is so to-day. though the name of the sultan, as head of the church, is held in reverence, yet many of the tribes would resist to the uttermost any attempt on his part to subdue them by force of arms, so unsettled is his empire. he holds himself to be far superior to the sultan of turkey, who is not descended from the prophet, but who, on the other hand, is the guardian of the sacred city of mecca, and who possesses superior forces. second in rank to the sultan of morocco follow his ministers--the chief minister, the foreign minister, the chief adviser, the minister of the interior, and the minister of finance. their duties are to carry out the sultan's wishes, and, receiving no pay, they look to enriching themselves at the expense of their respective billets. a body of secretaries come after the ministers, who write and dispatch the sultan's decrees to distant cities, where their letters are read aloud in the mosques to the people by the governors. a special body of messengers is employed under the secretaries. each district and city has its _kaid_ or _basha_ (its governor), whose duty is to read the sultan's letter aloud and carry out his instructions, who oversees the city market, prices food, detects false weight, deals with robbers and murderers, and sees that the peace is kept. as well as basha every city has its _kadi_, or judge of civil law, who settles all questions of land, of grants, divorces, etc. we visited the court of civil justice at tetuan, a tiny room, carpeted with yellow matting, where the white-haired kadi, attired in white, sat like a magnificent white rabbit on a large red cushion on the floor, beside him a table six inches high, with learned-looking books, ink, parchment, and thin slips of wood for pens. below the basha or kaid come _sheikhs_ (village elders), who may be called gentlemen farmers. they collect the taxes directly from the country people. a province is taxed according to what it produces: no one pays the sum demanded of him, nor at the time it is demanded, but eventually every householder in the district is judiciously squeezed to the uttermost farthing, and half of what he pays goes into the sheikh's pocket. morocco conceals its wealth in times of visitations such as these: money and corn alike are buried in the ground. some of the people are imprisoned, some tortured, and eventually all disgorge, and are left with barely enough for their every-day wants. it is a system typical of the east and its slipshod, rough-and-ready dealings: its great element of simplicity harks back to a life in tents, where red tape was unknown. the highest officials are in the habit of transacting business at their street doors or in their stables: the basha invariably sits in some gateway near his house, hearing and judging matters which two or three gesticulating claimants explain to him. private matters are public property: the man in the street chats with the minister of finance--for are not all men equal? the minister may have sold groceries at one time, before he was called upon to fill a position at court. who can tell what a day may not bring forth? the sultan--who is known as "the lofty portal, the exalted of god, the noble presence"--has a body of servants and retainers round him: first of all "the learned ones," men who advise him, but make a point of ascertaining his wishes before they give an opinion, and are of no use at all except in conducting negotiations; next the officer who carries the great pearl-and-gold-embroidered parasol over his head; next an officer who flicks away flies; then a master of ceremonies, a headsman, a flogger, a shooter, a water-bearer, a tent-layer, a tea-maker, a standard-bearer, and a "taster" to see that no poison is given. more closely connected than any of these with the sultan is of course his harem, of both black and white women, who have been honoured by admission into the much-sought-after precincts. some of them are circassians, supplied by constantinople: all are the best which money can buy, or ease and position tempt. when their numbers have been greatly swelled, certain of them are drafted on as presents to kaids and bashas. the offspring of the sultan's numerous wives are brought up in isolated sanctuaries, each boy in company with a slave of his own age, whom he calls brother. girls inherit no rank. one and all are married when they reach maturity, at a state function which takes place each year, the sultan choosing their consorts. he gives his favourite son--whom he has named as his successor--a high command in the army or an important governorship: as long as the boy is too young for either, the sultan associates him with himself in official receptions. all possible rivals to the sultan are disposed of, chiefly by banishment. guarding the intriguing and inflammable harem are eunuchs, imported at great expense from abyssinia, and responsible for the sultan's wives and concubines, whom "wise women" prepare to meet their lord. the late sultan was in the habit of having his harem paraded in his garden on thursdays, in order to select the most attractive, and spend friday--the mohammedan sunday--in her company. it is a curious fact that the imperial treasure, which is distributed between fez, morocco city, and mequinez, of which no details are ever made public, can only be opened by agreement between the keeper, the governor of the palace, the trusted eunuch, and the head woman in charge of the harem. the secrets of its treasures are jealously guarded. it is probably impoverished. every one who approaches the court is expected to make the sultan a present, and his collection of offerings would stock a museum. in the time of george i. we read of the sultan's being sent "a rich crimson velvet sedan or chair for the favourite sultana, and ten pounds of the finest tea at thirty shillings a pound." in the present day telephones, heliographs, gramophones, bicycles, motor-cars, guns, fireworks, and the latest inventions of all kinds find their way into morocco. in return the staple moorish offering has always been, and still is, arab horses, with richly embroidered saddles and bridles. it is impossible to estimate the strength of the moorish army. the only regulars are under european instruction, sir harry maclean (known as kaid maclean) acting as commander-in-chief. their pay is something like a penny half-penny a day for infantry, fourpence for cavalry, a shilling for commanding offices. the ranks consist of private, sergeant, captain, centurion, and colonel, each officer having a lieutenant. every moor capable of bearing arms in morocco is liable to be _pressed_ for service. in may, when the country is dry, each basha or kaid is ordered to collect troops in his own district: then is tetuan deserted, and every boy and young man absents himself. how the lady missionaries hid their house-boy! tetuan sent off two hundred men, under a colonel, while we were there, which were to help punish certain rebellious tribes. often these expeditions are for the purpose of raising taxes. in any case the tribes against which the sultan's troops are sent are said to be "eaten up." long before it happened it was known and talked of. "ah, yes; the beni m`saira would be eaten up in april." the tetuan two hundred were sent to help eat up the beni m`saira tribe, some of whom had abducted two spanish children a year ago. the children had driven their pigs on to land belonging to the tribe--a thing abhorred of by mohammedans, to whom pigs are unclean. expostulation was not heeded, and the beni m`saira resorted to strong measures, and kidnapped the children. they were sold from family to family beyond hope of recovery, and it would be hard to say what was their fate. of course they were never seen again. tales were circulated which said that the girl had been turned into a dancing-girl, and taught to dance upon hot ashes, or she may have become slave and concubine to some moor. she was sixteen years old, and the lady missionaries at tetuan knew her well, and her ten-year-old brother. the spanish government had complained to the sultan, and now a year after the offence the beni m`saira were to be eaten up; there was to be a general raid upon their country: men would be killed, women taken as slaves, villages burnt, and corn destroyed. the worst part of the whole business is the fate of the prisoners on these occasions. these unfortunate men, suffering scarcely for their own misdeeds, are sent in chains to far-distant city prisons, whence they seldom emerge alive. the colonel of the tetuan contingent was an example of the rapid rises and the vicissitudes of life in morocco. only the other day he had been harbour-master down at martine, but was accused of smuggling and turned out of that berth; he then took a café and sold drinks in tetuan, when suddenly the sultan's pleasure took the shape of making him a full-blown colonel in his troops. as in the days of joseph, the chief butler is sent for out of prison and made much of: the baker is sent for and hanged. [illustration: a saint-house, tetuan. [_to face p. ._] the lucky colonel and his two hundred left tetuan in bad weather: their pay was such that many of them, before starting, sold the bullets supplied them, in order to buy food with the money, preferring to fight without ammunition rather than on empty stomachs; but only _one quarter_ of them got as far as el k`sar--the rest deserted on the road, to escape hunger and exhaustion from rain and cold. the oolad moosa tribe were eaten up not long ago; their land was harried, their fruit-trees destroyed, and themselves killed, imprisoned, and enslaved. i was told by a spaniard that he had seen five camel-loads of the heads of tribesmen brought into larache while he was there. the sultan offered three shillings per head. his soldiers sent up not a few heads which belonged to their own companions-in-arms. consignments were sent off to various cities throughout morocco, where the jews, as usual, salted them, and they were set up over the gates and on the walls. there is little or no artillery in his shar[=i]fian majesty's army, though the few cannon he has, render him all-powerful against his rebellious tribesmen, who are only armed with rifles (principally french), which are smuggled into the country. soldiers are supplied with the same rifles and european swords: the native curved dagger is also used. pitched battles are seldom heard of. the troops entrench themselves strongly, gallop out in parties against the foe, fire a volley into his line, and gallop back again to reload. pillage is the great element in this species of guerilla warfare. in connection with the army are the _makhaznia_ (mounted police): they are practically cavalry. a few were quartered in tetuan, and the basha employed them to take men prisoners and preserve peace and take messages and so on. the makhaznia are paid for whatever they do by any one who employs them, and they often act as soldier-escort to europeans. the government of morocco has but one hinge--a golden one. thirty thousand pounds was paid by the late governor of morocco city for his billet, and a capable man would still make his fortune before he retired, by means of bribes and presents from every one in connection with him, and a little undue pressure and taxation here and there. but no governor is exempt from that war-cry in morocco, "pay! pay! pay!" and if he or a basha wish for the sultan's favour, which in order to remain in office is most desirable, he will forward a present regularly to court, though at every feast he is obliged to send another in addition. when a sultan imprisons a minister, he confiscates all his money. bribes largely contribute towards filling the coffers of government officials, from toadies down to unfortunate sufferers. a man has to buy himself out of prison: it costs a murderer about four pounds. those who cannot afford to pay do not come out. not long ago a poor man whom we knew was suddenly appointed to fill a lucrative post under government. he dare not refuse it, but he was head over ears in debt, and of course a large sum of money was due in return for the appointment. he borrowed from the jews and took up office. in one year he had paid all his debts, he had paid the jews, and built himself a luxurious house. and who can wonder at it? customs-house officers can all retire after _three years_ (if they choose), and live well. it is calculated that the government gets exactly half of the duties. tetuan had a favourite tale of bribery. a man wanted to make sure of a case he was bringing before the basha. he knew that the basha had a weakness for mirrors. he was a poor man, but he bought the best looking-glass he could afford, and dispatched it. the case came on; the basha gave it against him. "what!" cried the poor, discomfited loser; "did you not receive the mirror?" "yes," replied the basha coolly; "but immediately afterwards a very fine mule came along, and _he kicked the looking-glass into a thousand fragments_." so when a man is disappointed of his due, they say, "the mule has kicked the glass." another man had a brother in prison whom he wished to buy out: he took the basha a mule, and presented himself with his present. "you shall not bribe me," said the basha. "soldier! put this man into prison with his brother, and put the mule into my stable." the man's family had a heavy bribe to raise. chapter vi we look over a moorish courtyard house with a view to taking it--we rent jinan dolero in spite of opposition--an englishman murdered--our garden-house--the idiosyncrasies of moorish servants--a native guard--the riff country. chapter vi ah! moon of my delight, who know'st no wane the moon of heaven is rising once again: how oft hereafter rising shall she look through this same garden after me--_in vain!_ christmas day in a mohammedan city passed with nothing to mark it except deluges of rain. the fonda had not grown upon us; and when two moorish houses in the city at last presented themselves, the result of weeks of inquiry, we decided to take one, if, as was apparently the case, a garden-house outside the city was not to be had for love or money. the moors all told us it was impossible. the fact is, that they are chary of letting their houses to unbelievers: the thing is not encouraged in the land; indeed, they are liable to be imprisoned for doing so, unless they have "protection" from a foreigner. all sorts of complications have arisen out of permission granted to europeans to settle in the country: it depends on the european; he does something foolish, and legal or social or religious difficulties arise, and a storm in a teacup may end in serious dispute and a heavy indemnity to pay. so, naturally enough, the sultan's advisers are averse to extending the limits of property owned by europeans, and the barriers which they put in the way, debar ordinary people from running up villas and committing outrages such as half the world endures in silence. in morocco it is necessary first of all to obtain the consent of the government for the purchase of land. interest can sometimes do it, and the pill must be heavily gilt. the next obstacle lies with moorish jurisdiction, which, with forethought, sets forth that all disputes relating to property shall be referred to native courts and settled by moorish law. this opens a door to barefaced bribery and intimidation: some one will be fleeced. last of all, moorish workmen building for an englishman or any foreigner are liable to persecution and arrest. thus foreign labour must be employed. and how is foreign labour to be had? a jew or spaniard may not be available. it is scarcely less difficult to rent a house in morocco, unless it is in tangier. of the two which were thus unexpectedly offered us one was out of the question--it was damp; but the other, standing empty in a long narrow alley in the middle of the city, was as sound as houses built of rubbish and thin bricks can be, and we went to look over it, well prepared to ignore petty defects. it was entered, as usual, by a wide yellow door, studded with giant nails and a resounding knocker: a courtyard house--a most quaint and original construction in which to spend two or three months. from the ochre-coloured door we walked into a tiny tiled patio open to the sky, too small and insignificant for a fountain or an orange-tree: the kitchen and one other room where servants could sleep opened out of it, lighted only by their wide doors, which were never shut. so much for the ground floor. a tiny tiled staircase led to the first floor. four narrow rooms, windowless, flanked the four sides of the square, and looked down into the little court below. each room had double doors standing open for light and air. from the house-top above the first floor, on to which we went last, there was at least a view of a thousand flat white roofs, of pencil-shaped minarets, of turtle-backed mosques; but at the same time the sun itself could not be more dazzling to look at than was the impossible whitewash which besmeared all the roofs, and we soon left for our first floor, in whose four little dark rooms we proposed to live. standing on the gallery which ran outside them, and leaning on the balustrade looking down into the minute patio, it was a case of the view below into that, and the view above up at the sky, and no more--a limited, and on wet days gloomy, prospect. added to that, the orgies worked in the kitchen by a moorish cook could not do other than proclaim themselves all over the first floor. true, the little patio embodied the moorish conception of _al-fresco_ seclusion, and a depth of shadow lay in the inner rooms within the thin shell of the white walls. and yet--and yet--the lines of old-fashioned eliza cook returned insistently, and refused to be silenced:-- double the labour of my task, lessen my poor and scanty fare, but give, oh! give me what i ask-- the sunlight and the mountain air. and in the end the vote was given against the little windowless dwelling in the moorish quarter. no doubt a courtyard house is bizarre, but it has its imperfections. a scotch proverb has it that "where twa are seeking, they are sure to find." in time we found. a certain moor of tetuan, named ali slowee, a spanish protected subject, was guardian, uncle, and stepfather to a boy named dolero. dolero owned a garden-house outside the city, called _jinan dolero_ (the garden of dolero). ali slowee heard of our wants and offered us his nephew's house, provided we undertook to give it up at the end of march. than the unexpected, when it does come, nothing is so good. after a little difference over the rent (our landlord began by asking two pounds five a month, and came down to thirty shillings) all was settled, and new year's day, , found us living in a whitewashed garden-house in morocco, out in the country. moors have extravagant ideas of the sums english people will pay. mr. bewicke was offered a house and garden for seven pounds ten a month: some time after the landlord asked three pounds; eventually he came down to thirty-nine shillings. [illustration: jinan dolero. [_to face p. ._] having handed a month's rent over to ali slowee, he had jinan dolero done up, whitewashed at least, outside and in, from top to toe--a rite performed on every opportunity all the year round in morocco, like spring-cleanings at home. tiles were mended, windows repainted, glass put in, and we followed,--the simplest thing in the world; "furnishing" takes no time in morocco. three mules carried out all we put into the empty little house--all our effects, that is to say, from the fonda. a few rugs were unrolled, camp-beds, table, and chairs put together, some nails driven into the walls, and in one hour we were "in." gibraltar supplied the camp furniture; necessaries were raked together in tetuan, including the dome-shaped pewter teapot, and the painted tins, pink and green and blue, for tea, coffee, and sugar, which mark the tramp of the european across morocco, and are both of them for ever associated with sweet green tea and turbans. mattresses we had made, and made ourselves, of moss, brought in by the countrywomen and dried; and an englishman, a---- (one of the few who have become mohammedans and settled in morocco), lent several more, which made divans round our walls. a---- has a little house close to jinan dolero, and occupies himself with his garden outside the city. he dresses like a moor. in spite of it all, he is not welcomed among them as a brother, but goes by the name of "the renegade." they probably divine that he adopts their religion as a part of the customs of the country with which he identifies himself, less for the sake of mohammedanism itself than for the life which that religion inculcates. apparently men in such a position rarely benefit the country in which they settle, and often do harm, ending by paying the penalty of meddling with the manners and customs of another race. now, at the time of writing this chapter, a---- has paid in full. only a few months after we left tetuan he was shot one evening in his garden and killed on the spot, apparently from close quarters, probably from behind the hedge. the servants had gone home and found his body next morning. if they are to be believed, no one heard a shot. men have been imprisoned and men will suffer death for the murder, no doubt; but whether the actual murderer is shot or goes scot-free, and what his inducement for committing the crime, probably half tetuan will know and half tetuan will tell, _and tell a lie_. some say that a---- was shot for the sake of his gun and his money. others that he was shot by some riffi brothers because he was in the habit of talking to their sister. others that the murder was connected with his having lived at one time with a moorish woman, from whom he eventually separated. no one will ever know. jinan dolero would have been called in the riviera "a villa": it was a typical moorish garden-house. we lived upstairs, after the manner of the country, in the airiest and lightest of small whitewashed sitting-rooms: its three windows, set certainly with head-splitting glass, looked south, east, and west, on sea, mountains, and city. the second larger room, in which we slept, had a thick white pillar in the very middle of it, supporting the ceiling. a store-room on the same floor did duty as larder, and a staircase led up on to the flat white roof. underneath us were kitchen, mules' stable, and two rooms for our two servants: a little staircase led down to them and on to the hall and front door. the floors were all tiled: a dip in the corner of each room and a hole in the wall carried off the water when they were sluiced down. innocent of spouting, the water merely streamed down the outside wall. each window reached to the floor, and an inartistic iron grille removed all danger of falling out. it was the sunniest house in the world, and an airy one, for the passage and rooms had loop-holes, a foot high and four inches wide, cut in the wall, through which air freely circulated. on the ground floor the windows were _nil_, but more loop-holes let in ample light. one was constructed on each side our hall door, that before unbarring at night we might know what manner of visitor we had, and even fire a charge through the aperture if the occasion warranted. our garden was another moorish wilderness, another "field of the slothful," thick in a waste of weeds, blue borage, and yellow marigolds. but it was also a vineyard. dead-looking branches of vines trailed among the weeds, which later on were cut down with a sickle and turned into green meat for cows. splendid muscats, we were told, our vines would produce: branches are spread over them in the summer as a slight protection from the sun, but the grapes are left on the ground and often soiled; nor has a moor the slightest idea of picking them, or of preserving their bloom. besides the vines, there were fruit-trees in jinan dolero. pink almonds blossomed first; the leaf and the flower of apricots followed; apples, peaches, and pears came almost at the same time; and we lived in a pink world. the fig-tree softened its hard heart last of all, and its ashy-grey arms burst into tender green leaf and infant figs; at the same time the pomegranates shot into warm red leaflets. there were lemons which were ripe on the trees on new year's day, and made many a lemon-squash: there was double narcissus in flower everywhere; it sprouted up in the grass paths which divided our garden, and got badly trodden down: there were rows and rows of beans, which scented the air: last of all, there were some red geraniums in flower. a hedge of prickly pear ran down the east side of the enclosure, a tall cane fence effectually hedged in the rest, and the whole was entered by the inevitable locked and barred door, and whitewashed doorway, the long key of which, was a care in life, till we learnt that in morocco every precaution is taken up to a certain point; matters are then handed over to providence, and man, forbearing to meddle further, sits down and awaits their development. thus, with all their locks and bolts, garden doors were often left open, and the cane fences were full of gaps. but none of our lemons were stolen--not, at least, after we got rid of the guard of soldiers which for the first week the basha insisted on sending to jinan dolero every night. they ate them. fine days were never long enough in the little garden-house facing the mountains: in the mornings an opal light; the sunrise stalking across their summits, while a cloud of white mist would sweep down the valley out to the blue sea-line; all day bright light and dazzle, a wind soft and yet racy; at night an abrupt sunset, leaving for a few moments a rose-pink after-glow, followed by an intense silence. the first thing in the morning, we always wandered in our garden down the grassy paths among the dew; measured the rain-gauge; looked at the sky; watched the birds, of which a flight, chiefly flocks of finches, invariably travelled over the little terraces of fruit-trees towards the river, taking our garden on the way, and feeding there for a while. a white jasmine almost hid our white steps and pillars: a rose grew with lavish prodigality; as jinan dolero stood there, in the middle of the garden of the slothful, a certain imperious dignity was given to the little white-walled structure by means of its magnificent situation. sometimes we breakfasted in the garden: we were never in to lunch on fine days, but rode and walked all over the country, occasionally with the lady missionaries or mr. bewicke, but oftener alone with the big grey donkey and a boy. there were moors to see in tetuan, and always something of interest: we came away from that corner of morocco without having got through half of what might have been done. to live in a country, adopting some of its ways and imbibing a little of its spirit, is the only satisfactory way to "travel." hotels with home conventionalities and english tourists never amount to the same thing. either camp out or settle down for a month or two in a hut, with one of the country people to cook. there must be sport, or agriculture, or village characters, or architecture, or botany, or geology to study: bird-life and bird-watching are never-ending interests; the fields are never empty. only by living its own life, can the country and its ways unfold themselves, and become understood and cared for, by the traveller who has time for, and a love of, such things. as a whole, and seen in january before spring has begun, around tetuan it is a tired and brownish-looking country: its colour is bleached and dried out of it, and it has the air of a sun-dried, wind-blown land, patched with pieces of brilliant greenery where corn has been sown near water. and yet it possesses the charm of strength and repose which simplicity gives; for it has been worried by man but little, rather allowed to straggle through the centuries at its own sweet will. in the evening every friday, to mark the mussulman's sabbath, the sunset gun boomed and echoed among the opposite mountains. watching the grey turreted walls of the kasbah bitten out against a primrose sky, with watch in hand, at last the weekly flash of red, then a puff of brown smoke shot out of the wall, and last of all, a reverberating roar, tossed backwards and forwards among the hills. it is long before the "thunder" dies away, and we watch a gigantic smoke-ring, sprung from the mouth of the gun, float lazily out to the south; while the mueddzin's cry from the top of the mosque rises and falls on the waves of sound, drifting now clear, now faint, over the garden. when the sun dropped, the frogs began, from the cracks in the moist clay soil where they sat, all over our acre and a half, croaking in a wet, guttural chorus--the whole garden called; and the rattle of the tree-beetle which followed was one of those tropical sounds which recall the east. the frogs were tiny brown fellows, hard to get at. the owls would begin after the frogs--a brown owl, which flew noiselessly in the twilight among the fruit-trees and on to the edge of the roof, hooting long and low or chuckling oddly. then stillness, and wonderful starlight nights, all through january. that month no rain fell. in february we had seven and a quarter inches, and more in march. having found jinan dolero, and furnished it after a fashion, we still lacked servants, and they seemed to be almost as difficult to meet with as houses--that is, trustworthy ones. again, however, we were fortunate. a soldier-servant who had lived with a missionary happened to have nothing to do, and agreed to come to us with his young wife, tahara. they both of them knew something of european ways, and were scrupulously honest. they brought a few oddments, a little looking-glass, a mattress on which they slept upon the floor of the room near the kitchen, and a few cooking-pots and pans of their own. we overcame their objection to sleeping outside the city at that time of year; but i believe they never liked it up to the last, though they comforted themselves with two guns (one of which belonged to the man, and one he borrowed) and the fact of a revolver as well, being all under the same roof with them. [illustration: our servants, s`lam and tahara. [_to face p. ._] they were both of them riffis, and their own home was in the riff country, two days' journey into the mountains from tetuan. his name was s`lam ben haddon riffi of bekiona, son of haddon and of fettouch ben haddon of bekiona. s`lam's wife was tahara. he had served for a year in the french army in algeria, in the nd regiment of tirailleurs algériens; and having picked up a little french, we learnt, with a few arabic words, to understand each other. he and tahara spoke shillah to each other. s`lam was about twenty-six years old, tahara about twenty. he was a sinewy, long-legged ruffian, well over six feet, and holding himself creditably. he had a pair of fierce, dark, restless eyes, little beard or moustache, the front half of his head shaved, and a few locks left long at the back in token of his being a "brave" and having slain his man in a blood-feud. the riffi turban, of strings of dark red wool, was wound round his head; a white shirt showed at his neck; he wore a black waistcoat, a white tunic down to his knees, and red knicks, below which came his long hairy shanks, ending in a pair of yellow slippers. a scarlet leather bag, hung by a red cord over his shoulders, a leather belt, and his gun, finished off our moorish servant, who shot us partridges, roasted chickens, and was as good a hand at buttered eggs and coffee as i have ever seen. out of doors he always wore his brown jellab, embroidered with silk tufts of green and yellow and white. tahara was a pretty, pale, dark girl, with curious cabalistic riffi marks tattooed in blue on her forehead and chin. she bound round her head an orange-coloured silk handkerchief; wore, except when at work, an embroidered yellow waistcoat, a pale blue kaftan down to her ankles, a sprigged, white muslin, loose garment, all over that; and a creamy woollen haik, when she went out or was cold, covered everything. s`lam acted as butler, tahara kept our rooms in order, and they were joint cooks. their standing dish was mutton stewed in vegetables, or a chicken; and given time, four hours in the pot, on the pan of charcoal, it was quite a success. but they learnt many things in a dutch oven lent by the missionaries, besides stews. they had eccentricities--as when s`lam prepared to put the toast-rack itself on the charcoal fire, with the bread in it, thus to "toast": the toast-rack we made ourselves, too, out of some old wire. they kept chickens, which s`lam brought home from market, either in their bedrooms for the night, or else in the kitchen, until their crops were empty and they could be killed. every morning s`lam was dispatched to the city with a basket, instructions, and two or three shillings. he stayed there an unconscionable time, visiting his mother, and sitting sunning himself in the doorway of a little moorish café, returning laden before lunch. he never went into the city without his gun and best jellab, striding along with his long legs--a most picturesque figure. after dinner every evening he rendered his account, stalking into the sitting-room when we called, pulling up a chair, and sitting down at the table opposite r. from his leather bag, change was produced, and if the change was wrong, there was agony; but that only happened once or twice. a scrap of paper was brought out covered with arabic writing, items of the day's expenditure, which read more or less as follows:-- chicken d. milk d. four eggs ½d. mutton d. apples d. vegetables d. bread three times a week ½d. butter twice a week ½d. charcoal for cooking purposes, and oil for lamps, added three shillings to our moderate weekly expenditure. living is cheap enough in morocco, nor are servants' wages heavy. s`lam and tahara had eighteen shillings a month and their food, which was simple indeed--a loaf each of native bread a day, green tea, lump sugar, and odds and ends from our meals. our rent, it will be remembered, came to thirty shillings a month. morocco suits "reduced circumstances." once a week, one of the little donkeys, which passed along our "lane" in droves, carrying charcoal into the sok, was waylaid, brought into the garden, and its three pannierfuls commandeered for us and stored in the mules' stable, where tahara did the washing in a great tub bought from mr. bewicke. milk was left every morning by a moor, who took it in for sale to the sok. when the accounts were all settled up, s`lam would swing out of the room with a "bon soir tout-le-monde," unless he stayed to give r. a lesson in arabic, which he could write as well as read--an unusual thing, and marking him for a scholar in his country. blood-feuds among the riff tribe are common enough. s`lam's father was shot when s`lam was a boy. as soon as he grew up, s`lam shot the man. he had left the riff in consequence: he was a "marked man," they said; but he began to talk of going back again, and while he was with us he bought a new french rifle. in the riff he might be potted at, he might not: he would risk that. the brother or son of the man whom he had shot would never trouble to journey far for the purpose of shooting him. why should they? all in good time. some day, when he came their way, they would put a bullet into him. only women die in their beds in the riff. "sudden death, good lord, grant us." men in the riff who have blood-feuds will not go out of their houses in the early mornings without first sending the women and children to look if the coast is clear: neither will they walk up a hedgerow nor in a wood, but across the fields, keeping well in the open, since murder is always committed out of sight, decently, and in good order. a man living in tetuan now, has a blood-feud with an enemy, who has been in consequence obliged to move to tangier. sometimes he comes over, secretly, by night, to see his mother, and lies hidden in her house till the sok is full of market people in the middle of the day, when he can go out into the crowd without running great risk,--though in the sok a quarrel sometimes arises; in a flash, guns are up at men's shoulders--bang--bang--and bullets ping into the soft walls, if not into some one or other. only lately a boy was shot twice in the thigh, happening to be in the way in a scuffle. s`lam and tahara were often amusing, if not interesting: never commonplace or "well-meaning." one corner of the roof of jinan dolero had been left unwhitewashed, the whitewashers' ladder was still there, and one morning s`lam came to say in his best french, "deux mesdames. pour arranger en haut." the two madams were the whitewashers--two black madams, clad in a couple of striped towels each, ali slowee's slaves, bought for, say, £ each. a very ragged countrywoman who came and weeded the garden, and seemed almost devoid of intelligence, was also a madam. s`lam was deft with a needle; he borrowed one of ours and a thimble, sat himself down in the kitchen, and stitched away at a large white garment "pour maman," he said--sat up half the night, finished it, and took it to her next day. he did not make a bad man-servant; but he was fond of tempting fate by carrying trays, laden with china and glass, balanced on one hand; then he would stoop down and pick up a kettle in the other, there would be an ominous clatter, if not crash, in the tray amongst our crockery, and s`lam would murmur reproachfully under his breath, "o tray! tray!" he bought a new jellab for wearing on visits to the sok; and after it had been proudly shown us, it was found, neatly folded up, placed on a hat-box in our bedroom. when we asked why it was there, he was taken aback. "mightn't he keep it there? it was new: it was very clean." one evening, when he came in to settle accounts, he said that he wished to write a letter. would we give him a sheet of paper and envelope? they were produced. we were not quite prepared for it, when he at once drew up a chair, sat down at the table, and politely asked for a pencil. but it was impossible to snub so simple and well-meaning a child. i sharpened a pencil, and s`lam wrote diligently for quite half an hour, without a pause, from right to left, wonderful spidery characters: it was a long letter to his old master down in morocco city. he held his string-turbaned head on one side, and was without embarrassment as he sat between r. and myself (one of us worked, the other wrote); indeed, s`lam might have spent his evenings in a drawing-room all his life. when the letter was finished, he accepted a stamp most gratefully, wished us "bon soir," and departed. tahara had her eccentricities too, of which one was an extraordinary aptitude for annexing wherewithal to tie round her head in place of her own yellow silk scarf, which was kept for high days. one week one of our table-napkins was raised to this honour; the next one of our clean bedroom towels had taken its place round her dark locks. i made her a present of a flannel shirt to wear, but the second day s`lam had appropriated that, and wore it in place of his waistcoat, unbuttoned. apparently, in the eyes of the tetuan world, we were taking a most unprecedented and foolhardy step in sleeping outside the city in the winter: the ceuta "road" near us was said to be famous for robbery and murder. for some reason or other a reputation clung to us of being fabulously rich. the moors warned, the missionaries seriously expostulated with us. none of them would have done it, and mr. bewicke was put down as mad for countenancing such an action. but we had two men in the house at night; for, besides s`lam, a labourer was induced to sleep in the mules' stable for our protection, and we had a couple of rifles and a revolver. now, since the news of the murder of a----, one wonders . . . . . but _he_ was alone: _we_ had the safety of numbers. to show how jealous moors can be, and what precautions they take about their women, s`lam never allowed the labourer inside the garden gate unless he himself had come in. the man sat and waited on the bank. then, after he was installed in the stable, the door between the kitchen and stable was locked and bolted. when we went out, tahara was made to bolt every door; and if any one came to the house, she would only call down to them out of our bedroom window. the first night we slept in our garden-house and for several nights after, the basha took upon himself to send us out a guard of soldiers, who were responsible for our safety. we never asked this favour, and were annoyed; for they slept under our windows, talked and coughed the whole night, lay on the bulbs in a flower-bed, and stole the lemons. seeing, however, that we did not pay them anything at all for the attention, the basha soon grew tired of sending them, much to our relief; for when, to prevent their depredations, we locked them outside the garden door, they broke down our fence, scrambled into the garden, and lay under the prickly pears, as being a safer place than the lane outside. there has never such a thing been known, as a guard without a cough, or who do not talk. if told to be silent, they reply that they must talk to keep awake; for if they fell asleep, how could they guard? occasionally, to show how much on the alert they are, guards will discharge their guns in the dead of night. altogether moorish soldiers at close quarters are not conducive to sleep. we had an excitement one night, but it turned out to be groundless. guns were fired from the garden-house below ours, repeatedly, about p.m., and s`lam got into a fever of excitement, brought his rifle up into our sitting-room, and sat watching at one of the windows. he thought it was tribesmen come down from the hills to rob. at last the firing stopped, and r. and i went to bed; but s`lam was up all night, and tahara brought their mattress upstairs and slept in our sitting-room for safety. it turned out to be moors who had come out to sleep for one night, and were amusing themselves by firing rifles from the loop-holes and out in the garden. there is an advantage in being in a country where game is not sacred. for instance, one evening after tea, standing on the steps outside our "bungalow," in the hush which came just after sunset, r. and i were startled by a familiar call over in the garden next ours. s`lam was strolling about, and confirmed our supposition--a partridge. we went indoors and forgot about it; but ten minutes later the report of a gun brought us out again, and there was s`lam crashing over the great bamboo fence into "next door" with his rifle, scudding across our neighbour's beans, then stooping down over something; a second later and he was back again, across the palisade like a lamplighter, and striding triumphantly up our path with a partridge dangling from his hand--a red-legged frenchman, which we hung long. this acquisition to the larder had to be applauded perforce, in spite of its being shot sitting, and on some one else's acres. as luck would have it, s`lam's great bullet, about the size commonly used for big game, had gone through its head: he naïvely explained the advantages of shooting birds through the head. but i think he was a fair shot. most riffis are. i suppose that the riff tribe is more or less an anomaly. think, if you can, of a clan or a tribe who are pirates, wreckers, who encourage slavery, who count the vendetta an admirable custom, who have no laws, no governors, who acknowledge as their supreme head a sultan who has never from all ages ventured within their borders--a tribe who have, as it has been said, "no fear, no anything, save and excepting their faith in one god and mohammed as his prophet, their own daggers, a martini-henry if they can get one, and failing that, a ten-foot-long riff gun, coral-studded, ivory-butted, brass-bound, and deadly to handle"--a people who live in a country without roads, _and all within a few hours of gibraltar_: have they their parallel, except among adventurers in the far east, and those but a few upon distant seas? [illustration: two women from the riff country. [_to face p. ._] to explore the unknown riff country would be interesting indeed. no book has been written upon it except from hearsay, and no european has penetrated across its length and breadth. the riffis want no foreign interlopers among their sacred hills, and would "knife" the first who showed his face. it is but two days' journey eastwards from tetuan, this select and exclusive country, and it extends about a hundred and fifty miles, with a population, it is reported, of one hundred and fifty thousand souls. strange to think that no european pioneer, nor gentleman-rover, has ever exploited the riff. the law of the vendetta, is the law and the ten commandments of the riffi, which, if he fail to keep, renders him in the eyes of his country-folk damned to all eternity, to be ostracised among men. a widow will teach her baby-son to shoot, and studiously prepare him for his one great duty, that as early as possible he may put a bullet into the murderer of his father. and thus the feud is nourished. even the great-great-grandson of a man who has taken a life years upon years ago is not safe. he will probably meet with a dagger or the muzzle of a long gun one day. but a people who inculcate such severe and cursory measures have their redeeming-points. it is a fact that cursing and swearing, so common among moors, and polygamy and adultery, are seldom, if ever, met with in the riff: for if one riffi insults another, it is at the peril of his life; while the stain of immorality is wiped out at once by death. the gun, pistol, or dagger is the riffi's summary judge and jury. he submits to no authority. questions on land, on inheritance, all legal questions, are settled in each village by the keeper of the mosque. he arranges marriages. the riffis are therefore a moral people: a man has but one wife; the women do not veil, and yet familiarity is not tolerated between the sexes; a young man will go out of his way to avoid passing close by a young woman whom he sees in the distance, lest he be suspected of behaving lightly to her. the riffis are an indomitable race, one which has never been conquered, magnificent raw material out of which to shape a battalion of infantry. though acknowledged as the kaliph of the prophet and their religious head, the sultan, as has been said, has never dared to put his head in this independent hornets' nest. they are an industrious tribe, growing crops assiduously and rearing cattle: their valleys are fertile and well farmed for an uncivilized country. but these details must be taken for what they are worth. s`lam could say nothing but good of the riff: how cheap living was, and how abundant food,--except when rain failed, and then there followed disastrous famine, and starving riffis would come down to tetuan, and lie in the caves outside the city, and live on roots, doing any work which offered; and some of them would die, in spite of the missionaries' kindness and unremitting efforts. there are many legends about the riffis: they boast one tribe among themselves who are said to be descended from the romans; and there is no reason against the assumption, since the romans were in morocco after cæsar's day. another family claims to be descended from the inhabitants of sodom. some of them are quite fair--regular "carrots": vandal blood may run in their veins. while, again, some people say there are celts among them, with irish characteristics and irish words. possibly. pirates and rovers are apt to introduce foreign strains. at any rate they have nothing in common with the arabs, but are as unlike that race as a scotchman is unlike an italian. berber is of course their common origin, and they are identical with the kabyles of algeria, the touariks of the sahara, and the guanches of the canary isles. shillah, the berber dialect which they speak--one of the many dialects belonging to that race--is not a written language; but an educated riffi learns to write and read at his village _jama_ (mosque school); he uses the arabic character in writing, and he learns to read the kor[=a]n. yet in one great point, like the arabs, the riffi, in common with the berber race, lacks the power of cohesion and the spirit of patriotism, which should have welded all berbers into one powerful people. internal strife, that curse of africa, has split them up into isolated units, and they stand at the same point they stood at a thousand years ago. nor have the riffis, in common with the moors, reached the point of discarding "petticoats and drapery"--that is to say, they wear the brown, hooded, woollen jellab, and the white woollen haik--a sheet of material without seam, which they cast round themselves something like a roman toga. perhaps a cotton tunic is worn underneath. part of the sleeves, the hood, and front of the jellab are often beautifully embroidered in coloured silks. on the border of the cloth thin leaves of dried grass are laid, which are worked over and over with coloured silk, and make a thick, handsome edging. the coloured leather belts which they wear; the large embroidered leather pouches, with deep-cut leather fringes, which hold bullets and powder and money and hemp-tobacco; their shaved heads, with one long oiled and combed or plaited lock; their turbans, red or brown, of strings of wool,--all complete a riffi, and a very fine-looking fellow he can be. the labour element, which as a whole is antagonistic to the spirit of morocco, crops up here and there, less in the casually fanned fields than in out-of-the-way corners. the potters' caves just outside tetuan constitute one of those corners. there is always work going on in the caves, and smoke coming out of one or other of the many kilns, all the year round. morocco and moorish architecture would be nowhere without the potteries. those infinitesimal little tiles which fit together and make such artistic colour-patterns, lining the _al-fresco_ patios, facing the walls of the rooms, the pillars and doorways and flooring, the houses throughout, are every one of them kneaded and cut and baked there: crocks to wash in, pans for charcoal, immense water-pots, small water-pots, bowls and shallow basins, dishes of all sizes, and saucers down to the smallest, even ink-bottles, all come into being there. leaving the city by _báb-el-nooadtha_ (the gate of sheaves), a little winding path leads to the caves, which lie among thickets of prickly pear, at the foot of the anjera hills, out of which they have been hollowed, probably by the action of water. immense ramifications they are--great dark halls, roofed _au naturel_ in corrugated rock with fissured sides, where maiden-hair fern hangs cool and green. here in the dark shadows are a little company of workmen, chiefly in brown jellabs and leathern aprons, one cutting squares out of the soft clay with a penknife--he has a pattern to help him keep them exact; another cuts diamonds, another stars: piled up together, they look like little pastry shapes in brown, beside the workmen, who are all sitting cross-legged on the ground. a little farther on two more men are dipping the top surfaces of the diamonds into an earthenware bowl full of yellow "cream," which will glaze and colour them, all in one. this sulphur-colour, and a blue, and a white, are generally used for the tiles--no other shades, as a rule. a boy in a corner is at work at one of the first processes, treading out a vast circle of yellowish clay into the consistency of stiff dough. a rather superior old moor in a white turban, perhaps the master-workman, is deftly cutting out rosettes. in the front of the cave a little brown donkey, with pasterns as weak as a reed, is standing under the weight of four great earthenware pots full of water, two balanced on each side its pack. a boy empties them one by one of the water, pouring it into a natural basin scooped out in the ground, well puddled with clay, and therefore without a leak. the water is wanted to mix with the "dough." then the donkey patters off for another load, the boy sitting sideways on its pack and shaking his heels--that makes it go. to the left stands a kiln in process of being packed with millions of the clay dice, which, baked hard, dove-tailed together, and forming a smooth, polished surface, will keep many a room cool. the kiln next door to it, is full of pots and pans of all shapes and sizes, but its opening is plastered up with clay, and they are not to be seen. into the great fiery furnace underneath, a man is thrusting dry brown bushes, and dried prickly pear, and whatever rubbish will burn. much of it has been hacked off the hillside by women, and has come on their backs many a mile. there is a crackling sound, smoke comes out, and a pink flame glows behind the man's body. the tiles ought to bake all right. meanwhile, the same boy inside the cave has got his clay into good order--it is about two inches thick, and something the size of a big round table; then he stoops down, and, with a knife held in both hands, scores the clay across, much as toffee is scored; which done, each square, about a foot in diameter, is carried off to be cut up into little shapes or to go upon the potter's wheel. the potter sat in his little pit, working the wheel with his foot--as carlyle says, "one of the venerablest objects, old as the prophet ezekiel and far older. rude lumps of clay, how they spin themselves up, by mere quick whirling, into beautiful circular dishes." the potter thumped his wet clay; then, as the wheel turned, pressed and moulded it with clever clay-encrusted hands: the sleeves were turned back from his bony chocolate-coloured arms. he had a grey goatee and a quiet smile, a dirty turban round his head, a white tunic mostly clay, and underneath a claret-coloured garment showed at the neck. he was a spare, wizened old man: perhaps his work, like dante's, had made him "lean for many years." the faster his wheel revolved, the truer apparently was the shape of the vessel he turned out. his country might accept the lesson--that labour, like the wheel, conduces towards a good end. i fancy that a decadent people, who will neither work nor spin, but choose to rest and lie at ease, give the potter destiny no chance. he has no wheel, this potter--for morocco will not labour, nor be broken, nor disciplined; and so he is reduced to a mere kneading and baking, without the means he fain would employ; and he turns out a mere makeshift--his production at best is "not a dish; no, a bulging, kneaded, crooked, shambling, squint-cornered, amorphous botch--a mere enamelled vessel of dishonour." [illustration: selling earthenware pots. [_to face p. ._] the great pot which the potter slowly evolved out of the soft brown clay under our eyes was not perfect: he made it entirely by eye, and it matched the rest of the group to the ordinary observer; yet it had a distinct "lean." did it grumble to itself, that vessel of the more ungainly make? as human vessels complain sometimes:-- they sneer at me for leaning all awry; what! did the hand then of the potter shake? beyond the potter the ground was covered with an army of his soft mud-coloured vessels, all sorted and arranged in groups which matched, dozen after dozen, far back into the inner shadows of the cave, like some weird and interminable china shop. i gave the old man a cigarette, which he puffed at over his wheel. in the next cave a white-bearded aaron was solemnly dipping dishes into a bowl of blue colour and glaze, and placing each with his finger and thumb on a board by him among countless fellows, while with his other hand he gravely swirled the liquid to prevent its setting. others next him were again cutting out shapes; and three potters were hard at work, one moulding the bodies of pots, another the necks, another the lids, while a fourth put all three together. and thus they laboured on. their slippers lay in the mouths of the caves beside their brown jellabs; and the smell of the moist clay and the drip of water up amongst the green fern mixed with the cool air. almighty potter, on whose wheel of blue the world is fashioned, and is broken too, why to the race of men is heaven so dire? in what, o wheel, have i offended you? chapter vii country people fording the river--we call on ci hamed ghralmia--an expedition across the river in search of the blue pool--moorish belief in ginns--the basha--powder play--tetuan prison. chapter vii set not thy heart on any good or gain-- life means but pleasure, or it means but pain; when time lets slip a little perfect hour, oh! take it--for it will not come again. many walks began by degrees to tell upon our boots, for the cobble-stones of tetuan and the rocks of morocco in general are meant less for boots than for bare feet, which they do not seem to damage. in time, stress of circumstances drove us to a curly black-headed jew bootmaker, whose most expensive pair of thick black boots cost nine shillings. another israelite made us suits of rough brown jellab material, for the sum of £ each--stuff which wore for ever. the mountains on the opposite side of the river were our el dorado, but the river would not go down in january and allow of our fording it; rain followed rain, and it was higher than ever. one market day we walked down to watch the people from the other side come across, on their way into the sok, laden with country produce. years ago a bridge had been built over the wad-el-martine, but, like other moorish architecture, it was not built to last, and the immense floods which swing down the wad-el-martine in winter-time soon left only a broken pier or two, to point out that a bridge had been thought of. the money to build it was supplied by government: half of it went into the pocket of the builder; a little went towards the bridge, which naturally could only be built of rubbish, without proper foundations. now that there is no bridge, it is once more, as it had been for ages upon ages, a case of ferrying across by the big ferry-boat, or of fording. since ferrying means money, and fording only a wetting, most of the market-goers ford. it was a sight to see the countrywomen wading through, one after another like a string of ducks, trying to keep dry: the water came just about up to their bodies, and the white haik and piece of towelling for a skirt could be bundled up somehow--a very few wore short white cotton drawers. their legs were remarkable for an enormous development of muscle in unusual places. once across, they wrung out anything which had been wetted, shivering somewhat; then arranged their voluminous haiks afresh over the mysterious great bundles on their backs, and, padding off in single file, made for the city. what those bundles, which bent their backs half double, had inside them it was impossible to certify: often part of it was a baby, judging by a round shape like a head under the haik, and the fact that, when it had a knock, there was a cry: the rest might be chickens, oranges, vegetables, baskets of eggs, baskets of coos-coosoo, heads of brooms made of bamboo, honey, and so on. some of the chickens dangled in front of the women by strings tied to their waists: the chickens were alive, of course. [illustration: a ferry-boat on market day. [_to face p. ._] on the tops of their heads the women wore enormous straw hats, with brims large enough to act as umbrellas and to keep the rain off their shoulders. the ferry-boat, packed with them _and_ these straw hats, was worth seeing, like a grand-stand in a shower hidden by umbrellas. the weights which the women carry for hours at a time are almost incredible; but they begin as tiny girls, lopping along after their mothers at a half-run under tiny bundles, with the same bent backs; and habit is second nature. after the string of women came along a youth, with two small donkeys, laden with panniers full of green vegetables. the donkeys jibbed upon the brink; many "arrahs" and curses and much cudgelling with a stick got them started; the panniers swayed horribly, and threatened to turn completely round, as the current pushed the donkeys over this side and that. once in, they made pluckily for the opposite shore; but the stream carried them down; the water was well up their bodies; the distracted boy plunged and struggled behind first this one and then the other, whichever seemed in most danger--for the ford was none too wide. urging them to keep up-stream, he clung on to one refractory pannier. the water rose higher and almost took them off their feet; but that was the worst place; now it was better. the leading donkey was in safety in shallower water, nearing dry land; but the other poor fellow seemed less strong, and was not able to make half such a good fight of it--its load may have been heavier. in spite of the boy it got lower and lower down-stream: suddenly there was an upheaval and a splash; its head went under altogether, pack and everything in a hole. then the boy surpassed himself; for, deep as it was, he was there in a moment, got hold of the donkey behind, and pushed and half lifted, at no small risk to himself, and pulled, until the little fellow, after several relapses, found his feet. finally, he waded out, and stood, like a drowned rat, on the bank, pack and all streaming; then he collected himself after a pause, and doddered off towards the sok. the boy shook himself and his soaked clothes, clutched his stick, and ran after his donkeys. a well-to-do moor, possibly a sheikh, was the next to go for the ford. he probably farmed, and his sleek mule was full of green corn and "beans." they were things of colour, the pair of them: all the mule's appointments scarlet, himself a glossy brown; while his master, in dark blue, sat tight on his scarlet saddle, his bright chased stirrups flashing, so short as to bring his feet right up the mule's side--his turban, white as snow, with the red peak of the fez underneath, the deepest blot of colour, against the sky. a white garment waved out in the breeze under the blue jellab; he sat straight as a withy, feeling the mule's mouth with a hard hand, and bringing its nose into the air. there were some bravado and a great deal of assurance in the whole. the world used him well. moors ride everywhere, if they possess anything with four legs. why should they give themselves the fatigue of walking? but besides that, they are horsemen and most at home on a horse, while their country is not one to travel in on foot. having decided that the river was fordable, and that we ought to be able to ride across it, we walked back by way of the city, and went in to tea with a moor, ordering a donkey to be sent out the next day to jinan dolero, which should take us across to our el dorado. the moor who entertained us was a certain ci hamed ghralmia, the eldest son of a government official who had fattened physically and financially on the customs, and whose fine house represented so many perquisites and bribes, and so much pared off the lump sum which went annually up to the sultan. it was as luxurious a house as eastern could wish: soft rabat carpets, old fez silk hangings, round the four-post beds, standing back in recesses in the room into which our host led us,--hangings such as even fez can no longer produce; such silk is not made. one piece, which was quite as handsome in its way, was made years ago in tetuan, from tetuan silk-worms, reared on the slopes outside the mulberry gate--spun, dyed, and woven in tetuan. couches and divans filled up the corners; glowing colours and fine snowy linen abounded. it was a house in which to spend a sleepy sabbath afternoon on a hot day, if it must be spent indoors. cool air blew through the high rooms; the splash and ripple of fountains rose and fell in the cool marble patio below, and echoed up the tiled staircase; while back, far in the shade of the secluded rooms, among avenues of pillars, vistas of light and shade, women like butterflies, in mauve and yellow and white, rose from some soft scented divan and flitted across. and in the centre of it all, a little king, ci hamed ghralmia--a pale, café-au-lait complexioned man, who looked as if life had never shown him one of its angles. he was fat and lineless: soft white hands, fleshy ankles, no knots of muscle in so well-turned-out a mould of cream, not a spot, not a flush, no sign of liver; the lips slightly suggested sensuality, and there was a line of cruelty round the mouth, but no further indication of self-indulgence; he might have lived on sugar and chicken coos-coosoo all his life, and altered in nothing but size since he was a year old, except for a beard on the soft white chin, and his eyes, which were infinitely cunning. brown and cold, like polished marbles, they had not reached that stage of cunning which veils its cunning, but would still gleam at the sight of money and express satisfaction over a well-made bargain. they were suspicious, as the ignorant generally are, and believed in little that they saw. the old biblical characters who walk morocco to-day have most of them the same failing: they are sly. ci hamed ghralmia was an "advanced" moor--that is to say, in the afternoons, lying on his divan, he read arabic books. he had bought some french knick-knacks too. he told us that he rented a shop, in which he sat in the mornings and chatted to his friends, using it not in any way to dispose of any goods, of which it was devoid, but as a sort of "club" or meeting-place. then in the afternoons he occasionally rode out on his mule. he had a garden, i think, outside the city. or he played chess with a friend, or read. perhaps he would use his _hummum_ (turkish bath); he would pray at his own particular mosque, regularly, so many times a day; and he would drink much green tea, and consume sugar, and sleep inordinately. thirty years of this life in tetuan found ci hamed ghralmia still a contented man--supremely so. wrapped in the finest white wool and muslin clothes, he lay along a divan opposite to us upon one elbow, the picture of ease, and talked away. no moor was ever anything but self-composed. upon our camera's coming out, he was much interested; and to prove his progressive and enlightened state of mind, let us photograph him just as he lay there--a vast, voluminous white chrysalis. then he took us to see his wives and slaves--a large party of them. they were allowed to come out on to the staircase and talk to us; but when the interview had lasted five minutes, ci hamed ghralmia clapped his hands twice--we had seen enough--every wife and every slave vanished like magic. [illustration: the author fording the wad-el-martine. [_to face p. ._] the next morning we made one of many expeditions up into the hills on the opposite side of the river, towards the south, and in the direction, though somewhat west, of the riff. we rode in turns, it being somewhat of a rest to scramble along on foot, to say nothing of exercise. the big grey donkey had our lunch, a camera, some field-glasses, and a box for botanical specimens slung about him. we had a fairly intelligent boy--mohammed, a riffi--and managed to understand a word or two he said. it had been explained to him by s`lam that we wished to get to the blue pool if possible. arrived at the river, we found nobody--not being market day, it was utterly deserted. the current was still swirling in a forbidding fashion, but mohammed led the donkey straight in with r.; he tucked up his clothes, held his yellow slippers high in one hand, and after some goading they landed on the opposite bank. mohammed left his slippers, rode back through the river for me, and in due time i was deposited on the shingle. off we set--first by a narrow path, thick on each side with scented violets, and closed in with the usual ten-foot-high cane fence. more streams had to be forded, but they were small and the donkey strong; so, to save time, i sat above his tail, behind r., and he carried us across in one journey. so far we were still down on the flats; the hills towered in front of us; and among the streams, and where the river in its vagaries had often flowed, there was deposited many a rich bed of fruitful mud, turned into valuable land, the very soil _par excellence_ for oranges. and they were all around us--garden after garden, acre after acre, foliage studded with gold knobs by the million. and among them, and as far as the eye could reach, up into the gorge between the hills, picturesque white garden-houses showed through rifts in the half-tropical foliage, or over hedges of prickly pear and oleander. fig-trees, a hundred years old, made faded grey blotches amongst the vivid greenery; the pink bloom of apricot was stainless against stained-yellow walls. in such a place, the inexorable realism of the age in which we live, was shaken--spirits there surely were which should appear. we passed an old countrywoman with a tiny donkey carrying two great panniers full of green-stuffs: she was in difficulties, having a wrestle to make it cross a little stream. mohammed went to her assistance. once over, she climbed on its small back with the help of a stone, putting her foot on its neck to get into her place. and now, leaving the orange gardens and their wealth, our path took an upward turn into a more rugged country, a less fruitful soil. we left a field of pale blue flax on the left--a "blue pool" indeed; and about this point the donkey's pack, which had no breastplate, slipped over its tail; but mohammed's knife, and some string, and the britching, put all to rights for the time being. later on a stirrup-leather broke. following our winding path, we reached at last a white saint-house, which dominated a little hill overgrown with gnarled grey olives, and acted guardian over a large and flourishing village which lay below,--at least it was a collection of mud huts, and more of them than usual, but, like so many of these "villages," seemed to all intents and purposes deserted--a city of the dead. many of the inhabitants were out no doubt, but those who were in were not tempted by curiosity to stare at us: without windows there can be no signs of the rites which are carried on inside the houses. all we saw were dogs, fierce brutes, which stones alone kept at a distance, where they sat showing their teeth and bristling their crests ominously. the saint-house, of course, was forbidden ground: we went as close as common sense permitted, and from under the shady olives looked back at tetuan down below us, a snow-white streak in the valley. some rags were hanging upon a bush near us. it is an interesting and curious practice, that of hanging votive rags upon the bushes around chapels and holy shrines: no less venerable is the performance of pilgrimages to the same. both practices go back into the dim ages. they are in use to this day amongst the shintoists of japan, and the inhabitants of northern asia, india, the orkneys, and remote corners of ireland, where sickly children are dipped in streams, or passed through holes in stones or trees so many times running, going against the way of the sun, in order to produce the effect of making the sick child as strong as a lion. then an offering must be made to the saint, and a rag is torn off somebody's garment, and tied to a bush near his grave, to show that they would have done more for the good saint if they had had the power. rag-trees, burdened with the tattered offerings of the devout and impecunious tribes-people, flourish throughout morocco,--signs hanging out, and blown by the wind, in the face of travellers; warnings of the deep-rooted superstition entangled in the innermost heart-cells of its people, to be disturbed at imminent peril. leaving the saint-house and village, we struck a path upwards into a wild gorge, at the bottom of which a brawling torrent was tumbling. it turned many rude mills, and there were lush fields of corn on its banks. far away in the grey distance now, to the north, we could see a dark wedge of rock, almost on the sky-line beyond the anjera and other hills of morocco: _the_ rock--gibraltar. at this point we lunched. mohammed was provided, and dropped behind a rock: the donkey grazed. a little boy, minding goats, came up with a fascinating pocket-knife, but would not let it go out of his hand. a clear stream gave us drink--it was warm; bees hummed in the balmy air; there was an aromatic scent; clouds hung round the hills; the panorama below was essentially peaceful and "christian." and then we went on in search of the far-famed blue pool. but though we reached where the river lay in still pools, blue beyond all known blues, we found no more--only traces of a great flood and landslips, which, i suspect, had washed away the lake people had talked of. we found enough to bring us back on other days, and to understand why the missionaries take up their tents and camp in the mountains in the summer. we returned by a path farther west, and passed a great olive wood full of black shadows. the scrub on the hillsides holds pig--there are plenty of them; and the boars become more or less antagonistic at certain times in the year. we were told tales of people who had met with terrifying adventures, but personally our expeditions had no such thrilling incidents connected with them. it would have been unwise to stay out after sunset, and that time always saw us back at jinan dolero. it is said to be the most unsafe hour; for men are coming into tetuan, and if they can waylay and rob or murder a traveller, and make their way into the city before the gates shut, half an hour after sunset, and sleep there, who shall suspect them of dark deeds done outside in the evening? besides, mohammed would never have consented to be out late, on account of the firm belief which moors have in evil spirits. there is a special race of beings, they hold, in many respects like men, in others like spirits, called _ginns_. their principal abode is the under-world, but they come up on to the earth, and are fond of lurking in wells and in dark corners, even in houses. rooms are often haunted by ginns: men are surrounded by ginns. some of the more enlightened moors are inclined to represent ginns as merely superstitious imaginations and hallucinations on the part of the ignorant; but probably in his heart of hearts, no moor but has a secret desire to propitiate ginns, and a secret dread of falling in with them. ginns eat and drink and propagate their species, and even form sexual connections with men. a man whose wife is any way odd or mysterious has married of course a ginn. ginns are fond of inhabiting rivers, woods, the sea, ruins, springs, drains, and caves; they come out at night more than by day, and in certain streets no moor will walk at night. nor will a moor sleep alone in a room. ginns, when they appear, take the forms of men, goats, cats, dogs, almost any animal in fact, and also monsters. whirlwinds, and shooting stars, and dear times, and famine, and epidemics, are all caused by ginns. it is the ginns who have eaten all the food in the city when prices are exorbitant. if a man falls down in the dark, it is a ginn: a sudden illness or an accident is the work of a ginn. there are good ginns, but bad ginns are more common. the worst of them all is _iblis_ (the devil). iblis tempts men to wickedness. all iniquity is the fault of iblis. in order to keep the bad ginns at a distance, certain precautions may be taken. salt and steel are antidotes. salt in the hand when going out at night, salt in the pillow when sleeping, are measures which should be used. in building a house some people put salt and wheat and an egg into the ground, and kill a goat on the threshold. on sinking a well (the stronghold of ginns) a goat or sheep must always be killed. the best talisman against ginns is the repetition of certain passages in the kor[=a]n: when passing a dark spot, say the "ajatu-l-kursi": as for neglecting to say "b`ism allah" (in the name of god) before going for a ride, or before doing any sort or kind of action, why, that is to have a ginn as your companion on your horse, and at your elbow, whatever you may be doing. as every place has its "owners," its good or bad ginns, on striking a light and going into a room moors say, "good-evening to you, o ye owners of the place." and if a tent is to be pitched, first of all the protection of good ginns must be solicited in that spot. supposing a ginn gets hold of a man, and he is ill, there are certain doctors, magicians, among the moors who can cast the ginn out. they practice a regular "ginn-cult," and celebrate annual feasts, going outside tetuan to a certain spring near the moorish cemetery, and killing a bullock, a black goat, a black donkey, and some chickens. the word _ginn_ originally meant "the secret," "the mysterious," "the hidden"; and the belief in ginns is part of the actual creed of mohammedans, arabs, and berbers alike. but moors have a hundred superstitions. they believe that all animals had a language once upon a time,--that the horse prays to allah when he stretches out his leg; that the donkey which falls down, asks allah that the same may happen to his master. they say that the donkey was once a man whom allah changed into his present shape because he washed himself with milk; that the stork was a _kadi_, or judge, who was made a stork because he passed unjust sentences upon his fellow-men. it is therefore a sin to kill a stork, or a crow, or a toad, or a white spider, or a white chicken. a white spider once spun its web over a cave where mohammed hid: his enemies saw it, thought therefore that no one could have recently entered the cave, and passed on. it is hardly necessary to say, that about death--the great secret--there are numerous superstitions. there were too many funerals in tetuan: early in the afternoon one was often encountered at the gate of the tombs; death would only have taken place that morning, without much inquiry as to its cause, and whether by fair means or foul nobody knew and few cared. the procession came swinging along, stately men in flowing garments, white and dark, chanting the weird funeral hymn or "lament"--always the same mournful, monotonous cadence, rising and falling in the narrow streets, and at last out into the air. and then once through the báb-el-m`kabar, the great company in white turn into the moorish burial-ground, and arrange themselves in a long line against the hillside, and the chant becomes general, almost a great cry, full of the strange fascination of certain eastern music, withal so unintelligible to europeans. the body, loosely wrapped in white, lies on an open bier. after a sort of service on that rough hillside against the walls of the city, the procession winds on again to the shallow grave: a last chant, and the body goes into the earth, and is quickly covered. a scribe, or reader, is left behind when every one has gone: he reads pieces out of the kor[=a]n over the grave, and chants. friends, mourners perhaps, will come out on other days, and sit round the tomb, reading the kor[=a]n together, and singing the weird, sad melodies. you may see them. but i have never seen a moor give way to the slightest outward expression of grief. mohammedans firmly believe, of course, in a paradise to which the good are admitted: their conception as to this land of the hereafter, largely consisting of gardens and shade, adds a bridge, by which means alone access to paradise is gained. the bridge (_al sirat_) is finer than a hair and sharper than a sword: the wicked invariably turn giddy and fall off into the pit of hell, while the righteous negotiate it in safety. a rich man, when he is buried, is provided with a vault. the body is laid on its right side, its sightless eyes turned to mecca. during the first night, mohammedans hold that the soul remains in the body for the purpose of being interrogated by two angels before it can be admitted into paradise. they appear, and the body is roused to a sitting posture and to temporary life. it replies to the dread examination. if this ends unsatisfactorily, the angels torture and beat the body, until the sepulchre closes in upon it. but if they approve the soul's replies, they bid the man sleep on in peace in the protection of god. travellers complain of a want of "pageant" in morocco. ostentatious funerals and processions of all sorts, public demonstrations over trifles, the worship of gilt and glitter, and the emotional spirit called _loyalty_, of the present day, do not exist in el moghreb. there is a spirit of simplicity about its shows; they do not breathe of money: old as their customs are, there is vigour in them and a certain amount of use, for the people have not outgrown them, do not make of them so many lay figures on which to display signs of their own great wealth. the day of the great feast up at court with the sultan, that is _the pageant_ in all morocco. we missed it. connected with the bashas and kaids, who are the only great men in the country or in the cities, there is little or no respect or formality. only on sundays a sort of "flash in the pan" reminds the moor that he has a little despot in his midst, who is more or less lord of his life; and the drums are heard all over the city, the soldiers turn out, for the basha goes to pray at _el aoli_ (noon) in his own particular mosque opposite his house. on friday, the sabbath, the biggest _sok_ (market) in all the week, a little black flag was flown from the mosque-tops early in the morning to remind tetuan of the holy day. the basha was inside the cool mosque, praying, at the hottest time of the day; outside a few people collected, though the same event happened every friday. no moor is ever busy, ever hurries, but can always wait. at a quarter to one a bugler on the east side of the street, who had been sitting in the sun with his bugle, got up and blew a call to fall in. about sixty soldiers, who had all strolled off after the great man had disappeared into the mosque, sauntered up from different directions. if they were a ragged and indifferently drilled company, there was colour in the ranks at least. every man wore a short scarlet flannel tunic, a pair of white cotton drawers, and a red fez: one drummer had a tunic of beetle-green. as they lined the street, short sturdy men, with hairy legs and coffee-coloured faces, their bright bayonets flashing in the sun, the drums thumping and the trumpeter running up and down the scale, the dazzling sunlight gave a trace of splendour to the medley of scarlet and steel against the whitewashed walls. everybody waited expectant. a stout man in white came out of the mosque, ordered the small boys away, and saw that there was ample room for the basha to pass across the street and into his own house. then the ordinary crowd of worshippers began to file out of the building--prayers over: green-blue kaftans lined with crimson silk, filmy white robes, snowy turbans, moved slowly along--a dignified, impressive crowd. there was a pause before the basha appeared, a man arranging his two yellow slippers side by side upon the doorstep of the mosque. another moment and the great, voluminous, expected figure filled the doorway. a twist of his ankles and he was in his slippers, the bugle sounded, the ragged squad presented arms somewhat untidily, a line of servants bowed themselves low and respectfully before him, and the basha moved slowly across the street. leading his own troops, dispensing justice, an after-type of those great arabs who sprang from the sands of arabia and africa, shook europe, and flourished in spain, a basha should be no tyrant, but a courteous gentleman, a noble of "the arabian nights." but there was no aristocratic trace about asydaibdalkdar. carrying his rosary in his hand, clothed entirely in white, his features bore traces of servility and sensuality, the result of poisoning the arab and berber blood with the strain from central africa. slavery is proving fatal to the moorish race. unlike the well-bred moor, the basha's face was deeply lined: cruelty, cunning, pigheadedness, all fought for the upper hand in his swarthy countenance. he walked in under his own gateway into a courtyard beyond: there he sat down in a corner upon a seat--a great figure, much like some indian god--while his underlings came forward, stood in a semicircle, bowed low, and saluted him; followed by his soldiers, who marched in single file into the courtyard, round it, past their chief, and out again--this three times, to the sound of drums; then, headed by the officer in command, they trooped off to the barracks, the basha's gateway was locked, and church parade was over. [illustration: the basha going to pray. [_to face p. ._] for half an hour all the gates of the city had been barred and bolted, while prayers were going on--there being a superstition among the moors, arising from an old prophecy, that on a certain morning of a mohammedan sabbath, christians will gain possession of the cities while the kaids and bashas are in the mosques. two hundred soldiers are allowed by government to the governor of tetuan, by means of which he is to maintain law and order. however, a hundred only were maintained, and the pay of the remaining half went into somebody's pocket. there was apparently little for them to do; drill was a thing unheard of, and they spent most of the day hanging round the basha's house or doing errands for him. on the feast days there was _lab-el-barod_--the famous "powder play" of morocco; and then the soldiers all turned out into the _feddan_ (the great market-square), and showed what lab-el-barod meant: to me rather a foolish game, with but one interesting point--that it is the imitation of the old arab tribal battle. to-day the moors gallop forward, stand up in their saddles, fire their guns under their horses' necks, over their tails--all this at full gallop--throw their guns into the air and catch them, and last of all pull up in an incredibly short space, dragging their horses right on to their haunches, which evolutions are imitations of what their ancestors did with spear and javelin. lab-el-barod prevailed in spain till the middle of the eighteenth century, and it is still played in the east with reeds. there is of course a picturesque element in it--white turbans, white garments streaming in the wind, scarlet saddles, flashing steel, hard-held horses with yards of tail, and above all, the lithe figures in perfect balance whatever their positions; but the performance is often too "ragged" to be impressive, and it strenuously demands flats of desert as a background. the basha would always come out and look on when there was one of these "field days" at tetuan: his figure was not adapted to his participation therein, being perfectly in keeping with his walk in life, and that walk consisted in his sitting from six o'clock to ten o'clock in the morning, and from three o'clock to six o'clock in the afternoon, in a small open room off the street opposite his house, in a reclining position upon cushions, before him an excited group (as often as not), contradicting, swearing, gesticulating, abusing, all at the same moment--one of whom is carried off by the soldiers to be flogged, another is sent to prison, or, if the seekers after justice wax more troublesome than ordinary, they may all be thrown into prison by the heels together to calm them. at the same time the basha absorbs bribes, and sweeps loaves of sugar, packets of candles, and pounds of tea into his net. these are the ordinary bribes. when he was appointed basha, a royal letter from the sultan was sent to tetuan and read aloud in the mosque: then he entered upon his duties. he must needs go warily from day to day; and even then luck may desert him at any moment, and a summons may arrive from the sultan--he is to go to court at once. i recollect in what abject terror, one basha, who was sent for at a day's notice, set out upon his journey, only to find, when he got to court, that he was to have a more lucrative billet and a higher post of honour. many who have departed in terror, all unknowing of the future, have found, when they reached fez or morocco city, where-ever the sultan might be, that their worst fears were realized. either placed under arrest, tortured, imprisoned, or bastinadoed, the little wealth they had accumulated is extorted from them, under the pretext of there being arrears in taxes or other dues, which must be made good. the wooden jellab is used for the purpose of extorting confession in the case of imaginary wealth supposed to be hidden (and much often is hidden): it is made of wood, resembling in shape a long cloak, and placed in an upright position; the inside is lined with iron points, which prevent the body from resting against it without suffering. inside this "jellab" the basha is squeezed, standing up, and he remains there on a sparse diet of bread and water till he divulges. both the prime minister and the minister of war were sent to the prison in tetuan soon after the accession of the present sultan; but that was for plotting against his life. in the common gaol, heavily chained, under the same roof with the herd of common prisoners, all they were allowed was a curtain across one corner, behind which they sat. the prime minister died there. the minister of war is there to-day, march , and, after over seven years' confinement, getting fat. some members of the rahamna tribe are there also. this tribe, which belongs to the far south, near morocco city, about eight years ago was in a state of rebellion, to quell which the sultan sent his army with orders to _eat them up_. their fat lands and fine gardens were ruined; men, women, and children killed and taken prisoners; while six hundred of them were sent to the tetuan prison, and a great number--i do not know exactly--went to rabat. that was eight years ago. sixty of them are in tetuan prison now, the remnant of six hundred. there is a kaid among them who is very ill, dying: the eight years have done for him. since this was written, an order has come from the sultan for the release of the rahamna tribesmen. in rabat, unfortunately, almost all who were in the kasbah prison died long ago. its insanitary condition has earned for it the name of _dar-el-mout_ (the house of death). but in the other prison there were survivors. these came out with traces of the late governor's butchery. for trying to send a written petition to the sultan three years ago, which set forth their condition, and prayed that after five years' confinement they might be considered to have paid for their rebellious deeds, and be allowed to return to their own land for the last years of their lives, the late governor, ba hamed, gave orders that their hands should be mutilated. a knife was drawn across the back of the wrist, cutting the extensor tendons of the hand: the hand was packed with salt, and sewn up in wet cow-hide. when this was taken off or wore off, it was not recognizable as a hand. miss hanbury, who did her best to institute reforms in moorish prisons, and succeeded in tangier, left at her death a sum of money, out of which £ came to tetuan to be spent on their behalf. it fell into the hands of the lady missionaries, and they spent it in making jellabs for the prisoners to wear, whose garments are worse than filthy. unfortunately £ was not nearly enough to clothe all; it only provided a jellab for one out of every three of the prisoners, and the poor wretches fought like dogs for them. "they will wear them in turns," the gaoler said. he and another moor had superintended the distribution of them; and to their lasting disgrace, deaf to argument and remonstrance on the part of the missionaries, they each appropriated a jellab to himself, saying, "this is my share; this goes to me." they were of coarse material, such as neither gaoler nor under-gaoler would ever wear themselves: all they would do would be to take them into market and convert them into money. "moors have _no_ feelings," people say, and say wrongly; but that, to a great extent, it is true take just one instance--the state of the prisons and prisoners. it was enough in the distance to "wind" the tetuan prison. there remains the reflection--call it comforting if you like--that a people who consent to endure such filth, and misery, and harsh treatment, are not affected by them in the same way in which a highly civilized people would be affected. it is absurd to blame the moorish government; it is absurd to say, "the people are obliged to endure." no people can be forced to endure: a point comes beyond endurance, and they rebel, choosing death rather. the vigorous and progressive race endures least. therefore on the moors' own heads be the state of their prisons, the treatment of their prisoners: to that cursed spirit of _laissez-faire_ half the blame is due; the rest comes of their indifference to suffering, to bad smells and dirt and a sedentary existence. it is manifestly unfair to blame certain ministers and officials. taking into consideration the manners and customs, hopes and fears, of the moorish people, their prisons probably suit them right well, and they need no pity. * * * * * it was not always easy to get provisions, except life's bare necessities, in tetuan. provision stores, which were long out of their goods, always had the same answer when asked for them--"m[=a]nana" (to-morrow); and to-morrow never came. but it is unwise to "hustle the east": men have died trying to find a way of doing so. therefore we chewed with philosophy the cud of the moorish proverb:-- "_manage with bread and butter till god brings the jam._" on the whole we fared not amiss, while our establishment, with its two riffi servants, man and wife, worked well, until an occurrence took place which shook it to its very foundations, and left us to the end with a question which will never be solved. one evening, about half-past five, just as we had settled ourselves down after tea to read, there was an unusual stir on the stairs. a minute later and the door burst open. tahara staggered in, followed by s`lam, who seemed very much excited and alarmed. the woman was deathly pale; her eyes were ringed with black. r. and i, seeing she was ill, jumped to the conclusion that something or other was very wrong with her, and tried to make her sit down, or lie down, at once, on our divan. in a confused scene which followed, the only words we grasped were, "tabiba, tabiba" (doctor), and s`lam, at our instigation, rushed downstairs to go off to tetuan, and to bring back with him miss z----, one of the lady missionaries. tahara was almost beside herself, apparently with terror, and for a few moments one was inclined to doubt her sanity. we tried vainly to quiet her, almost holding her on the divan; but there was evidently something on her mind which every moment threw her into fresh agitations, and--_ah! what would we not have given to have understood arabic!_ for tahara knew no french, like s`lam, and could barely say half a dozen words in english; her spanish, of which she knew a few words, was greek to us too. "signorita! signorita! tabiba!" she kept repeating, wailing, and then a torrent of shillah and arabic and spanish would follow, and we were at our wits' end. at last r. managed to quiet her a little, and by-and-by to make her try to help us to understand, by saying slowly in arabic two or three words which would be intelligible to us, together with the word or so of english which she herself knew. then we gathered that her one desire was that i should go to the tabiba's. but why? we told her that s`lam had gone. she burst out into fresh agonies and shrieks: "s`lam not go! s`lam not go!" then she got up, and apparently wished to go downstairs--the last thing we thought she ought to do; but all our efforts to keep her still seemed rather futile; and from what she was trying to make us understand, there was more behind than we had an idea of. she went, almost ran, down into her and s`lam's bedroom, we following hard behind. inside the room she tip-toed up to a recess high in the wall, almost out of her reach, and with difficulty lifted down a small bundle of rags. this she unrolled, fold after fold, before our eyes, while a thousand guesses as to what was coming rushed through the brain; the last rag came off, and a small blue bottle, about four inches high, lay in her hand. she held it up to the light. it was half full of a colourless liquid like water. we read the label--"prussic acid. poison"; and an ugly fear took the place of vague conjecture. "who has eaten this?" r. asked in scanty arabic. "anna" (i), replied tahara. the remedy of hot boiled milk rushed into both our heads at once, but tahara was again beginning in a fresh agony, which was now more persistent than only terrified; and choking off her stream of words, we managed to gather, that what she wanted was to go herself with me into the city, at once, to miss z----. now a few drops of prussic acid of course meant that she had not long to live, and yet there were no symptoms of poisoning so far as we could gather at present. she might have taken it in a diluted form certainly. the whole thing was possibly wild imagination on her part. at any rate miss z---- would understand her, and that we could not do. i hurried on my boots, questioning as to whether the woman really meant that s`lam had poisoned her. r. helped tahara wind her long white woollen haik round her. in two minutes i was ready. tahara slipped into her slippers, and, with the white shrouded figure clinging to me, in the fast-deepening dusk we started. it took fully twenty minutes to walk from jinan dolero to the house in the middle of the city where the lady missionaries lived and had a dispensary. miss z---- had had some medical experience, and was a clever woman. she understood, probably as far as any european can understand, the moorish character; and it was with some confidence--possibly on the part of us both--that we set out. but the way seemed lengthy; i knew that s`lam would be there long before we could arrive: through the city there are at least three intricate ways by which the house is reached, and my heart sank as i reflected that there was every chance of miss z---- and s`lam's taking another way than our own, and thus missing us. meanwhile, it was growing darker every moment. would the city gate still be open when we reached it? was it not certain to be shut when we wanted to return? tahara hung on to my arm and hand. there had been rain, and we both slipped about in the dark, and splashed into unseen pools; she took off her pink slippers and carried them in one hand, and paddled along on her bare feet at a moorish woman's top speed, still shaking with terror. three or four times, dark as it was, she stopped and put out her tongue for me to look at it. it seemed very pink, and i did my utmost to reassure her, having disturbing visions of her collapsing altogether on the grass; for if she was to be understood rightly and believed, she had pains in her body, and breathing seemed an effort. we were crossing the cemetery now by one of the intricate paths which intersect it. there seemed not a soul within sight or sound. every moor would be inside his house or hut. i hoped tahara would pull herself together and last as far as miss z----'s. she said she was _bueno_, meaning good, better, and spoke again of the bottle which she was carrying carefully hidden in her waistband. then, as far as i could understand, she wished me to know that the poison had something to do with the signoritas--ourselves--and our food. this was a most unpleasant reflection: i devoutly hoped that r. would not begin dinner before i got back, and comforted myself with the assurance that it was unlikely, there being no one to get it ready. we had no outside man at that time sleeping in the house. "s`lam _no_ good; s`lam _no_ good," tahara kept repeating. and, to tell the truth, our long-legged ruffian rose before my eyes as no mean embodiment of a stage villain. the riffis are notoriously treacherous and put no value whatever on life; at the same time i knew that they made good and faithful servants up to a certain point, and i shrank from distrusting a man who had so far served us well. and yet, how much does one know of them? nothing. we had had suspicions that all was not going smoothly with the two servants: though they had been married so lately there was friction between them; tahara had been heard crying at night, and had looked red-eyed. it was likely, therefore, that there had been a quarrel. s`lam's old mother may have made mischief. she was madly jealous of tahara, whom s`lam had married without letting her know. he had gone over to tangier; had arranged the marriage with tahara's brother, who was living at tangier with her; had brought her off, hardly a happy or willing bride, for he told us that she cried the whole of the journey; and had sprung her upon his old mother at tetuan. in his bachelor days s`lam's earnings had gone to the old woman. now they were spent on his wife and himself. therefore maman saw nothing that was good in tahara, and would have given much, no doubt, to see the last of her. meanwhile, the city gate drew near. tahara was moving along firmly with her hand in mine. the gate was still open!--that was a relief. we hurried through, and, seeing a group of soldiers waiting outside, i judged that it was just about to be shut. we were none too soon: the bars behind us clanged into their places. i much wished that r. was not henceforth cut off from all communication with me, and left outside the city entirely by herself: there were the two guns and revolver; after all, the house was no more likely to be molested on this night than on any other. [illustration: the feddan, tetuan. [_to face p. ._] the narrow streets were nearly pitch dark; shadowy figures passed us at first; and tahara drew her haik all over her face, leaving only a slit for the eyes, and put on her slippers once more. occasionally a little shop had its hard-working inmate, sewing at slippers by the light of an oil lamp; but for the most part all was black darkness. how long the intricate streets seemed! we stumbled on the rough cobbles and slid into the muddy gutter. tahara's slippers again impeded her, and off they came. i wished devoutly i knew where miss z---- was, and could make straight for her, probably hurrying at that moment for jinan dolero, somewhere in the maze of streets and houses. we crossed the great open feddan, all deserted, and i strained my eyes for a glimpse of her tall figure beside that of s`lam's--in vain. late as it was, children were about; they collected gradually behind us and followed us, nor was it easy at that time of night to drive them off. tahara, though still struggling on, was leaning heavily on my arm. the sooner we get to the mission house the better. two more narrow lanes, a last winding alley, and the welcome door of the tabiba's--never more welcome. i called to miss z---- as i led tahara into the courtyard. her answering voice was all i would have prayed for at that moment. she was just starting with s`lam. leading tahara to the door, we found him on the threshold, with his old mother, whom he must have gone first to fetch--maman, whom r. and i had ever distrusted: feeling that she was after no good the first time she came to the house, we had limited her visits. i told s`lam to stay outside. he did not seem astonished at seeing his wife and myself, asking not a single question of either. miss z---- took tahara upstairs into her bedroom, and i followed, explaining that tahara did not want any one else to come in. for a moment or two, after we got her up into the room, all her old terror seemed to return; she was unable to speak, and collapsed upon the floor--a ghastly colour. briefly explaining to miss z---- that tahara believed herself to be poisoned, we knelt down on the floor and examined her. there were no apparent symptoms of poisoning--none; she was only cold and terrified beyond words. miss z---- did her best to calm her, and laughed away her fears, hoping to get rid of the state of panic which her condition suggested more than any poisoning. the next thing to be done was to persuade tahara to explain matters to miss z----. this might have been easy enough at jinan dolero with s`lam out of the way; but here, feeling that he and maman were under the very windows, her terror was abject, and i almost gave up hope of getting a syllable out of her. we shut every window, we shut the door, we pulled down the blinds, to satisfy her; we even stopped up the ventilation-holes; and then she still hesitated and trembled. at last, crouched on the floor, miss z---- kneeling by her, tahara, with her mouth at miss z----'s ear, murmured her tale in arabic, while i wished i could understand. _s`lam had given her poison. people in the city had spoken against her and said evil things about her. s`lam was jealous. he had been very angry. they had quarrelled, and he had poisoned her. but he must never, never, on any account, know that she had been to the tabiba's to tell the tale. if s`lam suspected that tahara knew he had tried to poison her, and had told us of it--well, her life was not worth a flus._ even i knew that. then in a fresh agony of terror she crouched on the floor. i told her to show miss z---- the bottle. now to part with the bottle, or to run the faintest risk of s`lam's seeing it, was evidently a nightmare to the poor girl. if he ever found out that she had taken it and brought it to miss z---- . . . we wasted many precious moments in trying to persuade tahara to take it out of her belt, where it lay concealed, and show it to miss z----. she looked at the curtains, at the door. could s`lam possibly see? at last, more or less by force, i got possession of it, handed it to miss z---- with one hand, and kept tahara still on the floor with the other. the stopper of the bottle, miss z---- thought, had a suspicious smell, but she gave it as her verdict that the bottle itself contained nothing but water. she recognized it at once as having belonged to s`lam's late master, who always kept drugs in his house, and the name of whose english chemist was on the label. miss z---- poured a teaspoonful into a tumbler, and returned the bottle to tahara, who was getting rabid at the delay. the teaspoonful we decided should be given to one of miss z----'s little chickens which she was rearing. i said i would come in the morning and hear her report. meanwhile, tahara had refolded and hidden the precious bottle as it was before, and miss z---- had managed more or less to reassure her, promising her that she was not poisoned this time, and laughing at her panic. the pain of which she had complained had no doubt a natural cause: giddiness might come on through bending over the charcoal fire cooking dinner, miss z---- told her. now tahara's only terror was that s`lam should ever find out what had happened. the bottle must be taken home--must be replaced exactly where it had been found. unsatisfactory as such a course was, there was some risk in pursuing any other. s`lam, if he found out that his wife had betrayed him or had suspected him and come to us, might shoot her like a dog, in a passion, and be inside the borders of the riff in a few hours. and who would blame him, if he gave as his reason for his whole line of conduct that his wife had been unfaithful to him, false though such a statement might be? a girl in tetuan a few years ago was _suspected_ of having been seduced. her father took her and her mother out to the mussulman cemetery, within sight and hearing of the city--the girl was sixteen: he shot her on the road, and he and the mother dug a grave and buried her by the roadside. they went home, and no one said a word. the man still lives in tetuan. miss z---- evidently shared tahara's fears, and was anxious to allay any suspicions which s`lam might begin to entertain. first, however, she found out from tahara that s`lam had no intention of poisoning the signoritas (_us_)--that was _quite_ a mistake--at least so the girl assured her. then, having once more reassured tahara about her own health, miss z---- led her downstairs; there she explained to s`lam and to his old mother that the girl was very nervous, that she had not felt well, was to take a pill that night (one had been given her), and was to keep quiet to-morrow, in which case she ought soon to be quite right. miss z---- wanted to walk out with me and to sleep at jinan dolero, evidently not liking our passing a night alone under such suspicious circumstances; but i was convinced there was no cause for fear, and i think we both knew that the less we made of what had happened the better; so, borrowing a lantern, i started back for jinan dolero, tahara clinging to my arm, s`lam lighting the way, and the old mother following. arrived at the city gate, it was shut. i had a strange wait alone with tahara and maman, while s`lam fetched a soldier to unbar the gate. the basha's leave had to be got, and the basha sent to the english vice-consul to ask if it was his will that the gate should be opened for a british subject. eventually we got through, all except maman, who said good-night and went home. it was a cheering sight to see at last a little light far away in the valley where our house lay--the only light visible. r. had left the curtains undrawn. in good time we reached the garden-house. i took tahara straight into the bedroom, s`lam going to the kitchen to prepare dinner. the little bottle in its wrappings was immediately replaced in its niche, and tahara ate some food which we brought her. s`lam, as usual, waited on us: he was oddly obsequious and deprecating in his manner, and i could not quite understand it. the night passed quietly. early next morning maman appeared, which neither of us liked, but she had come ostensibly to ask after tahara, who had quite recovered. i walked into the city, and went to the mission house to see miss z----. the chicken was quite as well as tahara, and the liquid which at least one of them had taken was probably water. even so, the mystery was not cleared up. if it was water, why did s`lam keep it wrapped up, and why did tahara think it was poison? it was half empty. if tahara had ever seen it full, somebody must have drunk a dose. of course s`lam's old master had not left a bottle of prussic acid about, and then not missed it. he probably emptied the bottle and then threw it away; it might have had a drop or two left in it, and the bottle may have been filled up with water; but that was pure conjecture. the poisons moors so easily get, and which s`lam or his mother could supply themselves with, are generally in a powder form. i do not know how they would mix with water: they are generally slow in working, sometimes weeks in taking effect. there was no reason why tahara should not be poisoned by such a drug, and yet feel no ill effects for the present. thus we argued. poisoning in morocco is such an every-day occurrence that it was a most ordinary suspicion on tahara's part. after all, there might be nothing in it, but merely a fear grounded on all sorts of reasons and assumptions. it is only a matter of sitting down and thinking to conjure up plenty of fears in morocco. feeling that it was not pleasant to have a bottle marked "poison" in the house, and not to be positive as to its contents, i resolved to empty and wash it out, sending the so-called "water" to an analyst at tangier, and refilling the bottle with _bonâ-fide_ water before replacing it. the chicken test was not thoroughly satisfactory. as matters stood, miss z---- decided to come out that afternoon to our house, while s`lam should be sent away on an errand, in order that tahara might be interrogated and the thing ended. [illustration: charming snakes. [_to face p. ._] arrived home, i found that s`lam had been dispatched to the city to market, and that maman had gone with him. alas! the little bottle had disappeared; it was no longer in the niche which could be seen every time the door was passed. miss z---- arrived in the afternoon. by that time some other occult influence had come to work in tahara's mind, and directly miss z---- spoke to her it was evident that she was hedging. as long as she was terrified and had lost her head she blurted out the truth; but given time to think the matter over, a thousand side-issues weighed with her, and she was no more inclined to trust us than she would have been to trust a moorish woman, who is brought up to lies, intrigue, and diplomacy, and fed upon such axioms as "when you have nothing else to tell, tell the truth." _the bottle_, she said, _had been taken away by s`lam and his mother. it belonged to his mother. it was poison to poison people in the riff._ a little later on she said _it had nothing whatever to do with s`lam, and that it had only water in it--that s`lam had told her so. that she had never seen him put anything into her food. that he was "good." that she only had a bad pain last night. that she did not know why the bottle had been brought there._ and so on. her one prayer was that the signoritas would forget all that had happened. but for days she would not let us: by creeping up when s`lam was out of the way and putting her finger on her lips, by anxious questionings and gesticulations, the thing was never allowed to rest. she felt, probably, that she was past one danger--there was no more to fear in that direction for the present; but that if her riffi husband ever suspected she had "given him away," he would soon dispose of so troublesome an incubus. and so we found the matter had come to a deadlock: more we shall not know. it was typical of the moors and their ways. it was, i cannot help thinking, rather a shady business. taking into consideration s`lam's manner towards us for days after, added to those intuitions which one has and cannot put into words, it struck us that s`lam himself did not think the bottle had only water in it. ask no questions in this strange land. lies are the portion meted out to the inquirer: it is not well to know too much. "knowledge and virtue and a horse's mouth should not pass through too many hands," and "if you question knowledge, it falls from its estate"--thus the moors. i shall hear from miss z---- of tahara's future welfare, unless she is moved from tetuan. if she comes to an untimely end within the next year or so, our suspicions were not groundless. for the present we "forget," of course. for the whole affair-- oh no, we never mention it; its feet are never heard! chapter viii missionaries at tetuan--poisoning in morocco--fatima's reception--divorce--an expedition into the anjeras--an emerald oasis. chapter viii "_the friendship of man is like the shade of the acacia. yet while the friendship lives, it lives. when god wills it to die, it dies!_" mused dicky, with a significant smile. "friendship walks on thin ice in the east." three times a week, from ten o'clock to twelve o'clock in the morning, the lady missionaries opened their dispensary, which, as there was no man missionary in tetuan, was in women's hands alone, miss banks at the head. though, unfortunately, she was not an m.d. nor a qualified surgeon, the good which she and her staff did was incalculable. the first day on which the dispensary was open after rámadhan over sixty moors came to be doctored. the day i went, there were forty-four; and the two rooms--one for men, one for women--were as full as they would hold, while a large surplus stood waiting their turn outside. most of them were of the lower class of moors: the better class of women would ask miss banks to visit them in their own houses; the better class of men would not go to lady missionaries. the patients sat round the rooms in a circle. miss banks went to each in turn, and made a note of the case in a book. this over, she retired to an inner room; and, among scales, and glass measures, and drugs, and tins, and bottles by the score, proceeded to make up all the various medicines. meanwhile, two others of the staff took up positions in the middle of the circles of men and women, and read the bible to them in arabic and talked to them. they seemed to listen attentively, and one or two nodded occasionally in agreement with what was said. thus, though everybody was doctored and provided with medicine gratis, they had to sit and listen for a certain time to christian views, _nolens volens_; and this is the chief opportunity which missionaries have of preaching to the mohammedan world. many of the patients who had been before brought medicine-bottles and ointment-boxes to be refilled. if not, the bottles had to be paid for. in the first instance they were given in with the medicine; but bottles are things of great value to the labouring moor, and it was found that the people came purely for the sake of getting them--once outside the house, the medicine was thrown away. one woman paid for her bottle in kind--four eggs. some of the bottles were absurdly small; others the reverse, for one woman appeared carrying a great earthenware water-pot standing three feet high. "my daughter," she said to miss banks, "i want medicine." "yes, but i cannot give you medicine in such a huge pot." "my daughter, i have been three days on the road, and i want _much_ medicine." another woman, who looked old and decrepit, begged and prayed that a bottle might be given her. miss banks was adamant. the woman whined and entreated from ten till half-past eleven: "i am too poor to buy one. look at me; i am ill," and so on--until at last one of the other missionaries begged miss banks to give her a bottle and send her away. still she refused to break her rule. the last patient got up to go. it was twelve o'clock. the old woman thrust her hand into the rag round her waist, pulled out a bottle, and handed it to miss banks to be filled. the cases we saw were numerous. a mother with two little boys whose heads had to be examined: they were dispatched with a box of ointment (sulphur and oil) and a bottle of medicine. a boy with swelled glands had them painted. a woman had her chest painted, a man various parts of him. pills, ointment, powders, etc., were distributed, with manifold instructions, repeated again and again, until the patient's clod-like brain had been penetrated and set in motion. even then one would turn round at the door and say, "then i am to eat this ointment?" a woman was given some salts wrapped in paper, to be mixed with water and taken the next morning fasting. she did not come again for a month, and she brought with her a large earthen pot half full of water and paper. she had mixed the salts in this with their wrapping, and had been drinking a mouthful daily, but felt no better. miss banks gave a woman in good circumstances a bottle of medicine which was to last her eight days, and be taken after food; also some liniment for external use. an urgent summons came two days later: the woman was dying. "i thought it did me so much good that last night i took all the rest, and then i drank the liniment," she said. she recovered. a man did the same with pills--was so much pleased with the effect of one that he devoured the rest all at once. they invariably ate the paper in which pills or powders were wrapped. on one occasion miss banks went to see a girl whom she was attending, and who seemed worse. the answer, when asked if she was having her medicine regularly, was, "oh no! she's so ill just now. when she's a little better, we shall give it to her." supposing that a patient dies, or a man who has once been a patient dies, the people have no hesitation in saying to the missionaries when they meet them in the street, "oh! so-and-so's taken your medicine, and it's killed him." it is impossible to trust moors with medicines which could damage them; this seriously handicaps a doctor: in extreme cases the dose must be administered by the doctor personally. besides the dispensary, the missionaries had day schools for the children, night schools for boys, and mothers' meetings for women. here, again, the mothers who attended the meetings were given the material of the clothes which they made for nothing; but they were obliged to sit down and listen to a bible lesson first. it was one way, it was an opportunity, of bringing christianity before mohammedans. [illustration: moors at home. [_to face p. ._] thus through the meetings and the schools and the dispensary the missionaries knew many of the women in tetuan, and there were few houses into which they had not been at one time or another. sometimes it was possible to read to the people in their homes, sometimes to talk. but with the men they seldom came in contact. never with an educated moor. he would despise women in general, despise christianity past words, and decline to argue on such a point with a man. people are apt to forget that mohammedanism is a faith to which many millions of earnest and intelligent men and women have pinned their salvation. to talk and argue with these--it is almost a truism to say--a missionary must be "up" in that subject which they have at their finger-tips--namely, their religion. this means that he or she must have a complete knowledge of the kor[=a]n; must know the traditions relating to mohammed and his companions; must be able to converse about the divinity and the innumerable saints of islam; must have read various religious treatises; and, above and beyond all, must understand to the smallest point the habits of the mohammedan himself, know his life, be able to follow his thoughts, understand his actions, and be in sympathy with his recreations as well as with his work, otherwise the missionary treads on the mohammedan's toes fifty times a day, and provokes amusement, mingled with contempt, of which resentment is born. needless to say, few missionaries in morocco, except at the end of their life's work, possess these qualifications. only a limited number know the arabic language: they speak it colloquially of course, but the immense difficulties, which a thorough knowledge of it entails, debar most of them from satisfactory study. after years upon years of hard work, an arabian scholar frankly avowed to me that he had but skimmed the surface of the depths of the arabic language. as far as the old idea of missionary work goes--of preaching to an attentive throng of mohammedans and baptizing converts--morocco ranks nowhere. the missionary who comes out to el moghreb does incalculable good in curing the hereditary disease and taint with which an eastern nation is rife, and many influence the surrounding people by the example of a good life and contact with a civilized mind: he or she is to be profoundly admired for the determination with which one end and one aim are held in view from first to last, and to the furtherance of which the whole of life is made subservient; and yet the shadows of disappointment must darken that missionary's path sometimes, unless he or she is a philosopher. for we met with none who could point us out a single convert, openly declaring himself to be one. in tetuan, after twelve years' work, there was not one. two women there were, who acknowledged to the missionaries, that they preferred christianity to mohammedanism, and who in private make use of christian forms of prayer, but they would not "declare" their belief. it is said, and no doubt truly, that there would be many converts to christianity in morocco among the lowest class, if it were not for the persecution of the government, and the strong anti-christian feeling which exists amongst those in authority. the religion and the government are one; the sultan is the religious head, a direct descendant from mohammed; consequently mohammedanism is _enforced_. a woman who declared herself a christian would have her children taken from her; a man would be flogged round the city and boycotted, if he was not killed. thus the prospects of the would-be convert are not happy: all which the missionaries have to offer him is, on the one hand martyrdom, on the other a miserable line of compromise--a life, that is to say, of concealment and deceit towards those nearest him, for though christian at heart, he must yet remain mohammedan to the world. this latter course of compromise is the line which is followed, and it is the course which is tacitly inculcated by the missionaries. i heard of no martyrs, nor christian moors openly declared, living in morocco at peace with mankind. there is a hitch somewhere. christianity is in danger of being dragged in the dust. if it were possible for missionaries to make their doctrines appeal to the powerful and more enlightened class among the moors, influencing the country to such an extent that it should adopt christianity of its own accord, this could never be so. but it is not possible. in the present state of morocco the idea is laughable. it is hardly to be expected that the most fanatical and conservative nation ever evolved, will cast its religion, like a snake its skin, at the bidding of a body of despised europeans. before such a revolution could take place, the character of such a nation must entirely change; the moor must be broadened and given a scientific training, if he is ever to become of a "progressive" turn of mind, desiring other ideals than those of his forefathers. at the same time the missionary must be adequately equipped for the fray, must be a "strong man," must possess some of the qualifications of a leader. the first point is the all-important one: that more knowledge should be given to mohammedans--scientific knowledge; that they should be fired to improve their own condition and that of their country, making themselves capable of mixing as equals with men who stand for the highest products of civilization the world so far knows. then, educated and self-educating, their creed, whatever it is, will be the outcome of their secular training. it matters little what the belief, so long as the individual is free as air to adopt it or not at his own discretion. it would appear, then, that morocco needs schools, colleges, and men of unusual calibre to deal with them. the doctor-missionaries do a vast amount of good; but it would seem that effort directed in fresh channels should meet with better results, and that so far there has been a tendency to "begin at the wrong end." it is easy to sit down and criticise; it is easy to map out new paths, the difficulties connected with which, few critics can realize. while we see that many of the old by-ways are tortuous and lead to error, and that many of them only result in waste of energy, let us at the same time not forget to give all honour to those who set out to dig them, for even "defeat, is great." one afternoon i walked round with miss banks, visiting patients. we started from the mission house with a basket of medicines, ointment, thermometer, paint-brush, etc., and dived into the little, narrow, crowded streets of countless windowless houses. the first call we paid was at the house of a moor in the capacity of "gentleman farmer": of course he was out. miss banks knocked; there was a movement on the other side, but no answer. she called through the keyhole, "anna. tabiba" (i. doctor); and a discreet slave, trained by a jealous and distrustful master, opened at the sound of her voice. we walked into a three-cornered, tiled patio: the lady of the house came to meet us in a pink jellab, shook miss banks's hand and kissed her own, shook mine and again carried hers to her lips; then led us into a room opening on to the courtyard, with divans, in white, all round upon the tiled floor next the wall. we all three sat down cross-legged on the cushions, and our hostess related her symptoms to miss banks. she had a bad cough, and seemed glad to have her chest painted with iodine. she was the daughter of her husband's cowman; and if, according to english ideas, somewhat below him in rank, was no worse educated than the first lady in the land. it is odd that, while moors are gentlemen born, their woman-kind, narrowed and degraded, are in no sense aristocratic. they will stand upstairs and shout "come!" to any one who is calling upon them and waiting below. "sit down," they will say imperatively: it is always the imperative. if they are asked to show anything, they will bring it and almost throw it at the visitor's head. they have no "breeding." our hostess was thin, and not at all typical of a moorish wife; for a moor likes a waist which he can barely clasp with both arms, and women, when they desire to attract, fatten themselves at once. a woman who is engaged, is crammed with sweet fattening pills and farinaceous food. at one end of the room we sat in, was a gorgeous four-poster bed, hung with scarlet, and covered with embroideries, the posts painted bright green, and a great gilt crown on the top of all. when no furniture is bought except divans and a bed, all the dollars can be piled on the bed. we left a bottle of mixture out of the basket and a doll for the only child, which would be treasured, for a bunch of rags is the nearest moorish approach to a doll. from this house we went on to our hostess' old home, where her father, the cowman, lived. the patio there was cold and bare, and seemed the general living-room; some wood was stacked in one corner; there was a well in another; there was an overpowering smell of "drains" everywhere; while in the third corner a poor, miserable little girl sat huddled up, with frightened eyes. several families lived together in this small house, and no fewer than six women crowded round the girl to explain her symptoms to miss banks. it was only too apparent what was wrong, when she uncovered her neck. syphilis, hereditary--a terrible evil, to be found all over morocco, the result of mohammedan customs and bad food. considering that women are divorced and remarried over and over again, and that the conditions under which they live are so unhealthy, it is small wonder if disease in some form or other does not show itself. examples are to be met with in almost any street--the features of the face obliterated, and so on. the poor child, whom miss banks was treating, had been married. now that this disease had broken out, her husband would probably divorce her. if she were cured, she might marry again. her friends had brought her all the way from shesaw[=a]n to tetuan to be cured, and a jew doctor had offered to put her right for the sum of £ . "but," said her friends, "suppose she dies? what shall we get for our money then?" so they sent to the english tabiba, who cures for nothing. miss banks left ointment and medicine. cases can be cured if the patient will persevere long enough with the medicine; but many of them are too far gone when they first come. an old man upstairs in the same house, but of a different family, claimed her attention next. three weeks ago he was perfectly well. he went to a café one evening, drank a cup of coffee, came home, was seized with pain, and became completely paralyzed. it pointed to poison, but he had no enemies. mercury is very largely used as a poison, and is given in different forms. little is thought of ending life by this means, unless there happen to be influential relations who object to their relatives being in this summary manner "put out of the way." there is a girl now in tetuan who keeps a shop. her father and mother kept it before her, but she said that they were both so old, had lived so long, and had had their day, that she felt something must be done to secure her own turn, and that speedily. therefore she gave them both some poison. there was a funeral. she took over the shop. another woman was anxious to poison her husband because he was about to take a second wife. she prepared him the dish with the poisoned pieces. suddenly she saw her child run into the house and join his father at the meal. careless of betraying herself, she rushed to her benjamin with cries of alarm,--too late; he had eaten, and he succumbed that night. the husband died at the end of a year from the effects of the same poison. some of the drugs which moors use take even longer to destroy life, but it is only a matter of time. the woman was put in prison, but she came out after twelve months, and another man has taken her to wife. some missionary and poisoning experiences are amusing. people often came and asked for poison to administer to somebody who happened to annoy them. a slave appeared once and said, "i have a mistress: she's very old, isn't she?" "yes," said the missionary. "she doesn't enjoy life now much, does she?" "no, i don't think she does much." "would she enjoy being with the lord much more than living on like this?" "yes," said the missionary, "she would be far happier with the lord." "then," said the slave, "give me some poison to send her to him." * * * * * meanwhile, miss banks looked at her patient, who might or might not have had his life tampered with; but there was little she could do then. we left that house and walked on into the poorest part of the city, down a little alley which was hard to find, in search of a certain door which was still harder. after two or three mistakes, we hit upon the right one, and knocked at an old, battered, rat-eaten entrance falling to pieces. "anna. tabiba," called miss banks; and the door was opened by a countryman, a riffi, rough-looking, only a coarse jellab over him, but with a kind expression on his face. the space inside was something like a chicken-pen. we stooped under a very low doorway in the farther wall, and went into a little shed-like lean-to, where the inhabitants evidently lived entirely. a boy of thirteen was lying on the ground, covered with a piece of sacking. the father squatted down beside him. two girls were grinding beans close to them in a hand-mill--the old mill of . . . "the one shall be taken, and the other left." miss banks and i seated ourselves on a wooden rail, which was part of a manger or a sheep-pen. these riffis had been forced by famine to abandon their home and come down into tetuan, where at first they had lived in a cave, on roots principally. the father would go out and hoe when he could get work--every land-owner has hoeing to be done; but lately he had had fever. the boy had an abscess, and could not move. in spite of it he smiled cheerfully, and was delighted with a new red jellab which miss banks brought him. poor little chap! he did not live to wear it. i gave him a trifle to buy food. beyond the dried beans in course of being ground, and half a lemon, there was no sign of anything to eat. beans and lemons to fight an abscess! [illustration: straw for sale. [_to face p. ._] after miss banks had attended to the child, we took our way to the house of a moorish doctor, who had been unable to cure himself, and had sent in desperation for his european rival. he was lying on a divan upstairs, himself the colour of oatmeal porridge, with his wife attending to him; and he had a terrible sore on his thigh. this was duly attended to. the long fast of rámadhan might partly account for his state of health. in spite of his faith in miss banks, which he would sooner have died than acknowledged, he had unbounded confidence in his own skill as a doctor. we asked him if he could read. "read? no. why should he read? what was the use of reading? the thing you wanted to do was to _remember_. now he, if he was doctoring any one, he would try first this herb and then that. this herb no good. try another. another no good. another no good. he might try twelve herbs, and all no good. and the thirteenth herb would be good. and then he would _remember_ that herb. why! all his doctoring he taught himself . . ." a rough sort of doctoring it is too, consisting of two remedies--a violent purge, or else burning with a hot iron. every sore place is burnt; and for all sorts of illnesses, in cases of rheumatism, etc., etc., the patient is scored, perhaps all over his chest or back--"fired" like a horse. sores are always cauterized. bullets are never extracted. wounds are bound up with earth and rags. a serious gunshot wound, means death. certainly there is a wide field for women doctors in morocco. from this house we went on to one where the father, mother, and children were all having a meal--a poverty-stricken family again, where one of the children was wasting away with fever. the rest of the party were sitting round an earthenware pan, which was full of mallow leaves, stewed in native oil, with red pepper and garlic in huge quantities. they were dipping in their fingers, fishing out the greasy mallow and garlic, and laying it on their brown native bread and eating it. they insisted upon our joining them. it is no excuse to say "i have dined lately," for a moor eats at any time, when there happens to be food. miss banks tasted the stew with a heroism worthy the noblest end. we went on to the house of a man who has one of the best shops in tetuan. it was consequently comfortable, and delightfully fresh-looking. the master of the house was in bed with fever--that is to say, we found him reclining on a divan on the floor, beside a gorgeous bed, with a lily-white turban fresh from the wash-tub wound round his head. we sat down on the divan running round the room, and miss banks was glad to hear that her patient had at last consented to take quinine. he was worn-looking, with small black beard and moustache. moors, like every effete people, are unable to grow a great quantity of hair on their faces. after visiting her cases miss banks suggested something of a change, and we turned into the best part of tetuan, to pay a call upon one of the first families in morocco, the head of which is now dead. b---- was probably the most wealthy and enlightened moor in the city: he was once employed by government, and he made his little pile; but he had never married--or, rather, his only marriage had ended in a speedy divorce; and most of his life he had been able to afford to keep a galaxy of slaves, whom he had freed in time, and whose offspring represent the family to-day. the name of the chief of his slaves, and the mistress of the dead man's house at the present moment, is fatima. fatima has a history. b---- possessed twenty white slaves: they were chiefly stolen from villages in the south, and they passed into his hands; but his treasures were two beautiful circassian women from turkey, one of whom he sent to the late sultan (who is the mother of the present sultan), the other he kept for himself--fatima. fatima early showed a disposition far from humble, and b---- spoilt her. at last he made her head of his house and all his slaves. one day she caused two of these women to be beaten in such a manner that one of them died. the other vowed revenge; went to b----, and told him that she had seen fatima looking through a window at a man in the garden below. considering that a woman of superior class must not look out of her window, though the prospect be an arid yard, the statement was calculated to rouse b----. brought up on such proverbs as "when the bee hums and the buttermilk ferments, place, o brother, a halter on thy little daughter," and to consider women "the nearest roads to hell," b----took prompt and drastic measures. he chained fatima up to a pillar for three months, and fed her on bread and water. her eldest daughter was to be married. fatima was released and told she might attend the wedding, but only as the equal of the lowest slave, and dressed as such. she said that she had been accustomed to mixing with the first-born of tetuan as an equal, and she would go among them as nothing else. to break fatima's pride, b---- married a wife; but the wiles of his old favourite were too strong for him, and he gave her presents, including a gold bracelet. the indignant wife, furious at her husband's attentions to a mere slave, got a divorce and left b----; whereupon he fell into the arms of fatima, and she graciously consented to become once more head of his house. she is now the proudest woman in tetuan, inclined to look upon the missionaries and european women in general as dust under her feet. her ignorance is unbounded. "india!" she said to miss hubbard. "you say all india belongs to you english. you may well wish it did. you've only got one port." meanwhile, we had reached the door of this famous lady's house, and were clanging the great knocker. it was superior to any door we had "wakened" that afternoon--made of pale, cinnamon-coloured wood, and immensely wide, carved up above and brightened with great fork-like hinges and nail-heads as large as pennies. a vastly stout slave, smart in proportion, opened the door, and said something in arabic to miss banks, which, translated, intimated that a large tea party was going on within. she led us along far-reaching, wide passages, which at length opened out into an extensive patio, paved with great black and white marble tiles, like a giant chess-board. a double row of finely tiled pillars supported the roof, and a fountain shot up water in the centre of all. the style of the building suggested that the dead man had known how to spend some of his money, and to make for himself a place refined and romantic rather than gorgeous. stepping down the cool aisles between the pillars, the slave took us towards a room opening out of the patio; and such a room!--hung with embroideries, surrounded with luxurious divans worked in scarlet and white, carpeted with deep-piled carpets, and yet no more than a mere setting for the fantastic butterfly world which seemed let loose inside. tetuan's most aristocratic women, scented favourites of moorish society, kept in lavender and reared on sugar and orange-flower water, are not among those things which one easily forgets. about twelve of them or more--enough to dazzle and not bewilder, furnish to perfection yet avoid a crush--were half reclining on the divans round the room. fatima was on our immediate left as we entered; a holy shar[=i]fa on the right; the daughter of another shar[=i]f sat beyond her. the circle was one of sanctity and rank. we shook hands with the mistress of the house, and were motioned to take our seats on the divan exactly opposite her. fatima was no disappointment. she suggested much, and more than fulfilled the promise of her history. she was pale and dark, with a little head like a snake's, thin sarcastic lips, and eyes full of smouldering devil. two silver trays stood in front of her, covered with fragile porcelain cups and thin gilded cut-glass, with a silver-topped box full of fragrant mint, another quaint box containing fine green tea, an enormous cut-glass sugar-basin heaped with small rocks of white sugar, two silver embossed and steaming teapots, some scent-sprinklers and incense-burners of silver. at her elbow, on the floor, was the largest silver urn i ever saw, capable of supplying half a dozen school feasts; down the room, in a line, upon the carpets, stood round baskets, three feet in diameter, filled with palest cream-coloured bracelet-shaped loaves of bread, made of too fine and white a flour and too perfectly baked for any but the upper ten to indulge in. the centre basket contained perhaps fifty cakes--nothing on a small scale here--made of thin flaked pastry, iced over with sugar, filled with a confectionery of almonds, and quinces, and raisins, and orange-flower water, and an essence, one drop of which cost five shillings. these take a day to make, and are only met with in an elaborate _ménage_. other tarts, lavishly coated with a snow of white sugar, contained jams and nuts and all the sweet things dear to the moorish heart. the movements of fatima's small hands among the cups, covered with rings, each polished nail just touched with a half-moon of dark red henna, were born of _dolce far niente_, backed by a long line famous for their beauty: her restless black eyes alternately gleamed with cruelty and cunning; flashed with passion; grew sad as it is given to few eyes to grow. many embroidered buttons, as edgings in front, betokened garment within garment, which she wore, all of them at last confined by a broad, richly worked belt; her kaftan was of lemon-yellow, shining with silver borderings; the muslin "overall" was the thinnest atmosphere of white; there were many necklaces, chiefly pearl, round her neck, and, most characteristic of all, a tiny yellow silk handkerchief was knotted once round her throat; on her black head, colour ran riot in silks of all shades, tied and twisted and arranged as only a moorish hand knows; her feet were wrapped in a soft pale yellow shawl, embroidered. she did not get up when we came in. multiply fatima twelve times, in colours more opulent and more bizarre than her own, instead of her lithe figure, picture stone upon stone of sleek flesh, and some idea of the epicureanism of the scene is arrived at. sitting on each side of us were two of the fattest women i have ever seen. [illustration: a group in the feddan, tetuan. [_to face p. ._] meanwhile, fatima signed to a slave to carry across the cups of tea which she had poured out, together with thin china plates; then we were supplied with the fine sweet bread. miss banks explained that i was not a _tabiba_ (doctor). fatima told her i was to ask about anything which i did not understand, and with interpretations we carried on trifling conversation. it was like stepping into "the arabian nights" come to life. these women seldom go out of doors, or, if they do, nothing is to be seen of them except a figure in an immense creamy woollen haik from top to toe, heavily veiled: possibly a pair of haunting eyes and beautiful slippers suggest an attractive "beyond." but here were we "i' the centre of the labyrinth," where mere men can never go; in a maze of hot imperious colour; in a world of ivory-tinted faces, flowing lines, and stately gestures; among _abandon_ such as one little dreams of in a mohammedan double-locked world. they lie at the ends of the pole, the women of morocco: the countrywomen, beasts of burden; the wives of the rich, sumptuously fed and caparisoned lap-dogs. amidst such a show of silk and embroidery no english-woman, in the utilitarian coat and skirt best fitted for travel, could feel other than out of place, nor resist the weak desire that the imperious fatima and her circle should have another impression of our countrywomen made upon their ignorant minds than that given by short skirts and nailed boots--say, covent garden one night when the opera has drawn all the diamonds in town. i remember the moorish french consul, in the tetuan post-office, saw r. writing a card in there once. "what a great thing it is," he said to mr. bewicke, "that your women can write and can arrange things for themselves. i go away; my wife cannot write to me. our women are just like animals." as far as i could gather, a moorish woman does not think for herself until she is divorced. her father, mother, or brother marries her to whomsoever he or she chooses; but when once she is divorced, she is free to marry after her own heart, and no one can interfere with her. divorce was of course allowed by mohammed. it is so common that no wife is surprised at being divorced a year after marriage, or six months, even a week. if she does not get up in time in the morning, her husband can divorce her, or if she becomes ill, or for a hundred petty reasons. therefore upon the marriage-lines is always entered the sum of money which a wife brings her husband; a poor woman will bring from thirty shillings to three pounds, a rich woman from a hundred to three hundred pounds; and whatever the sum be, the husband must refund it to the wife when he divorces her. the actual getting of the divorce is simplicity itself. man and wife go before the deputy of the governor of the city or province and state their case. the deputy will probably say, "very well. pay the woman such-and-such a sum mentioned in the agreement, and go your several ways." a man, however, often changes his mind, and marries the woman whom he has divorced; and perhaps they are divorced a second time and married a third time. but he may not marry her the third time unless she has meanwhile been married by another man and divorced from him. many of the moorish husbands leave their wives--the riffis, for instance, going back into the riff. if they are away over a year and send no money to the wife, she can claim a divorce: going before the deputy with a witness or two, it is soon arranged; she then probably marries a second husband. were it not for this arrangement, tetuan would be full of deserted wives. it must be most difficult to try to "preach" either to the men or women. the men would not have it. i knew one missionary who used to sit in their shops and talk to them, but directly he veered round within a point of "religion" that talk was over. the women were less difficult in that respect; they would discuss the point: one woman i heard say something as follows:-- "why should i turn a christian? see--i may steal, i may lie, i may commit murder; my sins may reach as high as from earth to heaven, and at the day of my death _god is merciful_. he will forgive me all, because i witness to mohammed as his prophet. your religion is a narrow little religion; mine covers everything. you go home and go away by yourself and _witness to mohammed_ as his prophet, and all your sins will be forgiven." it is a sign of their being low down in the intellectual scale when the members of society talk for the most part of "persons," just as it is a sign of a higher tone when the conversation runs chiefly upon "ideas." among the women at fatima's tea party there was no sort or kind of exchange of thought of any description, nor was there general conversation. they talked in a desultory way to each other about their children, their clothes, their food, their money, and each other--sometimes they included miss banks, but never touched an interesting point. if a woman unable to read or write only meets women also unable to read or write, and knows but one man, her husband, who feeds her and values her much like a tame doe-rabbit, it is unreasonable to expect to find in her much intelligence and energy. wives, when asked if they did not wish to do more, would not like to read or write or work, only laughed derisively. the idea was absurd: they could not understand any one wishing to exert herself in a novel and unnecessary way. on my left, still sat the stoutest woman in the room--the holy shar[=i]fa. she lost her snuff-box, and roused herself to hunt all over her enormous person for it--a work of time; but a friend had borrowed it, and it was passed back to her. she sat on the divan, cross-legged like some gigantic idol of ancient egypt, many yards in circumference at the base, her fat little hands folded across the embroideries and gold-worked buttons and worked edges of the many gorgeous waistcoats and kaftans, which seemed piled one on top of each other on her immense frame. her head, the size of two footballs rolled into one, was swathed in violet and scarlet silk: straight whiskers of hair, dyed jet-black, were combed a few inches down each cheek, and then cut short. the whole "idol" sat very still, speaking but rarely, and then in a harsh croak like some oracular and forbidding bird: "it" had the appearance of being comfortably gorged. meanwhile, fatima signed or murmured to the slaves, and the sweetmeats were carried round, and the fragile cups refilled; and there went up a great aroma of sweet mint tea. through the wide doorway the patio and its colonnades of many pillars lay cool and shaded; cages of singing canary-birds hung from the ceiling; the fountain rippled in the middle; a tall girl in green and white sauntered across in her slippered feet, carrying a tray; a gaily dressed slave passed silently; and the whole thing might have been a dream. . . . past the patio lay the courtyard, all one large garden, with tiled walks and red-gold oranges and heavy foliage set against the blue sky. broad date-palms, mimosa, and climbing creepers sometimes shook in a breath of wind. the clear tanks, full of ever-running water and lined with maiden-hair fern, moved with gold-fish, which matched the oranges; a pet monkey played amongst the lemons on a lemon-tree; a green parrot nodded to us from a bower of pink almond blossom. we wandered round the sleepy, silent courtyard, and in and out the chequered greenery, hot with windless, sun-filled air, back through the black-and-white courts, until at last the great outside door shut upon fatima, her tea party, and the eternal mysticism of the east:--we were without the gates of paradise, and in an atmosphere of rude realism once more. soon after that afternoon of many calls with miss banks, a day up in the anjera hills, to the north of tetuan, gave some idea of the strip of country which lay between us, and the sea, and gibraltar. this country possessed the fascination of being little known. no one troubled to go up there, except its own wild inhabitants. our own consul had never been. the missionaries had not climbed so high, nor so far, this side the river. now the tetuan _sok_ (market) is greatly dependent upon the country people belonging to the beni salam tribe, who live up in the anjeras; and from the flat white roof of our garden-house we had watched through a pair of glasses on market mornings, strings of women, winding by a precipitous path down the hillside, which is abrupt and mountainous, themselves dropping as it were from an upper world. they scrambled slowly down, one after the other, descending many hundreds upon hundreds of feet; then filed slantwise over the slopes, right into the rocky mussulman cemetery, across that, and thence into the city by the báb-el-m`kabar. the relations of these tribesmen between themselves and the city are more or less friendly, and it is comparatively safe to wander about the mountains as long as the "enemy," as the moors call the sun, has not set. we were most anxious to visit the country whence these market-goers came, appearing first upon the crest-line, then against the rough hillside, like a string of industrious white ants crawling down the wall of a house; therefore we engaged a youth with a downy beard and hairy legs and the big grey donkey--the most active of his race--and set off one morning at half-past nine, prepared to climb into a top world, like jack of the beanstalk, by means of a path which was less smooth "going" than his supernatural ladder. there was a strong north-west wind, and it was hardly an occasion for "aloft"; but there was no haze; the clouds were scudding away to south australia; it was a day for a view. taking the broken road towards the city, we branched off to the right, crossed a stream, and began the ascent. no one could ride at this point. r. tried a tow by means of the donkey's tail, and met with a remonstrating kick. certainly, if this could be called "one of the sultan's highways," it was an odd specimen. we scrambled up the east side of the range of hills, sometimes by a succession of rocky staircases, sometimes sliding (backwards chiefly) on loose shale: how the donkey contrived to look after its four feet must remain a problem, but the morocco ass is brought up from birth upon stony ground, with naïve and simple notions upon the subject of paths. it was a long time before our heads showed up above the top of jack's beanstalk (so to speak), and we met with a gale, at which the donkey's hair stood on end, and which occupied all our attention for a minute. we had seen tetuan disappear far below us behind the elbow of a hill; the topmost point of the gib. rock had loomed into sight; ceuta looked as if one might have thrown a stone upon it; and the riff mountains were next door, clear and blue. we had passed some red fritillaries and the bee-orchid, a little wild mauve crocus, and some magnificent clumps of white heath, which smelt of almonds and honey; had seen several pairs of stone-chats with their white collars; had sat down for many "breathers"; and at last were at the top, in a wind which flattened every palmetto-bush plumb against the hillside. it was a breezy spot for riding (and here one _could_ ride, for the grey donkey was on _terra firma_ once more); therefore we cut short a survey of the country below us, hurried off the crest-line, and followed the path which led straight away into the heart of the anjera country. it was a good track when once the top had been reached, exactly the right width for one individual, and used by thirty or forty every market day--three times a week. at the time when the cave-men lived in england, _single file_ was a standing principle in morocco, and the practice still holds good. the path was beaten hard, by bare feet, in the rich dark red soil, and had taken a shiny polish; the wind was held off us by boulders and small hillocks; we got along at a steady pace. on each side mountains and only mountains were to be seen, peak beyond peak, slope after slope, covered with short wind-tossed scrub and sharp, hard rock, except at any great height or in the prevailing wind; there ledge after ledge lay peeled by the weather, blistering in the sun, the scarified faces of the cliffs worn at the summits into pinnacles of gaunt stone. no mark of humanity, except the single red path, suggested that civilization ever troubled these heights, and there was hardly anything worth the notice of a goat in the shape of fodder. the path rose and fell, skirting now this shoulder and now a gully, but keeping for the most part on high ground, here and there winding upwards across the sharp spine of a ridge, and, by way of some awkward staircase, once more landing us on the level. more often than not, the donkey had only himself to carry; the boy probably thought us mad, but there was no understanding what the other would fain have said. except for the wind--and even that dropped--a great silence lay on the proud heights; they defied man to interfere with their grizzled _débris_: the birds had forgotten to sing: all around was that certain awed solemnity, always to be found, in the companionship of the everlasting hills. but the air was champagne; the heather was mad in the breeze; the sky where it met the rocks, an intoxicating blue. and how the clouds "travelled"! though, in spite of that, the hills never spoke: like the sphinx, whose repose no dance of lizards nor flashes of sunlight can disturb, they are "too great to appease, too high to appal, too far to call." occasionally a dip in the hollow back of a mountain showed the sea beyond: there are few seas bluer than the blue mediterranean can be, and this was one of its days. the polished track led us on: still no sign of a village, nor any evidences of civilization. at last from the top of a ridge we looked over and down into a calm green oasis, "a lodge in some vast wilderness," secluded, sheltered, where it would have been good to pitch a tent and camp for many moons. we swung along downwards, dropped under the lee of the hill, and our path skirted the fringe of the green oasis. it was not many acres in extent; it was covered with short scant grass; it would have made an ideal polo-ground. water lay over a small corner of it, and beyond a shadow of doubt it had once been the bottom of a lake; indeed, the beni salam tribe believe that water still lies underneath the turf. here the first sign of humanity showed itself: two goatherds drove their flock down to the water, and one of them carried in the hood of his brown jellab a few hours' old kid; they soon passed on and disappeared among the boulders and heath. the long level lines of the green oasis were broken at the edge by diminutive bones of rock protruding through the grass. sunk in the hollow of the hills, there was little or no wind; the sun glowed indolently down on the green lawn, tempting us to stay; but the foot-prints in the red soil pointed forward, and we turned our backs upon the flat stretches of sunny turf and left the waveless tarn behind. no more emerald oasis, but grey-green scrub and stones on the mountain-sides: we were up again in a stern and desolate defile, waste beyond waste strewn with rocks. the distances were oddly deceptive in the rare, clear air: a saddle between two peaks looked miles away--we were upon it in half an hour; again, a turret of rock apparently within a stone's-throw was a weary climb. and still the red trail snaked on before us. even the big grey donkey began to lose its interest and to require "encouragement" from the moorish boy. we speculated as to whether we should ever reach a village before it was time to make tracks for the world below, while the sun was well up. at last, in front of us, a long low saddle intervened, with rising ground on each side: this we determined to scale, once mounted on top see all there was to be seen, and go no farther. and toil brought its unexpected and exceeding great reward. standing on the crest-line, shading our eyes with our hands, mountain beyond mountain lay in the distance--the anjeras, the hills of spain, the mediterranean, gibraltar; while in the foreground clustered four villages, brown mud-coloured huts upon the brownish slopes, and only picked out of their surroundings by means of the one little whitewashed spot of a mosque. below us a river had carved a gorge in the red soil and tumbled over worn boulders beside the nearest village, but it was more or less hidden from sight. much as we wanted to go on, it was impossible. first, there was not time. secondly, the donkey would have had as much as was good for him by the time he got back. therefore we chose a warm, sheltered spot, backed by sun-baked rocks and scented with cropped tussocks of yellow gorse; and there we lunched, the boy and donkey slipping out of sight, and leaving us alone, with the hills, and the sound of the wind. it must be a long tramp into tetuan, even for hill people born to the life of the open road,--four hours into the city with heavy loads of charcoal, faggots, chickens, eggs, butter, vegetables; four hours back again with oil, sugar, salt, tea, and every sort of necessary which is not home grown. and three times a week. and only women. we met a string of them as we set our faces homewards, like "toiling cattle straining across a thousand hills"; but they all had a word to say and a smile, as they sloped along at a steady swing. the sun was setting when we left the good upper world of silence and the winds; by-and-by the crest-line intervened between ourselves and the strong serene heights--they were seen no more; and we came "hand over hand down the beanstalk" which led to the white city below. chapter ix we leave tetuan--a wet night under the stars--s`lam deserts us--we sail for mogador--palm-tree house--sus and wadnoon countries--the sahara--the atlas mountains. chapter ix the stream of life runs, ah! so swiftly by, a gleaming race 'twixt bank and bank--we fly, faces alight and little trailing songs, then plunge into the gulf, and so good-bye. about the month of april, morocco takes its head from under its wing; the bad weather turns its back on the country; the tracks dry up and are fit for travellers to take to once more. the time had come for the sake of which we had borne with the rains, and we longed to be off, to know something more of this strange and fascinating land. may is a better month than april, up in the north, for travelling; april is often dashed with the tail-end of the rains; but our desire was to go down into the far south, and may and june in the south are both too hot to enjoy camping out. april is quite warm enough; indeed, morocco city "stokes up" early in april; therefore we made it the middle of march when we said good-bye to jinan dolero and set our faces tangier-wards, there to await some steamer which should take us down the coast. the odds and ends which had furnished us at tetuan and were not wanted had to be sold--a very simple matter. the day before we left our white garden-house, s`lam and some _mesdames_, as in his best french he always spoke to us of his ragged countrywomen, carried them into the sok, as they were, on their backs; and they were sold to the highest bidder among the market-goers. to transport ourselves and our belongings over to tangier, a jew muleteer was requisitioned, who provided men and mules for the two days' journey. after long consultations we decided to take s`lam with us on our travels in the capacity of personal servant and head cook--partly because he could cook, partly because, in spite of the tahara-and-bottle-of-water-or-poison episode, we liked him, and he had been a good servant according to his lights. after all, he was probably as trustworthy, and more so, than any man we could pick up in a hurry down south--at least, everybody warned us that they were a set of rascals there, of whom we were to beware. finally, he was used to us and we were used to him. so s`lam set out with our cavalcade, and we proposed to keep him while we were at tangier, take him by boat to mogador, and after our march was over return him to tetuan. but, while "man proposes----" i was sorry for tahara. she was left behind with her old enemy--s`lam's mother. he left the mother money, but tahara not one flus. he said, too, that when he came back from morocco city he should go straight off to the riff and get work there; and tahara would be left again. such is the custom of the country: the husband may go off for a year, at intervals returning to his wife, whom he leaves generally under some sort of supervision. so poor little tahara, who had no voice in her marriage, but had wept all the way to tetuan under the escort of her bridegroom and brother, was left penniless in the old mother's clutches. she had no relatives near to help her, otherwise i have no doubt that she would have got a divorce. we could only ask z---- to keep an eye on her, for interference in the moorish domestic hearth on the part of a european would be a fool's work indeed. it was march when we began to wander once more, having handed the keys of jinan dolero back to its owner and cleared out the little white house. unfortunately we pitched on the _aid-el-kebeer_ (the great feast), starting the very day before it was due; and, in consequence of the mohammedan-world being upside-down with joyful anticipation, could get no good mules, nor induce any one but a jew to leave tetuan at such a time. s`lam looked forward to feasting with his brother at tangier, and started off with a good grace. a more serious miss than either moorish servants or reliable mounts was perhaps a tent. there was none to be had in tetuan at just that time, and a night had to be passed upon the way. however, there was no help for it: we set off as we were, and arrived towards sunset at the half-way caravanserai, the little white-walled fondâk on the top of the hills, where we passed such a windy night, on our way over from tangier in december, under canvas. it was a good ride, and our mules travelled badly: saddles and bridles were tumbling to pieces too. for the last mile or so we both walked and sent the baggage on ahead. from a bend round the crest of a hill we said farewell to an uneven white streak set at the foot of the distant hills--tetuan--and saw it no more. the fondâk was in front of us, four lonely walls exposed to every change of weather, and no life stirring outside. we walked through the arched gateway into the square, which is surrounded with norman arches, and found a company of mules and donkeys, of owners and drivers, taking shelter for the night: our own baggage animals were already hobbled in a line in front of the arches, under which the muleteers sit, and drink, and smoke, and sleep the hours away, till the first streak of dawn. we scrambled up an uneven stone staircase at the corner of the square, and investigated the two little rooms at the disposal of travellers. one look: there were suggestions of the insect world in both. we recrossed the thresholds and sought further: the flat white roof above the arches round the square, if windswept, was too airy to be anything but fresh and wholesome,--it should meet all our demands. here then, out in the open, under the sky, our two beds were arranged, in the lee of a few yards of parapet which had been built to shelter the west corner of the roof. s`lam had a small pan of charcoal also up on the roof in our corner, over which to get something hot for us to eat; and as soon as the odd little meal was finished we turned in. the precipitous twilight had shadowed down sufficiently to undress in more or less privacy even upon a housetop; over our beds we spread a thin woollen carpet to keep off the dew; the moon, which was beginning its last quarter, faced us full, in a sky picked out with a few stars, against which the dark outline of the hills was cut clear; there was hardly a fleck of cloud in that best roof under which a man can sleep. [illustration: a breezy camping-ground on a roof-top. [_to face p. ._] below, down in the square, the picketed mules stamped and munched barley; the muleteers' voices, back under the arches in the colonnade, arose and fell, round a fire where green tea was brewing and much kif was in course of being smoked; occasionally an owl hooted. waking from time to time, the moon was always staring down (i shall never forget that moon); but at each interval it had moved farther round overhead. at last it sank behind the field of vision, and up "in that inverted bowl we call the sky" the remote and passionless stars had it all to themselves. about half-past three in the morning we were awakened suddenly by the patter of rain on our faces, great single drops, which quickened into a hurrying shower; while gusts of wind from the south-west rose and swept round the corner of the low parapet against which we had put the heads of the beds. one glance showed that the sky was overcast; it was very dark, most of the stars were hidden, and there was an ominous sound of rain in the wind. the fondâk is notably a wet resting-place, for it lies on the top of the watershed which divides the plains of tetuan and tangier, and it draws the clouds like a magnet. one of us put up a sun-umbrella, which had been useful on the hot ride the day before; it kept an end of one bed more or less dry, and fortunately the shower did not last long, while underneath warm bedding it was possible to keep dry for a time. the wind rose, however, and forced itself in at every fold of the bedclothes. we had carefully arranged all our kit under the parapet close to the beds, partly to prevent its being stolen, which sometimes happens if left out of the owner's reach, partly to prevent its rolling or blowing off the unprotected edge of the roof. the sunset of the night before had not foretold wind; but wind there began rapidly to be, and by-and-by the lid of one of our cooking-pots bowled along the roof, fell over the edge, and rattled on the stones in the square below: a cloth belonging to the cuisine took flight next over the outer wall, and was seen no more. we lay speculating on what might follow. then another shower began; but the clouds were lifting a little, and it was short if it was sharp; while underneath the blankets there was not much to complain of. at four o'clock a sound of life began down below; the muleteers were all up and stirring in the square. lights were lit, for since the moon and stars had been obscured, the night had turned from brilliant light into one of shadows and blackness. was there to be more rain? nothing else mattered. in this fine interval--for the last shower was stopping--it seemed wise to get up and dress and have our bedding rolled together: neither of us was going to move into the rooms. certainly dressing was a chilly opportunity. the evening before had been warm; but the rain freshened the air, and the wind made it still more brisk. it was darker than ever--too windy to have kept a light going; and clothes, discovered with some difficulty in the shadows in hiding-places under rugs and pillows where they had been stowed the evening before to escape the dew, were hurried into in the dark anyhow and any way, half blown inside-out in the wind. at half-past four s`lam came up on to the roof-top with a light (which was promptly extinguished) and a pail of cold fresh water, in which we had an acceptable wash. he rolled up our bedding, and brought an earthenware pan of burning charcoal, which was stowed away in a corner of the stone stairway out of the wind, and on which the kettle soon began to boil. at this point two remaining stars were put out by the advancing dawn--a wan and shivering dawn. sitting in the lee of the parapet, five o'clock saw us ready, and supplied with hot tea and eggs. not long after, the rain-clouds blew over and the day broke clear. meanwhile, the muleteers had loaded up and vanished with the first streak of daylight, in order to be in tetuan in time for the great feast that day; the inner square of the caravanserai was deserted; our own five mules were all that was left. it was not a long business loading them: the last rope was knotted, and the muleteers drove them off. we followed, riding out under the gateway, whereon is written in arabic a sentence to the effect that mulai abdurrahman built the fondâk in , according to mohammedan reckoning of time. the sky was grey and menacing: too many of the little single clouds called "wet dogs" drifted across it. having started at half-past five, not till three o'clock that afternoon did we reach tangier; halting once on the march, at ten o'clock, and that only for half an hour for lunch. a heavy storm cut that halt short, for the rest of the day the "wet dogs" were true to themselves, and we were deluged. vivid lightning flashed and cracking peals of thunder rolled over the plain; it was one of those march days which make march no month for camping out in northern morocco. added to that, the track was in a shocking state--up to the girths in mud and water and clay of a sticky and treacherous nature. the mules slipped back at every step. we had many small rivulets to cross, and were obliged to make great detours in order to circumvent them at all. even then our baggage was in the greatest peril, for the mules could barely keep their feet; and once down in some of the deepest quagmires, there would have been the utmost difficulty in getting them up again, or in rescuing our unfortunate kit. and the rain came through everything, bedding and all being fairly drenched. the mules which carried the baggage were of course much the best of our beasts: r.'s and my mounts were indeed sorry for themselves. the last hour was the darkest, during which r.'s mule fell down for the sixth or seventh time--it was slippery and rough--and we had the worst piece of country of all to cross, where we found one unfortunate mule bogged in a sort of mud stream. though a soaking does not greatly signify when dry clothes and a roof lie at the journey's end, nine hours at a foot's pace, through mud and water, wet and weary, will take the heart out of most people. we tailed into tangier, a dilapidated, worn string of bedraggled vagrants, and rode to the continental. an hour later, clean and dry, in comfortable chairs, with hot coffee, there was content. meanwhile, s`lam was not at all fulfilling our expectations; and since we left the fondâk, far from distinguishing himself on the march, he failed over and over again to rise to the occasion, excellent servant though he had been in the garden-house near his own city. while the muleteers walked all the way from tetuan, driving the baggage-mules and urging on our own, s`lam by arrangement rode on the top of a light load; and there he sat, huddled up on the mule, wet and discontented, dawdling behind, last of all, in the cavalcade, and anything but living up to his character of soldier-servant and escort. by virtue of his late service in the algerian army and his rifle, he should have been admirably adapted to fill that capacity; but less like a soldier, and more like a whimpering dog, man never looked. nor did he look after our things, allowing them to be badly exposed to the rain, and taking no precautions for protecting anything. in the face of condemnation he sulked. arrived at tangier, nearly a week elapsed before a hungarian boat put in, by which we could sail for mogador. s`lam was of course due daily at the hotel to report himself and to execute orders. it was on one of these occasions, upon the very morning before we were due to start for mogador, that he sprung upon us his intention of going straight back to tetuan. this announcement came rather like a bolt from the blue. we had congratulated ourselves upon taking down into the interior a more or less tried and faithful knave, where knaves of such a description were proverbially scarce; and now our henchman announced that he had no longer any wish or any intention of accompanying us to morocco city. the reasons or excuses which he gave were: first, that his wages were insufficient; and, secondly, that "a courier" had been sent over to him from tetuan to tell him that his mother and his wife were quarrelling to such a degree that tahara had threatened to go back to her native riff country with her brother unless s`lam returned, and if she took that step it would mean a divorce. his wages had been already raised considerably, because the post he was now to fill had more duties connected with it: they might have been further increased. the other excuse may or may not have been true; but as the two women had never done anything else except quarrel, the situation was a foregone conclusion. the old mother may have been trying to poison tahara again. but would s`lam trouble to prevent that? whatever his motive, it was more than annoying that at the last moment he should throw us over, leaving no time in which to look out for a new man, and a reliable man, without whom, in a country as lawless as morocco, it would be a little rash, on the part of two people only, to travel. but an unwilling servant is not to be endured. we gave s`lam his release, stipulating only that he should return the dollars advanced him for his wife and mother not many days before. to this he protested that he had no money, not a peseta left--every coin had either been spent at the feast or had been left at tetuan. in this case, the best plan would be, we said, for s`lam to take with him a letter to the consul at tetuan explaining to him what had happened; then as s`lam earned money, he might pay it into the consul's hands for us, until he had made good the sum advanced him. at this s`lam looked blank: he said such a letter would mean _prison_ for him. we stood firm. it was a rude shock to our faith when his hand found its way into the leather bag at his side under his jellab, and he pulled out and threw on the table two-thirds of the money which had been given him. it was suggested that he should pay the whole sum. no! he was penniless. then in that case he could sell the new jellab he had just bought. he scoffed at the idea. in reply to our order to come to the hotel the first thing the following morning and see our baggage safely on board the steamer, he said that he should leave tangier at daybreak, and that it was quite impossible for him to attend upon us, evidently expecting that his prepaid wages would be amicably allowed to slide. but not in the face of this final desertion. we reiterated the former course--a letter to the consul at tetuan; again he pleaded abject poverty; but meeting only with inclemency, once more plunged his hand into his bag, and pulled out dollars amounting exactly to the sum which he had been advanced. so much for his poverty. we were now, he explained, "quits." "all was right between us." he "would not like to leave us with a trace of ill feeling remaining between us and himself." he _did_ leave us, however, with his tail fairly between his legs, and, if he had been kicked out of the hotel, could not have gone forth more sadly. what motive he had for going back to tetuan, or what whim seized him in tangier, remained a mystery. impulsive as a child, he had been at first madly keen, so he said, to go with us to the world's end; then, as the time approached, in the same ratio his ardour evaporated; until, finally, he had no more desire left, and on the march over to tangier grew more indifferent and morose at every step. while we were in tangier he was like a fish out of water. and yet he had been once to fez and to morocco city: he was a travelled man. possibly he had a more remunerative billet in view, or was homesick, or jealous about tahara. after all, whatever the reason, his line of conduct was only distinctly moorish, and characteristic of a race in which, as a whole, no wise man places great reliance. a moorish servant will not rob his european master: perquisites are a _sine qua non_, of course. probably his lies are no blacker than those of european servants; but the moor, in place of that quality of faithfulness which can ennoble an english rascal, has a cold-blooded current in his veins. his manners may be charming--he is a plausible devil; but lean upon him, and he turns out to be as jerry-built as his own crumbling whitewashed walls. it is with somewhat of a feeling of banishment into the unknown, that the passenger by the little coast-steamer takes his departure from tangier, and sees first its white houses and yellow sands, and last of all spartel lighthouse, disappear as the boat ploughs southwards. once upon a time gibraltar had constituted in our minds the outposts, so to speak, of civilization; but since we had spent three months in such an unexplored spot as the tetuan vale and mountains, without society of the conventional type, or library, or church, or any other adjuncts, tangier, when we came back to it, appeared in the light of a paris. and now tangier was again to be left behind; and on one of the little coasting-steamers, which deliver cargo at ports on the way, we meant to travel down to mogador. to have marched the same distance would have meant perhaps a month on the road, going by fez and taking it easily; therefore we saved much time by taking the steamer. though by all report it was not likely to be at all a comfortable journey, it could only last four days at most; and few travellers but can stand four days' discomfort. we did not start without a few warnings and cautions from various friends, who seemed inclined to think that we were doing an unprecedented thing in thus setting off alone into the interior without even a reliable servant, which since the desertion of s`lam was the case. that could not be helped. we hoped for the best as regarded finding men in mogador. [illustration: illustrative of the way we rode in morocco. [_to face p. ._] sir arthur nicolson had provided us with letters of introduction to the british consul in mogador, and to a moor in morocco city, where it is unnecessary to say there are no representatives of the english government. i had written to him on the subject of getting up to glaouia, in the atlas mountains, and had received the following reply:-- "dear miss savory,-- "as the court is away from morocco city, i hardly think it would be wise for you to attempt a visit to glaouia. matters are never very stable when the seat of government is away, and i do not think the government would be disposed to give you a permit at present. there would, however, be no objection whatever to your going to morocco city, and i think you will find the journey interesting. "yours very truly, "a. nicolson." this letter was a blow. but when we finally reached morocco city we found that the thing could be done--that we could get up to glaouia either under the protection of the english missionaries or with a certain jewish trader who lives in morocco city. the fact of the matter is, that to travel "officially," as it were, in morocco is a fatal mistake. it means a written permission from the sultan, an army of followers, a commotion wherever a halt is made, and a great deal of hospitality. the sultan does not encourage europeans to travel out of the ordinary line of route, on account of the superstitious and fanatical spirit of his people, which would be roused to wrath against him, were he to countenance the invasion of their sacred land by infidels. consequently, when he gives a permit, he writes upon the document to the effect that the christian is committed to the care of kaid so-and-so, and kaid so-and-so is to see that no ill happens to him. when the christian traveller arrives at the district belonging to this kaid, through which he wishes to pass, he goes to the castle and delivers the permit. the kaid reads it, and knows what it means: the sultan only wishes the christian to be kept to frequented roads. therefore the christian is offered every hospitality, and the kaid almost weeps as he explains that it is impossible for the traveller to proceed--the tribesmen are dangerous, are in revolt along the line the christian wishes to go. the traveller says he will take his chance. his servants, primed by the kaid, refuse to go with him on the score of the danger. if he manages to get away with one trusty follower, the kaid sends soldiers after them, fetches them back to the castle--to save their lives, he says, and his own life, which would be forfeited if a hair of their heads was injured. the christian, after his rebellious conduct, may be forced to return discomforted to the coast towns, or he may be allowed to march on in another direction, keeping on the beaten track. thus the moorish government will politely frustrate enterprising spirit on the part of the infidel. but if the traveller is content with other than a royal progression through the country, if he will travel quietly and without ostentation, dressed according to the habits of the people, and be prepared to "rough it," the chances are, that he may get to places which he could never have reached while impeded by a government escort. but the way above all others to travel in morocco is to secure the help of a missionary and to go with him. medicine is the golden key which opens every gate; and a moor will do anything for a _tabiba_ (doctor), which is what a missionary practically is to him. the missionary arrives at a remote village, and the countryside flocks to him to have its teeth pulled out, its sores doctored, its fevers cured; and if the tabiba wishes to go on farther, by whatever path, who shall gainsay him, while he carries life and health in his hands? he understands their dialect a little, he dresses as they do, and he brings no overbearing servants to eat up their substance. nor is he a spy, but only some harmless fanatic, some quaint nazarene, who thinks to win heaven by thus walking the earth and doing good. thus several missionaries have penetrated to places in morocco, from entering which, europeans are debarred: they have not "advertised" themselves nor written books upon what they have seen. but the thing has been done, and not only by men. women missionaries have been where no christian is supposed to be allowed. indeed, it should be easier for women, in one way, to travel in forbidden territory than men, because their sex is not credited with the sense which could do harm; and the idea of a woman spying, or thinking to exploit the country, discover mines, and so on, would be absolutely laughable to a moor. probably women, with a large stock of medicines and a knowledge of the country dialect, could travel in the unknown "beyond" with comparatively little risk. there is one other way for the englishman to see something of the less-known districts of morocco, and that is to travel under the protection of a holy shar[=i]f. shar[=i]fs are, like the sultan, descendants of mohammed, and they possess the holy _baraka_--that is, the birthright of the shar[=i]fian line. they are little gods, and they have immunity from the laws of god and man. their advice is sought for and followed by the ordinary country people on every question, and their decision is invariably accepted as final. there is no such thing as an aristocratic class or nobility in morocco; and yet the shar[=i]fs answer in a way to the same idea, for they possess a religious authority which sets them far above their countrymen, and constitutes them, in a sense, lords over the people. besides, they act greatly as mediums between the secular governors and the tribes, and judge upon various matters. it is possible for a holy shar[=i]f to sin, but quite impossible for him to be punished, the obvious argument being that "the fire of hell cannot touch a saint in whose veins runs the blood of the holy prophet." the shar[=i]fian families form an entire class by themselves. they are fed and clothed and housed by a convenient system of religious taxation, and large presents are made them, while after death their tombs become objects of visit to all devout mohammedans. a holy shar[=i]f generally rides a horse, and he dresses in white, with a blue cloth cloak, or else a white woollen over-garment. he wears a pair of yellow slippers, or perhaps riding-boots, called _temag_, buttoned all up the back with green silk buttons, and embroidered down the side with silk and silver thread. a scarlet fez and a white turban complete him. shar[=i]fs never shave under the chin, since the days when a certain sultan was being shaved thus by a barber who had it in his mind to cut the royal throat. but a little boy passing saw the evil design in the barber's eye. with great presence of mind he rushed into the shop, crying to the sultan, "o most holy one! the great mosque has fallen down!" both sultan and barber leapt up and rushed out: the boy explained matters to the sultan, and the barber was killed. but neither shar[=i]f nor missionary-doctor had we any hope of meeting at mogador, able and willing to travel into the atlas mountains with us. we started with plenty of chances open in front, but with nothing certain whereon to rely. telegraph station and all such vanities were left behind us at tangier: letters could not reach us till we ourselves reached morocco city, ten or twelve days being the time they would take to arrive there from tangier. our agents--cook & son--in the latter place, had instructions to open all wires, and in an urgent case to forward to us by a _rekass_ (a runner), who might do the distance in as short a time as seven or eight days. a wire sent thus, by a rekass, might cost three or four pounds, according to the time the man took: the faster he did the journey, the more he should be paid. in spite of its hotels tangier does not possess a single shop where english newspapers or books can be bought. our literature had by this time reached a low ebb; and on board the hungarian boat, at a time when one generally reads omnivorously because there is nothing else to do, we had but a couple of standard books to fall back upon--a history of the country was one, the other a volume of lecky. the history was fairly committed to heart before travelling days were done. on the whole, when at last we got off in the little hungarian steamer, she did not leave much to be desired. for three days we had hung on at the continental hotel, waiting for the hourly expected arrival of the boat, beginning almost to despair of her ever coming in. finally, patience was rewarded, and one afternoon, with all our baggage, we went on board. we had everything wanted for camping out except tents, and these were to be hired at mogador. a great wooden kitchen-box held pots, pans, knives, etc., and a case contained potted meats, soups, biscuits, and so forth. r. and myself were the only women on board when we left tangier: eight men joined us at dinner that night, at one long table in the small saloon, and we were said to fill the boat. she was very small, only eighteen hundred tons, and there was not much room for walking about on her; but we never went out of sight of the coast, and, sitting on a couple of chairs, could see through the glasses whatever was going on on the beach--which, i must add, was little enough, at a time when the smallest incidents become of importance. the greater part of the _arpad_ was given up to cargo. we landed green tea in quantities at mazagan, and black-wood, cane-seated chairs for the jews and spaniards living there, as well as bales of goods and casks; but we took nothing on board, and the _arpad_ became more and more like an empty egg-shell, with a decided inclination to roll, on the swell which invariably sets down that coast. the captain, a small dark hungarian, when we left tangier, changed into a thin tweed suit and straw hat: he did not understand english. there was no stewardess; but the steward, who did all the waiting at table, spoke a little german. one of our fellow-passengers was an englishman, born in morocco, without any desire to leave it--his horizon gibraltar: he was dutch consul at mazagan. another man was a grain merchant in mazagan. all were interesting, and could tell us a great deal about the country. certainly the coast-line, as seen from the deck of the _arpad_, was monotonous, desolate, uninviting to a degree: a long low shore, kh[=a]ki-coloured, treeless, without sign of life, did not raise in us regrets that we had come by sea, especially when told that what we saw, was a fairly correct sample of most of the country we should have ridden through. [illustration: lighters loading. [_to face p. ._] on the entire six hundred miles' length of coast south of cape spartel, and down which we were steaming, there is not a single lighthouse, bell, beacon, or buoy to mark a reef or shoal, nor is there any harbour, and no steamer dares to lie close in-shore off a port at night. therefore, as there are several ports at which cargo has generally to be landed or taken on board, steamers go on the line of steaming all night, and lying outside a port in the daytime, while boats carry cargo between them and the shore. rabat, casablanca, mazagan--we stopped at them all, and got accustomed to the eternal clank of the crane hoisting bales in and out of the boats; to rolling on to the backs and down into the troughs of the atlantic combers. finally, we reached mogador early on the morning of good friday, , and said good-bye to the uneasy _arpad_ and its primitive _ménage_ without regret: irregular, white-walled mogador, set in its rock-locked harbour, lay in front of us. it was the hot south--there was no doubt about that. the riviera is called "the sunny south," and tangier is warmer than the riviera; but penetrate inland into africa, go down as far as mogador, and it is another thing altogether. here there is no _trace_ of europe, but a great sense of being far away in letter and spirit from england--farther away than bombay, and many another place, which out-distances it in miles again and again. we saw mogador first in a grey light: heavy thunder-clouds hung above; dim and visionary hills lay behind; a regiment of camels paraded the wet sands in front, and lay in the sun underneath the battlemented walls; black flags floated from the mosque-tops, for it was the mussulman sunday. for the rest mogador is a city of sea and sand--sand, sand, and yet more sand: it takes two hours' riding to get to anything else except sand. with the grey waves washing round two sides of it, and two sides blown and sanded by desert wastes, white-walled mogador has a somewhat saddened aspect, as of lifeless bleached bones, apart from the fact that it is so far removed from the outer world. and infinitely remote, it certainly is. a telegram takes about a fortnight to reach england; so that an answer by wire to a wire can be expected in about a month. a letter sent by a special courier to tangier takes eight days--a distance of four hundred miles: by this means a wire could be sent to england in nine days. the steamers to mogador are most irregular, because, in view of there being no safe anchorage, a boat will not put in in bad weather. cargo, passengers, and mails are often and often enough not landed at all, and the inhabitants of the city see but the stern of the vanished steamer with all their letters on board, not to return perhaps for a week. when the english consul married, and his furniture was sent out from england, the _forward_ boat, which brought it, came in sight of mogador, and, being a rough day, went off to madeira and on its round by the canary isles, back to london again, without touching at the sad white city at all. in this way things are apt to be lost: it has happened with passengers. a rowing-boat landed us on green seaweedy rocks, and we walked up the old shell-encrusted water-stairs, and under the arch of the water-port gate, above which is carved in arabic, "the glorious king, my lord mohammed, ordered the building of this gate by his servant hamed, son of hammoo, ." once on a time, agadir, a city on the coast, much farther south, was the great port and commercial centre of southern morocco; but it was far removed from the sultan's grasp, the tax-gatherer could pursue the even tenor of his ways without interruption, and the kaid afford to be dictatorial and troublesome. then the heavy hand fell, and the sultan's armies closed the seaport, offering its throng of prosperous merchants the alternative of going to prison or of taking up their abode in mogador. this they did, and mogador arose; while to work the lighters (the cargo-boats), and to generally serve the merchants, a company of berbers was transported with them from the sus and agadir to the new seaport. beyond the water-port gate we met a line of heavily laden camels, with a company of athletic berber drivers from the sus, in quaint long tunics of butcher-blue, and lank black hair: many of the men veiled themselves; they all looked as wild as hawks, different from any type hitherto seen. the familiar hebrew broker, in dark blue or black gabardine and greasy skull-cap, was strongly _en evidence_; while as to the state of the dogs we met, of them must the moorish proverb be written, "if fasting be a title to paradise, let the dog walk in first." our baggage had all to pass through the customs house inside the water-port gate; and there we walked, through great white-walled courtyards, whose vistas, of arch beyond arch, suggested temple courts. donkeys laden with skins were hurrying across them. now and then a train of camels swung along, carrying gum or wax or argan oil or almonds. in a good almond year as many as a thousand camels have sometimes come into mogador in one day. the customs house officer was at breakfast, and we awaited his coming by our baggage. at last there was a stir among the many hands who had carried our things up from the boat, and the most solemn and dignified individual conceivable slowly sailed upon the scene, way being made for his flowing robes, which were white as a sheet of best glazed "cream-laid" before the pen marks it. i handed him our pass-paper from the customs house officer at tangier, feeling like a humble subject laying a petition before a monarch: he slowly unfolded it, and more slowly searched for and produced a pair of spectacles in a silver case. lastly, having read the document and reviewed our pile, he "passed" it with an impressive wave of his hand. he then took a seat, a moor minion on each side: we filed solemnly past him, shaking him by the hand. a new-born infant has not such a guileless face as that bland arab. we took up quarters in the suera hotel, managed by a capable scotchwoman and her husband, who had once farmed on the veldt. early next day i rode to palm-tree house on a little horse belonging to the hotel: out by the beach gate, we cantered along the sands close to the sea, crossed the river, left the patron saint-house of mogador on our left hand, bore upwards across the sandy dunes, and struck inland over hard calcareous rock, where, in the teeth of the wind, the sand never lies. it was blowing, that day, a hot desert wind, which in a naturally hot place only makes one the hotter: with the wind, came a good deal of fine sand, on a really windy day making riding almost impossible. palm-tree house is a hotel four miles south-east of mogador, in the loneliest of situations, with the advantage of a view and an open, wild country all round: it has none of the drawbacks of the city; it is breezy, wild, and bare. having reached the top of the dunes, we struck off in more or less of a bee-line for palm-tree house, still riding over soft sand, where nothing but miles upon miles of _r`tam_ (white broom) grew, lovely when in flower, of which we were destined to see almost more than enough before we left southern morocco. the horses ploughed their way through the white track; two or three butterflies hovered about the r`tam; chameleons scuttled occasionally over the path; a tortoise crept along. there were not a few locusts about either, looking like handsome little dragon-flies on the wing. a last canter along one of the rough rides through the scrub led us up to the house, planted well on a rising sand-hill, a view of the sea in front, the hills behind. there are no palm-trees, and there is no garden, nor is there any water, i was told, on the spot; but for all that, palm-tree house might have been a satisfactory lodge wherein to put up. the stunted bush and the sand fringed the very walls. it had the country to itself, and there was nothing _but_ itself which could spoil that country. it was cool and airy and oddly quiet. inside, tiles and open patios and big panelled rooms gave all that could be desired: outside, there was an impression of simplicity and freedom. the stables were a great point, and the bobbery pack, which hunt pig for five months all through the winter, accounted in one season for something like nineteen full-grown boar, ten tuskers, and nine sows. palm-tree house belonged for more than twenty years to a british merchant, who simply provided accommodation for any sportsman liking to come out and put up for a week or so outside mogador: it has still the air of a shooting-box. the host, in breeches and gaiters and a great felt wideawake, rode up while we were there, and offered us every hospitality--a tall wiry man, with good hands and seat. had time been of no object, we should have moved on into palm-tree house. it would be a spot to visit at any season, for the climate scarcely varies all the year round: the difference between summer and winter is not more than five degrees. back again in the city and strolling round it that same afternoon, the conviction was borne in upon us that of all saddening spots mogador was possibly the saddest--that is, to the traveller, from an outside point of view: residents may have another tale to tell. but without vegetation or cultivation within sight, suggestive of life and change and labour, with the monotonous roar of the grey breakers beating its seaward walls, and wastes of blown white sand to landward, mogador is the picture of a city which has lost all heart, and settled down into grim apathy, without a vestige of joy or activity outside its walls. the overcrowding of the jews in the mellah is a shocking evil, already stamping the rising generation with disease. earlier by three-quarters of an hour than tetuan at the same time of year, the city gates at mogador were shut at six o'clock, and picnic parties of moorish or european traders were hurried back in broad daylight. we met the basha gravely pacing the sands on a white mule with scarlet trappings--of all stout officials, in a country where it is a sin and a shame on the part of one in office to be thin, the stoutest. his broad body overshadowed the big mule, and his two little legs might have been a pair of ninepins below a vast cask draped in white. to the south of mogador lies first the sus country and then wadnoon, dividing the morocco which is partly known to europeans, from the sahara, which nobody knows. the sus may be said to be practically unknown, and it is distinctly "forbidden" land, through which only two or three travellers have ever passed--oskar lenz, gatell, gerhard rohlfs, and possibly a missionary; but they were all disguised and went in terror of their lives; nor have they left satisfactory records of their experiences. [illustration: after rain in mogador. [_to face p. ._] and yet the sus is comparatively close to mogador, with which it trades; mules from the sus were always in the mogador market; camels were coming in every week with wool, camels' hair, goat-skins, hides, beeswax, a little gold dust, ostrich feathers, gum-arabic, cattle, and all the produce of the sahara; while the berbers from the sus were interesting above any riffis or tribesmen with whom we had hitherto met. their country is supposed to contain rich mines: it is said to be fertile and thickly populated; it is not loyal--on the contrary, it is ill-affected to its liege lord, the sultan; it is fanatical to a degree, and largely swayed by a form of government best expressed by its title--council of forty. in return for their own goods the berbers from the sus carry back into their country all sorts of manchester goods, powder, tea, sugar, cheap german cutlery, and the like. these same berbers, of unknown origin, were, so the kor[=a]n tells us, packed up by king david, in olden times, in sacks, and carried out of syria on camels, since he wished to see them no more. arrived somewhere near the atlas mountains, their leader called out in the berber tongue "sus!" which means "let down!" "empty out!" so the exiles were turned out of their sacks, and the country in which they settled is called sus to this day. wadnoon trades to a great extent with the soudan, and mogador receives an immense amount of its ostrich feathers: slaves are the most important article of commerce in wadnoon, and morocco is the chief market for this traffic in humanity, the slaves being brought chiefly to morocco city. but if a fever lays hold of the traveller for penetrating into the unknown sus, what must be felt of the great sahara, that waveless inland sea of sand, with its eternal stretches of depressionless wastes reaching on, past horizon after horizon? perhaps an occasional oasis, green as young corn; a well; a feathery date-palm; a melon-patch. but rare are these things, and for the most part the sahara is an endless desert which few europeans could cross and live. its ancient lore, its mystic traditions, give it a fascination all its own. imagine the ostrich-hunting on its borders; picture the natives riding their unequalled breed of horses, the _wind-drinkers_, which carry their masters a hundred miles a day, and which, ridden after the birds up-wind, gradually tire them down, until they can be knocked on the head with a bludgeon; the arabs too, themselves, with the unforgettable manners possessed by such as abraham, and handed down from time immemorial; last of all, timbuctoo, the queen of the desert, the fabled home of the voracious cassowary,--does not the picture imperiously summon the traveller "over the hills and far away"? very far away; for timbuctoo is twelve hundred miles from mogador, and a journey there would mean at least forty days across the sahara, through a country belonging to peoples in no way friendly towards "infidels," where oases are few and far between. some day we may know the sahara under other conditions, for a scheme was started years ago with the intention of flooding the great desert by means of a canal from the atlantic ocean, which should carry water on to el joof, an immense depression well below sea-level somewhere in the centre. thus, where all is now sand, would lie a vast sea: we should "boat" to timbuctoo. so far, however, the scheme has begun and ended in words. but though the great sahara is desert pure and simple, it is a mistake to imagine it devoid of life. even as there has never yet been found a collection of aborigines without its totem, neither are there any extensive parts of the globe where life of some sort does not exist. the sahara is little known, chiefly because the oases in the centre are occupied by intensely hostile and warlike tribes, whose animosity is chiefly directed towards the french, whom they hate with a deadly hatred. but the edges of the great desert have been visited, and on the northern limits two animals are found--the addax antelope, and loder's gazelle. the wide-spread hoofs of the addax antelope enable it to travel over sand at a great pace. it is a large and ungainly beast with spiral horns. probably it follows in the wake of the rains wherever they go; but what happens to it in the dry season is unknown. similarly with loder's gazelle: though more or less a desert animal, it is a mystery how it remains alive through the long rainless months, in places apparently without water, and on wastes of rolling, wind-drifted sand. of the natural inhabitants of desert country, the sahara is by no means devoid: sand-lizards, jumping-mice, sand-grouse, sand-vipers, desert-larks, and even a family of snakes belonging to the boas, are to be found. the kh[=a]ki-coloured sand-grouse are most difficult to see on the yellow face of the country: the sand-rats and sand-moles all take on the colour of their surroundings, and thus hide and protect themselves: one and all exist in some marvellous manner where it would seem that existence could only be miraculous. the skink is met with, beloved of the romans, who imported desert-skinks into rome in pliny's day, and held them a valuable remedy for consumption, chopped up into a sort of white wine: the trade was brisk in . to-day the arabs consider it a remedy, and eat it as a food. it acts very much in the same way as do flat-fish in the bottom of the sea, sinking itself under the sand, allowing the sand to lie over its back and cover it, like a flounder, only leaving its sharp eyes out of cover, and sometimes the spines on its back. for the maintenance of all this animal life, it is quite possible that rain may occasionally fall even upon desert, and disappear with lightning-like rapidity; for on the borders of certain african deserts in the north a phenomenon very much like the description of the mosaic manna occurs when the plains have been wetted with rain. the surface is seen next morning "covered with little white globes like tiny puff-balls, the size of a bird-cherry, or spilled globes of some large grain." it is gathered and eaten by the arabs, but, like an unsubstantial fungus growth, melts or rots in the course of a day or two. enough of the sahara. meeting with men in mogador who had come straight from the mysterious country, veiled, untamed, and remotely removed from european touch, our interest was naturally kindled in that back of the beyond. there is no need for the traveller to penetrate so far as either the sahara or the sus. long before he reaches them, and in order to do so, he must cross the atlas mountains by one of the wild passes, and the great chain of the atlas is still unsurveyed and practically unknown. sir joseph hooker and dr. ball explored a part of its valleys many years ago: no one since then has made a satisfactory attempt to learn details. the chain is supposed to be about thirteen thousand feet high, and it is about twenty miles from morocco city; but the character of the lawless chiefs and tribesmen who inhabit it, so far prevents intrusion and exploration. in a few days we were to see it--the mighty, solitary wall, on which the ancients believed the world to rest, described by pliny, rising abruptly out of the plains, snowclad, one of the world's finest sights: the atlas had largely brought us to southern morocco. chapter x on the march once more--buying mules--a bad road--first camp--argan-trees--coos-coosoo--a terrible night--doctoring the khaylifa--roughing it under canvas. chapter x and all this time you (at home) are drinking champagne (well, most of it, anyway), and sleeping in soft beds with delicious white sheets, and smoking turkish cigarettes, and wearing clean clothes, with nice stiff collars and shirt-cuffs, and having great warm baths in marble bath-rooms and sweet-smelling soap . . . and sitting side by side at table, first a man and then a woman--the same old arrangement, i suppose--knives to the right and forks to the left, as usual. the hot desert wind in mogador showed no signs of changing: there was no enlivening sun, and the sad white seaport could only charm in a morbid manner: to be out under the skies, in the open, away from the city and sealed houses and the _eyes_, was a thing to be sought after, and that quickly. southern morocco is like the east in that it is all eyes. the watchful east--it may be lazy, but nothing escapes its eyes. they gleam between the folds of the veil; they look from out of a smooth face, mild and yet as little to be read as the deep sea. and who knows what lies at the bottom of those quiet pools? there need be no waste of time in morocco, even as there is no convention: having decided to start--_start_. the st of march saw us away, leaving mogador with the intention of marching to _marrakesh_, which is the moorish name for morocco city, the southern capital of the empire. in order to see more of the country we marched by a zigzag route, crossing, but not following, the beaten track; thus we were once or twice in villages where european women had not been seen: we met no one, and we camped in odd, out-of-the way corners, objects of huge interest to the wandering arabs with whom we fell in. mr. maddon, the british consul at mogador, to whom we brought letters of introduction from sir arthur nicolson, helped us in several ways, and in his turn provided us with letters to an arab in marrakesh. we managed to buy two mules: one was from the sus, with a backbone like a sword-fish and every rib showing, but he was as hard as nails, and would pace along all day without any trouble; the other was a lazy beast, fat and older; but they both of them proved useful animals, answering our purpose for the time being. we meant to sell, when we left the country: hiring is expensive work. of course it was "just a dear time to buy": it always is. the jew broker, through whom we bought the mules from the susi to whom they belonged, asked seven pounds ten for each of them, but came down to six pounds fifteen. we sold them some weeks later for five guineas each: hiring would have cost a great deal more. ordinarily they are to be bought for five pounds and less in mogador. no susi will trade direct with a european, and every bargain goes through israel's hands, which means a big percentage pocketed by the jew. [illustration: where manchester goods are sold, mogador. [_to face p. ._] our hotel-keeper, the scotch lady, provided us with reliable servants, one of whom turned out to be invaluable. mulai omar was, as his name indicates, a saint by heredity. algeria was his birthplace. he was twenty-four years old; and having lived in a french possession, spoke french, not like s`lam, but perfectly. he was a well-educated little fellow, enterprising, energetic; interpreted arabic and shillah for us; acted as cook, in which capacity he was first-rate; generally organized the camp; and was our personal servant. mulai omar was quite a man to know, and a friend to trust. he was unattractive-looking--small, dark, and dirty; wore a red fez, a short black monkey-jacket, and immense, full, white cotton drawers. saïd, our second servant, intended to look after the mules, was a lazy arab, who acted the fine gentleman, and was never without a cigarette in his mouth. he helped omar more or less, and was responsible for much loss of temper on our parts, before we parted. another saint by heredity, mulai ombach, looked after our camel, which carried the heavy baggage. our fourth and last man, mohammed, drove a donkey, nominally for the purpose of carrying provender for the mules and camel, but which often as not bore either mulai ombach or mohammed himself. the two principal servants, omar and saïd, rode two mules, which carried light loads as well. we hired a couple of moorish men's saddles for our own use, red-clothed, high-peaked, and well stuffed; also two big tents--one for the servants, one for ourselves. our commissariat was not hard to manage, helped out with stores we had brought from tangier; for bearing in mind napoleon's truism that "the army marches on its stomach," we had laid in an ample supply. eleven o'clock saw us finally under way on the morning of the st. we had intended to start at nine; but any one who has ever travelled and camped out knows the difficulty of getting away upon that first morning--the final wrench between the servants and their old surroundings, the dozen petty obstacles. in this case one of the mules hired for baggage turned out to be in a wretched condition when it came to the hotel, and another had to be found in its place--no easy matter. the camel was started off at half-past ten with our beds, bedding, cuisine necessaries, part of the tents, and chairs and table; but, to our disgust, mulai ombach, its driver, stopped short at the bazaar, and there we found them both when we rode through the city. they were hurried up, and the whole party seen safely through the city gates; but once outside, the camel was so slow that we left them behind, r. and myself jogging ahead with mulai omar and saïd, trusting that the heavy baggage would catch us up at lunch-time. one more delay--outside the jewish cemetery was standing, waiting for us, the wife of saïd: many tears were flowing, and sobs to be heard under the haik. saïd produced some dollars, which were no doubt intended to last her during her husband's absence: he then rode on without attempting a farewell, and we were really off at last. for the first five miles we hugged the coast in a northerly direction, keeping close to the sea: the tide was high; in one place, where we made a short cut, resulting in rather a nasty bit of riding, we were actually in the waves, slipping over black rock, with deep pools on each side. it was a grey day, not hot, and the hard flat sands, across which we rode for the most part, were excellent going. the only wayfarers we met, tramped along behind camels. untrustworthy brutes these animals are, especially the bubbling ones, out of whose way we most cautiously kept; for though a camel seldom bites, when he does it is serious. he never forgets an injury. a man in mogador ill-treated one badly a few years ago: it went into the interior for a year, and came back to mogador, and met and knew the man at once, taking him by the nape of the neck, as is its habit, and tearing the back of his skull off. the sandy dunes on our right were covered with _r`tam_ (white broom), slender, waving, silver-green stems, in seed just then. only r`tam could grow in such poor soil. when we turned inland we found ourselves amongst dense undergrowth, a small forest, consisting chiefly of _tugga_ (a sort of juniper), of myrtle, _sidra_ bushes, and other shrubs, intersected by narrow paths, along one of which we paced in single file, the limestone which crops up all over the country making our pace a slow one. it was the middle of the day when we found ourselves in the thick of this jungle. omar pointed out a little sandy clearing, and in amongst the bushes, out of earshot of the track, we halted for lunch. the mules had their packs taken off, and rolled themselves in the sand. a carpet was spread on a bank; and there, with the sea still to be seen behind us, the thickets echoing with familiar blackbirds, and every space glowing with thyme, iris, lavender, and other flowers, we spent the first of many lazy hours of the sort. alas! our camel was still behind us, and never turned up: that was a wretched piece of _bundobust_. but long before we quitted morocco we vowed never to have a camel for baggage again. only half-an-hour's halt we allowed ourselves; then saddled up, and were off again. still through "jungle," and by a sandy path the trail led us, blocked often by stones and rocks, truly one of those . . . sad highways, left at large to ruts and stones and lovely nature's skill, who is no pavior. the flowers became more interesting at every step; but there was little time to get off and collect specimens, though the path was so narrow that, riding along, pink climbing convolvulus and tall lavender could easily be gathered off the bushes. for any unknown specimen some one dismounted, and it was stowed away in an empty tin kettle for safety. by-and-by we dropped down into a narrow valley, green and cultivated: a lonely palm-tree or two stuck up--the "feather duster struck by lightning" of mark twain. a fine crop of beans was growing on our right, indian corn and barley to the left: the land looked full of heart, rich, and unlike even the tetuan country. we came across a man or two working in a dirty white tunic in the fields, and left behind some wretched huts down by a spring. about this time we lost omar's dog, which was to have been our guard--a rather lame lurcher, which thought better of footing it all the way to marrakesh. the country was full of magpies--not nearly so smart as our warwickshire mags, brownish about the tail, and with less white; yet they could scarcely have been in bad plumage at that time of year. in a narrow pathway we stood aside to let a camel pass: since we had left the coast wayfarers had grown rare for the most part. the place at which we had halted for lunch was el faidar, within sight of one of morocco's countless little white saint-houses--sidi bousuktor. now, after a long climb over a ridge, we looked down from the top into a valley--ain-el-hadger; and omar pointed out in the distance the spot he suggested we should camp at for the night. descending the ridge was the roughest piece of riding on the road to marrakesh: the shale gave way under the mules' feet; great rocks projected on the track. none of us dismounted, however: tetuan had hardened our hearts and accustomed us to awkward corners, and the mules were clever. slowly we slipped and slid down into the most luxuriant green vale, set in the scrub-covered hills, carpeted with fields of young corn, olive-trees, gardens, fruit-trees, and flowers abundantly. to the north, upon our left, lay the iron mountains, no very great height, somewhere about two thousand feet, and famous for iron in the days of the romans and carthaginians, who both probably worked them. now they are mined no more, and only known as the favourite quarters of wild boar, signs of whose existence we saw for ourselves, in patches of ground rooted and torn up. we rode down through these fruitful acres as the sun was getting low: here and there lay a little white farmer's house; birds were everywhere--suddenly we heard a cuckoo, then a nightingale. at a place where three little glens met we passed a tall look-out tower, standing sentry over each one, from the top of which the ain-el-hadger people could easily see an enemy coming. in england it would have been a ruin: in morocco it was in active use,--it is still "the middle ages" in morocco. leaving a garden on the left, surrounded by a high tapia wall, we crossed a little streamlet into the brook which waters the valley, and reached at last a corner surrounded with grey olives, deep in lush grass, and overlooked by the inevitable quaint white-domed saint-house on the top of a rocky hillock. it was an ideal spot. omar and saïd laid their two guns under a tree (they rode with them across their knees, ancient flint-locks, and carried bullets in bags at their sides, omar possessing a french rifle as well); we off-saddled, unloaded the two men's mules, and unpacked what there was to unpack, the camel having practically everything. r. and i strolled about and photographed. a countryman brought us three fowls and some eggs. the sun set. still the wretched camel had not come. dew fell heavily, and omar made a famous fire and supplied us with hot green tea. at last there were voices; a great form loomed in the darkness and swung towards us; the donkey followed. it was not long before the camel was unloaded, our big tent up, table and chairs and beds put together, and though dinner was late it was the more acceptable, the saint proving a chef. a pannierful of bread was part of the camel's luggage, and intended to last us until we got to marrakesh: vegetables we had in plenty for the first two or three days. and omar worked wonders with the means at his disposal. early we turned in: the stars were out; the frogs croaked in the streamlets. with the tent-flap tied back, and looking out into the quiet night, we slept as sound as tramps on the roadside at home. i woke at a.m. the guard had stopped talking, and were all asleep and snoring round the tents, except one old greybeard, who was sitting up by the fire. four ain-el-hadger men had come to act as guard for the night, bringing their guns and long knives with them. it was oddly light--the "false dawn" of omar khayy[=a]m; but there were no stars. [illustration: our camp at ain-el-hadger. [_to face p. ._] such a dawn woke us at five! every bird for miles around was singing: blackbirds sounded like england, wood-pigeons cooed, cuckoos insisted, and among them all, strange and indian, a hoopoe called. the sun climbed up behind the saint-house and solitary palm; the olives began to cast shadows; the grass was silver with dew. we breakfasted soon after six, our table out on the green lawn. such air and scents of moist earth! it was chilly too. the mules fed busily in the long wet grass; behind the kitchen-tent the camel lay, chewing; an old sheikh turned up on a donkey, and joined the servants at breakfast round the fire, at one of those meals which were all green tea and tobacco. just as we were starting a party of fifteen sheikhs and countrymen rode up on their way to a distant "powder play" at the fête of some saint, two days' journey off. passing our camp, they turned into a little three-cornered field of much poppies and little corn, and proceeded to bivouac for an hour or two. tailing one after another through a gap in the hedge, on the finest barbs southern morocco can produce, heavy, but handsome in their way (particularly a white with flowing mane and tail, and two iron-greys), they pulled up underneath some dense green fig-trees, and dismounted in the shade, leaving their scarlet cloth saddles to match the poppies. there was colour running riot indeed. several of the stately figures, all in white, walked up to the saint-house to pray: one great man waddled down to the stream (to be great is to be fat, in morocco), and a few began to groom their horses. the guns were piled: the sun glinted on them and on the silver-chased stirrups, and blazed on the snowy garments, on the poppies, and the saddles, one of which was blue, another yellow. we were in the land of arabs: the berbers were left behind at mogador, and these tall lean horsemen, burnt coffee-coloured, were all descendants of the sons of the desert. by this time the camp was scattered: the camel had risen from its knees and paced off under its medley load some time before, attended by mulai ombach, mohammed, and the donkey. the ain-el-hadger guard had each received a trifle for his night's services; saïd had groomed and brought up our mules; we mounted, and, followed by himself and omar, perched on the top of the two packs, their guns sticking out at one side, rode away. the first few miles were not marked by anything of particular interest: the collections of huts and bare walls which sometimes adorned the hillsides were far away; the curious piles of stones in the fields, almost like scarecrows, were only landmarks. but after a time we rode into the country of the argan-tree, that most interesting and unique specimen, which flourishes in this corner of morocco, covering an area about two hundred miles long and forty wide, and growing nowhere else in the known world. southern morocco would be lost indeed without argan oil, which is used for cooking purposes as a substitute for butter, and of which we had with us a large supply. the oil is extracted from the fruit of the tree: at the end of march it should be fit to gather, looking much like a large olive, and possessed of a green fleshy husk, greedily eaten by camels, goats, sheep, and oxen. thus, as well as gathering the nuts themselves off the ground, the country people allow their flocks to feed upon the fruit: having driven them home, the animals chew the cud, disgorging the argan nuts, which are collected, and eventually cracked by women and children in order to obtain oil. the average height of the tree is twenty-five feet, but its rugged side branches will cover a space of seventy feet. gnarled and twisted, the bark is a little like crocodile-skin, and forms in squares: the trunk has a way of folding upon itself, too, as it grows--slowly; for a large tree may be three hundred years old, and in consequence its wood is immensely hard. the argan is more or less tropical: though a tree has been known to live against a south wall in england, it was killed by the first severe winter. among the argans, little oxen were ploughing the red rich soil of the vale through which we rode; it was watered by a brook, and real hedges of pomegranate, out in brilliant flower, divided the fields. in one of these some arabs were digging carrots; in another homely potatoes, the first we had seen, were doing remarkably well. by this time the camel and attendants had been overtaken and left far behind, and since we had passed our heavy baggage no other forms of life seemed to be travelling along the same trail as our own: certainly a countryman joined himself to us, partly to point out our direction, partly for the sake of company; he held his stick behind his shoulders and stepped out well, but not for long. and after he had left we only saw a few women in the distance. these were often on donkeys, and some carried water-pots on their heads; but not one of them was "a beast of burden" in the sense of the women round tetuan--not one crouched under an overpowering load of faggots or charcoal. as we jogged on, the great barley-fields, all in ear, though still green, might have led us to believe we were in england, except that in the next sheltered spot a white saint-house would be found, with its dome and its palm-tree, perhaps a shady olive grove, allowed to flourish for the sake of the holy place. yes, it was africa. farther on, an arab village lay close to the track, no windows in its yellowish flat walls, apparently no roofs: a stoned arched entrance was filled up with thorn-bushes, and the tops of the walls piled with the same to prevent outsiders from molesting the inmates. this warlike tendency was again shown in another watch-tower, built, like the last, at the conjunction of two valleys. meanwhile, the bare and uninteresting-looking iron mountains were disappearing from view: another ridge, which met them at right angles, spotted with argan-trees, looked in the distance like a tea or coffee plantation on eastern hills--that too faded from sight; and we rode on--now through a blaze of flowers, for every hedge flamed pink and yellow, and even the dry thorns were blotted with colour--now past fields of mauve poppies and scarlet poppies and stretches of stainless blue. a white saint-house stood out against the colour, its dome like dazzling chalk, it shadows blue: we looked back at it from under an argan-tree, in the shade of which we rested for ten minutes, picking up a few nuts, and drinking long and deep out of omar's stone water-jar. not far from this spot we came upon _sok-el-had_ (the sunday market)--that is, a place where every sunday a country market is held, and to which the whole countryside flocks to do its marketing. this was tuesday, and therefore sok-el-had was forlorn and deserted, its rows of little mud huts and its meat-hangers empty, not a soul within miles. they are as old as morocco, these places known by the name of the week-day on which the market is held--places so strangely deserted upon any other day. still we rode on for several hours, past sheikh boujiman ben hamed's white house, while the sun blazed on the bare path, and the argans stood too far apart to cast consecutive shade. it was with much satisfaction that we saw our next camping-ground in the distance about one o'clock: we had started early, and a long lazy afternoon was a good prospect. _sok-el-tleta_ is named once more after its market--tuesday market. even as sok-el-had was forlorn, so sok-el-tleta in proportion teemed with life. held on the open hillside, upon a great bare space worn brown by cycles of tuesday markets, the prevailing colour brown and white, hundreds of mules, hundreds of arabs, the sight was one not to be forgotten. we dismounted, and followed omar into the thick of the fray, surrounded at once by a staring and interested crowd. it was an extraordinary scene. streets were formed by rows upon rows of little mud cubicles, thatched over, inside which, on a mud shelf, the vendor sat, with his goods spread out for sale round him. slippers were being mended; blacksmith's work was being done; cottons and stuffs were selling, sugar, groceries of all sorts, brand-new slippers and new clothes, vegetables and meat. meat was the centre of the whirlpool, and round the carcases and shapeless joints the largest crowd: it hung on upright stakes and branches stuck in the ground, and the effect was that of a nightmare wood, in which the weird trees were bearing gory and dreadful fruit. it was all life and stir, that bare hillside; and by half-past one o'clock the whole thing had melted away, and there was no sign of a human being moving. mulai omar was well known in sok-el-tleta, his wife's relatives living there: because he was a saint his clothes and slippers were kissed by every one who met us as we rode along to our camp beyond the tuesday market. we passed women and children digging for ayerna root: the corn not being yet ripe, they were short of food. the root of this weed, though eatable, is most unwholesome, and unless carefully prepared, people grow thinner and more yellow upon it daily. but all our interest in a few moments was focussed upon a most imposing ruin, a real windsor castle of a rudimentary type, which commanded a hilltop on a table-land on the right, great walls rearing themselves up to the sky, towers defending every corner, a turreted gate-house the entrance, and the whole loop-holed, grim-looking enough. obviously the kaid who built such a kasbah was a great man: his garden, a beautiful overgrown wilderness, gone like his castle to rack and ruin, lay below at sok-el-tleta, wisely situated, for vegetation would have been badly exposed upon the hilltop. about twenty-seven years ago the kaid who built the kasbah--chiefly by forced labour on the part of all the country people for miles round, though skilled workmen came from mogador and were paid--was attacked by the arab tribes from end to end of his province of shedma, and after a six-months' siege was forced to fly to marrakesh, where he died in prison, the tribesmen demolishing the castle for hidden treasure, till every wall had yielded its secret. probably he oppressed his province like every other kaid, and was well hated. we went inside, and it was a foregone conclusion that we should camp there upon the grass. the governor's own halls were in a block in the centre, room after room, most intricate. our tents were pitched in the vast sunny courtyard. we wandered about, exploring the odd corners, all the afternoon: not a vestige of timber or decoration remained. handsome little red-brown kestrels with grey heads hovered over us and sat on the old walls, uttering their querulous cry: a beautiful blue jay, with cinnamon back and black-tipped wings and tail, was nesting in a hole among the bricks, and let us come close to him. a _sib-sib_ scampered along an old window-ledge, a little animal like a squirrel, grey with striped back, the stripes running from head to tail: it ruffled out its tail at will. the camel turned up at five, having been nine hours on the road. later on a _mona_ (a present) was brought us, consisting of butter, in a lordly dish set round with pink roses. so in the deserted walls of the kasbah we passed the night. ghosts ought to have haunted those horrible death-traps, the _matamors_, of which there are said to be a hundred. the ground seemed riddled with these "wells," intended for the storage of grain, but used by sheikhs and kaids as their private prisons, whence at their will they draft on luckless captives to the public gaols: an old enemy is quite harmless in a matamor, with a square stone over the top, for the rest of his life. the wonderful cisterns were another feature of the kasbah, immense tanks underground, concreted and still water-tight--at the end of every dry season cleaned out and whitewashed, now half full of stinking rain-water and decay. we got off at seven the next morning, struck the main road from mogador, left it, and found ourselves in quite an agricultural country, green barley-fields, planted all over at intervals with figs and pomegranates, even hedges of a sort. then again we were in the argan forest--the last of it, and the best: beautiful trees, with their knarled, twisted branches. i thought of yews on the surrey hills. here coarse grass grew between, something like a park at home: goats clambered up into the forks, feasting on the green fruit. but all too soon the argans came to an end, and we saw this phenomenon of morocco no more. nor was the exchange of the argan forest for the everlasting _r`tam_ (white broom) and a sun-baked, arid wilderness, a welcome one. it always meant stones and sand and a general grilling, the r`tam, as it waved like pampas-grass to the far horizon. by-and-by palmetto cropped up, the fan-shaped dwarf palm, which makes ropes and twine, baskets, mats, dish-covers, leggings, hats, and girths. here it grew in the middle of wretched little attempts at corn-fields--a drawback to farming, though from want of water farming might well have been let alone. topping a rise, the whole undulating country was r`tam and palmetto: occasionally a flock of goats moved on its face, tended by thin mahogany-coloured arab boys in dirty woollen tunics. when a single olive-tree appeared, we hailed its shade for lunch. the mules, hobbled together, grazed: omar and saïd lay at a short distance, drinking green tea and smoking near the little fire they had lit. botanical specimens had to be dried. that night we camped outside the kasbah belonging to the most powerful kaid in the whole district: an immense reddish-yellow pile it was, built of _tapia_--that is, of mud, gravel, and water principally, poured into bottomless cases on the wall itself, and left to set. the kasbah had lived through a siege or two, and looked as if it would "ruin" quickly. from the arched gateway a crowd of squalid retainers emerged to stare at sun-helmets and englishwomen: living like mediæval times within the castle's protecting walls, the "feudal system" practically obtains in morocco in the present day. alas! the governor, kaid mohammed, was at fez: his _khaylifa_ (lieutenant) received us inside the filthy and squalid kasbah, seated on a doorstep--a better-dressed man than his retainers, curtailed perhaps in intellectual allowance, who gave us leave to camp outside. [illustration: a blindfolded camel working a water-wheel. [_to face p. ._] that evening we watched a blindfolded camel turning a water-wheel, and some wretched prisoners, with irons on their feet, who shuffled out of the gate and drew water. a black slave brought kaid mohammed's horses to water one by one; then made each roll on a sandy patch of ground, off which he first carefully picked every stone. the sun streamed in at our tent door next morning, but we were at breakfast before it had more than left the horizon, and soon on our way through a rough country of scrub and olives--a capital country for pig (which are shot in numbers), and practicable for spearing them, one would think. jogging along little paths, with a cool breeze in our faces, which invariably went round with the sun, we came by-and-by to a valley, green and wooded with olives, where barley was growing, looking as if it had been kept under glass, it was such an even crop, and rooted in the richest soil. crack--crack--ping! and a stone whistled over our heads: this meant arab boys scaring birds with slings, made of dried grass, and probably after david's pattern. from out of an arab village a little black child ran with a bowl of very sour milk, which, however, omar and saïd appreciated: the child wore one filthy whitish garment and a bead necklace, a little inky-black pigtail completing it. this was a day of all days, in that we had our first view of the atlas mountains--those mountains which we had come so far to see. there they were, first seen from a certain ridge, mighty peaks, snow-covered, filling one with an intense desire to travel into their fastnesses: a haze, however, hid the greater part of the range. a countryman joined us for a short distance, to whom omar gave a cigarette-paper and a pinch of tobacco. again all cultivation was exchanged for uncompromising plain, stones, stones, and a soil like iron, on which nothing grew except the thorny zizyphus lotus, with the double row of thorns, one pointing forward, the other back, out of which the soudanese make their zarebas. a colony of bottle-shaped nests, made of dried grass, in these thorn-bushes, tempted me to try for some eggs. the attempt proved what a barrier the thorny lotus can be. i was extricated with difficulty by means of omar's gun-barrels and saïd's hands; but not without one nest and eggs--they apparently belonged to a variety of sparrow. a well with one tree, a spot of shade in the arid plain, intervened farther on. the mules drank. an arab rode up, lean, walnut-coloured; slipped off his high-peaked red saddle, hobbled his mule, and lay down under the tree. hot as it was, we pushed on. this plain is said to remind travellers of the stony part of the sahara. in the air was a scent of burnt grass and flowers--a _honey_ smell: every time a breeze came we were duly grateful. the mules clattered on over the stones until sidi moktar came in sight--a saint-house of the deepest sanctity, near which a country market is held one day a week. up to this cluster of what omar dignified by the name of _shops_ we rode, and, dismounting, stooped our heads, and took possession of one of the minute mud-booths, the servants going into another next door. we could sit upright, though not stand, and there was shade in the shape of a thatched covering, while after the glare and flare of the sun outside it was as cool as a cellar. from one to three we rested there, drank green tea after lunch, studied maps, took notes. but the sun was as hot as ever when we took to the open road again, plain before us, the atlas dimly to be seen. some oddly formed hills, from four to five hundred feet high, flat-topped, presently appeared: one, from its contour, is called _hank-el-jemmel_ (camel's back). we rode past them. a layer of coarse chalcedony covers the flat summits, which would offer resistance when, ages ago, the atlas wall was scooped into ridge and ravine, and the plain below washed bare, except for isolated remnants, such as these table-hills. we picked up fragments of chalcedony and small blocks of volcanic rock, or basalt. about five o'clock we reached an arab _douar_, or village, and decided to camp near it for the night. twenty or thirty conical huts, made of branches and grass and anything which keeps out the sun, black camel's hair or a worn-out garment; the whole surrounded by a great hedge, or _zareba_, of the thorny lotus, not growing, but piled up, one hole left in the fence for exit, and closed at night by simply piling extra thorns in the space; a company of howling dogs,--such is an arab douar, and it is probably unequalled for filth, though when the parasites become too many, even the thick-skinned bedouin moves out, and a new douar is put up somewhere else. there was no choice as regards camping near such a spot: it may have been unsafe in the open--at any rate no servants could ever be induced to sleep except under the protection of a village or a kasbah. it was five o'clock. an old sheikh or headman came out from between the thorn-barrier, welcomed us, and led the way inside to a perfectly impossible open space, a dunghill, amongst the huts, where we might camp; it was overrun with fowls, and covered with filth of every description. therefore, though assured that we should be much safer within the zareba, and deeply against the wishes of the servants, we insisted upon leading the way outside, and choosing a spot as far removed from the fence as possible, though only too near for our own comfort. as soon as the tents were pitched and the sun had set, such a noise of goats (which had just been driven inside the douar) bleating, and donkeys braying, and dogs barking, and children crying, arose, as we prayed it might not be our lot often to hear at the end of a hard day. an admiring throng had gathered round us while the tent was in course of erection, and we were sitting on the grass. one old woman squatted before us, cross-legged, not a yard from our feet, and _gazed_; she wore nothing but one woollen garment, apparently a square held together on the shoulders by steel pins: her skinny arms, legs, and feet were bare, of course. we did not encourage "the masses," but kept them at arm's-length with sticks. that was a noisy night: half the douar was apparently being entertained in the servants' tent, which for safety was pitched all too close to our own, and they talked far on into the small hours in mumbling undertones, to the sound of which we finally slept, nor waked till a glorious dawn in a cloudless sky roused us at five o'clock. the herds were then wending their way out of the douar, filing across the plain, the mysterious delicate light of sunrise on the backs of the sheep and goats. by seven o'clock the sun was too hot to sit in for choice. we had already breakfasted in the conical shadow cast by the tent, a group of children watching every operation, some of them wearing the quaintest necklaces, of argan nuts strung together, and lumps of yellow sulphur sewn into perforated squares of leather: these were eagerly untied and handed over to us for a _bellune_ ( ½d.). at eight o'clock we had left the douar behind, and were heading for sheshaoua, south of the camel's back, along a trail more stony and desert-like than any before: even the few thorn-bushes did not flourish; perhaps the white snails, with which they were so thickly covered that the branches looked all in blossom, did not agree with them--snails which are beloved of partridges. we met no man nor animal, till at last a _rekass_ passed us, a runner carrying the mail to mogador, jogging along the two hundred and seventy miles' journey, for which he would be paid, there and back again, thirteen shillings. his stick was tucked under his clothes, down his back, for the sake of ventilation; his waistband was tightened; his palm-leaf wallet was on his back, with letters, possibly some bread, a match or two, and some hemp, inside. he was a long-limbed fellow, bronzed and bearded, with the vacant, glassy eyes of a kif-smoker; for kif kept him going often instead of food, and helped him to swing along day after day, untiring, like a camel, sleeping little, praying occasionally at a saint's tomb, fording the streams, trotting over the plains, his eyes fixed on the horizon--"eating the miles," as arabs say. this particular rekass left marrakesh on monday morning at ten, and reached mogador on wednesday afternoon at three, doing his two hundred and seventy miles in forty-nine hours. when sir william kirby green died suddenly on an embassy in marrakesh, a rekass carried the news to mazagan, a hundred and sixty miles, in thirty-two hours; but the vice-consul told me that upon reaching his office the man fell down--he could not stand to tell the news. we rode on, praying for a breeze which never came: the sun literally sizzled on the baked desert, the rocks gave out an oven-like heat, and the rarefied air oscillated over the wastes. it was too hazy for more than glimpses of the atlas and their snows: as far as we could see stretched only illimitable drab-coloured plain, broken by the flat-topped hills. at last we stumbled along to the top of a ridge; and there, strange and delightful sight, away in the distance lay a green basin, trees, no mirage, but the valley of sheshaoua. sheshaoua is a district ruled by a powerful governor, whose great kasbah lies somewhere about the centre, dominating a large village. the district is watered by a stream from the atlas mountains, which accounts for its fertility; for, except where irrigation is possible, there can be no cultivation in this sahara: wide ditches conduct the stream across the length and breadth of the province, resulting in a green ribbon upon the face of the plain, the fields being edged with little hard mud-banks, keeping the water evenly distributed over the surface when the crops need flooding. to have lived upon sun-burn is to appreciate the colour green: the march lost its monotony and some of its heat, when green lay in front and came nearer with every stride. two hours and a half were short: the end of that time found us riding between corn-fields, crossing streamlet after streamlet watering the vegetation, and at last jogging over real turf, instead of clattering on stones, which had made talking difficult for the last day or two; now the path was actually soft and earthy. a long string of camels kept pace with us for a time on a parallel trail; then a douar came into sight, afterwards two saint-houses and a ruined kasbah. that half of these castles are ruined is not to be wondered at, considering that they are mud-built, and that tribal disputes and invasions are interminable. some of those same crumbling tapia walls which we passed supported immense earthen jars, standing out against the sky--jars which are stored with corn or butter, and sealed up: nine months' old butter has the reputation of an old wine. shady trees, standing for the most part by the stream, hung over our path, but would have made damp camping-grounds, and we rode on through a marsh, up one ridge, down the opposite side, and at last into the principal village of sheshaoua, not far from which, on a hillside to the north-east, lay one of the familiar country market-places, with its collection of little shelters for the sellers, its upright branches on which to hang meat--thursday's market this. a ruined, red-walled kasbah faced it, apparently inhabited by storks alone, busy building their great rough nests: some were in the village. sheshaoua was no douar, but a high-walled collection of houses, overlooked by the modern kasbah on the hill. thither we rode, up the steep slope, to call on the kaid, sekassam belcady, and ask permission to pitch the tents in one of the gardens which fringed the stream below. this the khaylifa granted at once (the kaid himself being at fez with the sultan), pressing on us the alternative of putting up inside the kasbah itself; but the open air had stronger attractions, and we wound our way downhill to the stream, on the other side of which the kaid's own garden lay. there being no bridge, the stream deep, and the banks steep, the mules were driven over by themselves, and r. and i followed one by one on omar's back--on and into a natural garden fit for the gods, one of nature's own parterres, and a paradise at that. on dry ground, underneath orange-trees covered with blossom, we lunched and lay down: of flowers, except wild ones, there were none, nor any attempt at cultivation; the terraces were dense in greenery and shade, interlaced with branches, intersected by streamlets, perfumed with orange flowers; water murmured; nightingales answered each other from every corner; wood-pigeons cooed content; most musical of all, the bulbul's throbbing, passionate note--not loud--was heard for the first time. yes; we might have said: "if there is a heaven upon earth, it is this, it is this, it is this." the snake creeps into most paradises: suddenly a thunder-storm invaded ours; heavy rain began even to penetrate the thick lace of leaves and branches over our heads, and, walking to the opening at the edge of the wood, it was clear that heavy storms were working up from the north-east; nor did the day improve. having sat through two downpours, with every sign of more to follow, when another pressing invitation came from the khaylifa to spend the night in the kasbah, it seemed foolish to do other than accept; for bad weather under tents, which like ours did not claim to be waterproof, has no attractions. further, the khaylifa had stated that the guest-house was new, and had never been occupied. thither we hurried through the rain. the inside of the "castle" was blocked by a collection of filthy-looking sheds or rooms, which seemed to be full of arabs and negroes and women--wives of the khaylifa--all of them squalid and mannerless: the paths between were littered with refuse. a country kaid, judging from the state of his kasbah, is possessed of no refinement, and has less sense of decency and comfort, as european ideas go, than many members of the labouring class at home. the appearance of the guest-house was, however, reassuring: the long lofty room into which we were shown had been newly whitewashed, the ceiling painted red and green; its double doors and two windows opened into a little courtyard, and rooms beyond housed the servants. a sheep was being skinned in an adjoining shed: we were to be feasted. meantime, few, if any, of the kaid's retainers could have abstained from visiting us, to judge by the levée which we held for more than an hour: perhaps the black slaves were most interesting, but they were also hardest to remove, from the scene of such a phenomenon, as two englishwomen within their own walls. probably no such thing had happened within the memory of man; for sheshaoua is off the beaten track to marrakesh, nor do travellers as a rule sleep out of their tents. while we had tea, under a battery of eyes, and further annoyed by the chatter at the open door and windows, a _mona_ (a present from the governor) arrived, and was set down at our feet. it was not the time--just after tea--to eat an immense dish of _coos-coosoo_, or a steaming pile of hot mutton and raisins, cooked in oil, which lay on the round trenchers, when the great beehive-like straw covers were raised: some of the hot cakes accompanying them might be managed, but the rest was handed over to the expectant servants, to whom coos-coosoo is as roast beef to the british labourer, though less stimulating, for it only consists of wheat or millet or maize flour, granulated, steamed, and eaten hot, sometimes crowned with chicken. following hard on the mona came a message from the khaylifa asking for medicine. graphically answering my question as to what was the matter with him, the messenger stroked his waist: we found a pill, which was carried off with much gratitude. a short time elapsed, and then, to our horror, four slaves arrived, carrying great preparations for tea--brass trays, urn, and the whole paraphernalia--mint and sweetness filling the room. again the servants benefited; and even a third time, after we were actually in bed; for the door was bombarded, and three women came in, and laid a great almond pudding, of much delicacy, covered with stripes of grated cinnamon, at our feet. that night was the one bad experience of our time in morocco. though the guest-room was new and apparently clean, some matting had been laid on the floor, which we had not removed, and with the darkness its occupants came out in such numbers that, in spite of "keating" round the legs of each bed, the long hours were taken up in warfare, and we never slept. next day the room was scoured out, and the lively matting ejected, while we were strolling round sheshaoua between heavy showers of rain, which reduced the clay country to a state of quagmire. however, sunday, after a peaceful night both inside and out of doors, broke fresh and clear: all the great loose thunder-clouds had packed themselves into long cloudlets with ruled horizontal bases; and in clear, rarefied air, standing up almost unearthly in their beauty, the atlas range from end to end, was to be seen at last. chiselled peak after peak, upon which no traveller has ever set foot, glistened in the sun, apparently about ten miles off, in reality more like thirty or forty. it was one of those mornings which have been thoroughly washed, and the swirling pea-soup river bore witness to the operation as surely as the air of purity which the whole country wore. all was radiant: down below, the orange grove of our arrival rang with nightingales and bulbuls; there was a scent of heaven, an undertone of racing waters. [illustration: ships of the desert we pass on the march. [_to face p. ._] just as we were packed up to start, the khaylifa sent and expressed thanks for our medicine, and asked that as a favour we would see his wives, one of whom was ill. they were found in mud rooms, dark and dirty, most uninteresting in themselves. one stout "lady" had a swelled neck, the other had cataract: both wished to be prescribed for. i recommended, through omar, bathing the swelled neck: it was necessary from a cleanliness point of view. from the same point of view i shook hands hurriedly and departed, climbed into the saddle, and was soon far away from the kasbah at sheshaoua. chapter xi a parting mona--fording sheshaoua river--jars of food--first sight of marrakesh--a perilous crossing--ride into marrakesh--the slave market. chapter xi "we who are old, old and gay, o so old! thousands of years, thousands of years, if all were told: give to these children, new from the world, rest far from men. is anything better, anything better? tell us it then: us who are old, old and gay, o so old! thousands of years, thousands of years, if all were told." w. b. yeats. we were once more upon the march; and yet all links with the kasbah were not broken, for we had gone but a short way when a servant ran after us, carrying a familiar dish, known from afar--a parting mona. laid at our feet, we tasted, as courtesy demanded, a coos-coosoo made of grated almonds, powdered sugar, and cream--a sweet which cloys at an early hour in the day, though to moorish servants, at any and every moment of their lives, it is as caviare to the few. a circle was formed round the dish: in two minutes, all that was left, was "an aching china blank." quantity rather than quality distinguishes moorish cookery. the rich man's dishes are more or less like the poor man's, only that he has six times as many; indeed, there are said to be dishes of coos-coosoo which seven men can barely carry. the sultan's own cuisine is quite simple, better served, and more of it perhaps, than his subjects', but otherwise exactly the same. having disposed of the mona, our cavalcade started, and we rode down to the sheshaoua river, still in heavy flood, but fordable since the fine night. the waters roared past between the crumbling banks: we saw in one place waggon-loads of red soil suddenly subside with a vast noise into the cataract which had undermined it. upon the brink the men stripped themselves; then, wading into the torrent, hauled across mules, camel, and donkey one by one: we took our feet out of the stirrups, and managed to keep dry; the camel behaved admirably. [illustration: transporting our baggage. [_to face p. ._] it was an uneventful day, across a bleak and stony country. towards evening we passed a ruined kasbah, rose-red in the sunset. riding due east, our long sharp shadows pointed ahead: there was a peace over all things. the shadowed heights on the right, scooped into blue gullies and mighty crests, carried a veil of cloud on their tops: the good little red path we were on, was without a stone. as the sun dropped we swung along into a dim grey beyond, to the muffled tramp, tramp of the mules' hoofs, _shuffle-shuffle through the night_, while a cool breeze got up, and a flight of birds high above us called aloud as they passed over. ah! but how good it was!--no telegrams, no conventionalities, no possessions worth worry or consideration. strange, the influence which such a simple life has upon the mind: letters, and newspapers, and the topics of the day, and the world in general, have little interest for the time being, and get buried in the wastepaper-basket of trivialities, while the weather, and the state of the track, and little things in nature, assume gigantic proportions and fill the mind. we camped that night near another red ruined kasbah, whose long line of crumbling tapia walls against the atlas mountains stretched itself out like a watch-dog beside the forbidden hills. in the morning arabs were more importunate than ever, one woman thrusting her head between the flaps of the canvas while we were dressing. a deal, meantime, went on in the kitchen-tent over a lamb, omar feeling its neck and tail, and subsequently buying it for five shillings, after which it was silently dispatched on the far side, skinned, cut up; and the donkey bore a pannierful of meat that day. our blue jay of the ruined kasbah at sok-el-tleta turned up again on the march, beautiful as ever, and no less tame; but all the birds shared that distinction, and were of a confiding nature delightful to see. before frouga, one of our next camping-grounds, was reached, we passed a kasbah which six years ago was in the possession of a kaid, who may or may not be still alive, in prison. his province, at any rate, rose against him to a man at the late sultan's death, and wrecked his castle, the government disposing of him after he had escaped to marrakesh. the orchards of almond-trees, with thriving beans planted underneath them, and the fat fields of barley, spoke volumes for the prosperity of his days. it takes much provocation to induce country people to rise and rebel against their kaid; for rebellion, if unsuccessful, brings down such awful vengeance on the heads of the tribesmen: therefore his hard case was probably just punishment. another river, the asif-el-mel, had to be forded on the same day. it was a bad crossing, we were warned by one sheikh not to attempt it, and neither of our men knew the ford; but some arabs turned up, and they helped to get the mules safely across. r. and i had each four men with us: we tied our boots, stockings, camera and glasses round our necks, and rode over, careful not to look down at the race of the torrent, which has turned horsemen giddy often enough,--a raging river rather more than breast-high is not a thing to be trifled with. on the banks beyond lay a large and flourishing village, chiefly remarkable on account of its _mellah_ (jews' quarter),--a strange thing to find so far from civilization; and yet it was not, for the interior of morocco is full of wandering israelites, who, living and dying in remote arab and berber settlements, become naturalized to a certain extent, yet ever "keep themselves to themselves," housed only in their own "quarter," under lock and key after sundown, and subjected to a few irksome regulations. some of them become rich on the profits of the "middle man," buying skins and produce of all sorts from the country people, and passing them through to the coast towns: such men may be worth from £ , to £ , . it is hard to conceive a race settling from choice amongst the squalor and filth of the lowest type of arab, but as a matter of fact, the jewish quarter violated, over and above all the rest of the village put together, every tradition of cleanliness. the berber villages of the north, dirty enough in all conscience, absolutely shone in comparison with the arab douars in the south, or with their larger settlements, those semi-villages, whose flat-roofed huts were stacked with earthen or basket-work jars. these bottle-shaped jars, full of what mohammed calls "the liquor of the bee," cream-cheese, barley, etc., were plastered with mud, and waterproof: when they occurred in twos and threes on every roof, the effect was striking. it would have been a monotonous ride to frouga except for the atlas mountains on our right, which we had been steadily nearing for days: now comparatively close, their gleaming snow-peaks were never without interest, and omar told tales of travellers' experiences up in one or two of the passes. the principal roads across the chain to taroudant, ras-el-ouad, and the sus, pass through frouga, and make it an important place. it possesses an _inzella_, or sort of fondâk, where men and transport are safe for the night under the protection of the kaid of the district. we pitched our tents among little fields of beans and barley, planted with olive-trees, close to a mosque, and awoke when _es-sbar_ (sunrise) was called in sonorous tones from the top of the dome: a cuckoo answered the mueddzin, and a pair of little doves began to coo persistently. the gardens of frouga are celebrated--full of vines planted like hop-gardens, of prickly pear, figs, pears, apricots, and corn, in between the fruit-trees. and yet the owners are not rich: the governors of the district see to that; for supposing a man becomes richer than the governor, x., he goes to the government and says, "if you make me governor instead of x., i will bring you more money than he does, and here is a present at the same time." the government accepts the bribe, and gives the man a letter stating that he is made governor instead of x. the man collects his friends and ousts x., perhaps imprisoning him for life. a governor, therefore, never allows a man under him to possess capital. he may be rich in cattle and gardens, but he will have to pay the governor out of his profits from thirty to ninety shillings at stated times all the year round, and never have any "spare cash." if he refuses to pay, he is turned out of his own home and acres, which fall into the governor's hands. naturally he prefers to cling to his gardens. beyond frouga lay some of the most fertile land in morocco. we passed wonderful crops of barley and wheat, which in an average year, for every bushel sown, yield forty bushels. moors say that corn in morocco is known to yield, not forty, but a hundred-fold. in england fifteen-fold is considered an average crop. morocco grows two crops each year: there is a spring harvest and an autumn harvest. it would seem, therefore, that if agriculture were encouraged, and light railways laid down to the coast, money would pour into the country--especially supposing that, instead of wheat, such a crop as linseed was grown. russian and american competition would probably diminish the profits to be made out of wheat, but a soil and a climate like morocco might grow anything and everything. at present fraud and dishonesty seem the soul of trade: the jew brokers cheat the moors; the moors sand their sheep's wool to make it heavy, mix paraffin candles with their beeswax, put all manner of things into oil, and so on. but a single example shows the spirit of the country. a friend of ours found his horses becoming poor, yet he saw their corn taken out to them every evening: he examined it; it was quite good. after a time it occurred to him to look inside the horses' mouths, and he found the gums cut and lacerated in order to prevent their eating their barley, which, after it had lain a certain time on the ground untouched, was confiscated by the servants. [illustration: marrakesh. [_to face p. ._] meanwhile, each day as we marched on, brought us nearer to our bourn, and at last we found ourselves on a wide flat plain, unbroken, except by the trail which we followed, consisting of six or eight narrow paths, winding on side by side like railway rails--a splendid "high road" for morocco. truly it is a spare-room country. the snaking track might take up acres and acres of rich land. what matter! there is room. it was still very hot: smoked spectacles kept off a certain amount of glare, and i wore two hats, a straw on top of a felt, having neglected to bring a solar topi; but even so the sun was unnecessarily generous, glowing on the splendid polish which some of the arabs carried on their sepia-coloured skulls, and making it impossible to follow the crested larks, singing their heads off, up in the brilliant sky. at last we felt a breeze, topped a low rise: an old greybeard all in white jogged up towards us on a donkey, a man running behind; a village lay below; but our eyes only went to one spot in the wide blue plain, which was spread out like a praying-carpet before us. that spot lay twenty-five miles off--a single tower, the kutobea in morocco city. "marrakesh!" cried omar and saïd simultaneously. we rode on, across dry plain, over old river-beds, through patches of olive-trees, pink oleander, and castor-oil plant; leaving arab douars behind; meeting with white cow-birds which recalled tetuan; passing men with merchandise on camels and donkeys, strings of country people, and wanderers of all sorts; stopping to rest near wells where swallows were building in the brickwork and donkeys stood asleep in the shade; watching arabs beating out corn with sticks, men ploughing, until we were once more amongst "greenery" and in a fertile stretch of country. surely there was a river near. we passed fine crops of maize; onions were doing famously; fields of bearded wheat rustled in a life-giving breeze. and then the wad-el-nyfs, the largest river we had to cross, came into sight. saïd at the outset precipitated himself into a great hole, and was well ducked: eventually we all landed safely on the other side, though the start was far from reassuring, some arabs on the bank telling us it was "not good" to cross, and wading down into the torrent, for us to see that the water took them up to their necks almost at once, sweeping them down-stream. before we rode into the water every man divested himself of each particle of clothing which he wore; and r. got across with two dark-skinned individuals clinging on to her legs, one on each side of the mule, a third hanging on to its bridle, and a fourth at its tail; while i followed also with four attendants. not long ago, a party of missionaries was fording one of these very rivers, and neglected to have men at the mules' heads, one of which stumbled and threw its rider into the rapid stream: she was drowned. it was not deep at the time, or more precaution would have been taken: on the other hand, the stream is always like a mill-race, an accident can happen in a moment, and therefore a rule should be made, and never under any circumstances broken, to the effect that every rider have a man at the mule's head, and more than one, according to the state of the river. we had a long hot ride to tamsloect: the breeze, which was westerly, was useless to us; the track led over stony yellow hills; now and again we caught glimpses of the kutobea standing up very far away; and all the time the great snow-fields, on the vast mountains, close upon our right, looked tantalizingly near and cold. occasionally we watered the mules at a stream: tortoises were swimming about in one of these. but on the whole it was a singularly uneventful and a very sultry ride, until at last long lines of red mud walls, many gardens, three mosque towers, and some tall, dark, green cypress-trees proclaimed tamsloect--an important village, possessing a friday market, an unequalled view of the atlas, and a saint, mulai abdullah ben hassi. an arab, hadj cadour, is one of the great men in tamsloect; and to him, having an introduction, we went. the best hours spent in morocco were those lived with certain of the moors themselves, sharing for a short time their simple and yet fantastic life, learning something of their innate courtesy and generous hospitality. hadj cadour was a host of the old aristocratic school. he was out at his garden-house when we reached the village, entertaining friends at a tea party; and upon our message reaching him, he sent back a man on a white horse to point out another of his gardens close at hand, where he suggested that the tents should be pitched, while r. and i rode out and joined his tea party. leaving omar to superintend the camp, we started off after the rider on the white horse: he led the way through the village, finally into a labyrinth of gardens, where we brushed through bearded wheat such as i have never seen before nor since, which luxuriated with olives, fruit-trees of all sorts, and pale pink monthly roses. presently in the midst of the semi-wilderness a little white house intervened, half buried in trees, and close to it, in the shade, under an olive, was gathered hadj cadour's tea party, six or eight dignified arabs, in those perfectly washed and blanched garments which so fit their solemn, dignified manners, their sad and intellectual type of faces: not that moors are necessarily either of the two last; but they look it--that is all. a great tea-kettle, as usual, loomed in the background; carpets and thick red morocco leather cushions made seats for the members of the charmed circle: we reclined there with the rest, talking, as far as a few arabic words would carry us, of our starting-point, our destination, the road, the rivers, the weather, hadj cadour helping us out, one and all interested and anxious to be understood and to understand. our host dispensed _sherrub de minat_, the wine of the country, made from grapes; the little dome-shaped pewter teapot was there, with its fond associations of morocco, together with the copper tray and circle of diminutive painted glasses; a gorgeous indolent sun poured down beyond the patch of shade; the hum and hover of insects vibrated in the air; and presently musicians were summoned--girls wearing pale green jellabs and silver ornaments, with yellow handkerchiefs twisted round their heads, men in bright colours. sitting down between us, each was given a glass of sherrub de minat, and by-and-by they began to play. weird and wild music it was, that of the _tareegea_, the _gimbi_, and the _tahr_, quaint native instruments of the roughest construction, and yet, as music, possessing fascination not a little. the long kif-pipes were lighted, green tea and wine were sipped, the white figures stretched themselves on the cushions, and a great and dreamy content came over the faces under the white turbans. there was nowhere a trace of boredom such as mars so many european entertainments--rather the thing was loved for itself, and every man felt it and entered into its spirit. now and then the musicians broke into a strange song, and the guests beat their hands and murmured in chorus; then again they would seem half intoxicated, in a harmless fashion, with kif and wine and music, and would appear to be absent in a world of their own. the music had a lilt in it, and often a suggestion of something half tamed, desperate, swung along with the cadences; and thin wreaths of smoke from the long pipes blew up through the olive branches, and an arabic sentence dropped now and again on the ear: the hot, slow, sleepy afternoon waned. . . . poetry bulks so largely in the arabic nature. emotional and yet simple, that nature is, to a certain extent, appealed to by the refined. the sordid and vulgar have no attractions for it. there is no language more poetical than the arabic language, where "snow" is called "hair of the mountain" and "rainbow" is "bride of the rain." "red mullet" is "the sultan of fishes": "maiden-hair fern" is translated by "little cane of the well." ordinary arabic words show an extraordinary gift of description: the word for "secretly" means literally "under the matting," and "never" is expressed thus, "when the charcoal takes root and the salt buds." uncontrolled ascendency of imagination marks the arab, and endows his nature with a fascination all its own: an outdoor life is his heritage, and the things of nature are a part of himself. "spring" he calls "grass"; "summer" is "gleaning"; "autumn" is "fruit"; "winter" is "rainy." if only he could keep pure his race, morocco had never stood among the nations where she stands now. the steady infusion of african blood is becoming her ruin: the sensual negro type, spreading rapidly, is eating its way into the heart of the people. when it is remembered that thousands upon thousands of slaves are imported into morocco from the interior of africa every year, that they become eventually "free," their children inheriting equal rights with other children, it is no longer a matter of wonder that the moorish race shows signs of deterioration, that its people are effete. it is after meeting with men such as hadj cadour and many others, who hark back to the old type of chief and horseman and the desert life, touched with the old vein of poetry and chivalry, that one regrets the things which are. but we had spent an afternoon which was one worth recollecting; and when we had parted from that little circle under the shady olive, and were jogging back to our tents, it was to remember that there are still good things in morocco. the tents we found ready for us in a delightful spot enclosed by a wall: a tank lay in the centre of the garden, around it a few paths, and a great deal of mint. but a terrible ordeal awaited us--green tea and a great spread, provided by the brother of hadj cadour, who had also arranged carpets as seats around the tank. again next morning, just after we had finished breakfast, this hospitable individual sent into our tent two steaming hot chickens fried brown in argan oil, with half a dozen round cakes of fine flour; and when, immediately afterwards, we rode to his house to say farewell and tender our thanks, he proffered green tea once more. heavy drops of rain awoke us in the middle of the night; but just as an ominous patter was coming through the old canvas and sounding on the bed-clothes, the shower stopped. again later it came on, with thunder. omar changed the smart clothes which he had put on in view of a triumphal entry into marrakesh; we packed and got off as quickly as we could, expecting more rain; many good-byes were said; hadj cadour sent a servant with us to the gates; and we rode out of tamsloect. [illustration: the open gate. [_to face p. ._] outside, towards the east, its gardens were numerous: great black poplars and palms grew freely. for an hour we rode alongside a district which belonged entirely to mulai el hadj, the great man of tamsloect, and a holy shar[=i]f to boot. this man is rich, and because he is a holy shar[=i]f he can never be dispossessed of his wealth. his white house and cypress-trees stand out prominently in the village we had just left; throughout his gardens he has built a succession of water-towers, which irrigate his land; he is british-protected, and as important a man in the south as the french-protected wazeer of wazan is in the north. all this time we were riding steadily towards marrakesh, interest increasing with every step as we neared the city, to visit which we had left mogador about ten days before. that last day's march was not an interesting one: the great atlas, upon which we had now turned our backs, were no longer to be seen, on account of clouds which the last night's storm had brought upon them; the plain over which we rode possessed a deadly monotony, for we were not entering marrakesh upon its best side, where gardens upon gardens of palm-trees stretch beyond the city gates for miles and miles, but our road from tamsloect was prosaic and dull. certainly we crossed some of the wonderful underground canals, which carry water five and ten miles, from springs in the country, into the city--about whose origin nothing whatever is known, tradition remaining silent as to any builder. these great works are merely water-ways tunnelled through the solid earth, not at any great distance from the surface: along their courses the streams are conducted for great distances. there are openings at intervals which ventilate the tunnels: these are kept clean and easily examined by means of the same. the whole arrangement is very rough, very primitive, but perfectly answers the purpose for which it was made. the crops which we left behind us at every mile looked well, and it was to be hoped would soon make good the failure of the preceding crop: that failure had accounted for the skinny children and lean women whom we had met, and was the reason of the country people's continuous digging for ayerna root, and washing the same by the roadside and in so many villages. meanwhile, marrakesh and its adobe walls, of a sad yellow-pink tone, grew nearer and nearer, till at last the long line of crumbling tapia was but a short distance off, and the báb-el-roub, a massive gateway, plainly to be seen. just outside the walls, mr. miller, one of the missionaries, met us: he had one piece of news, which carried with it regret wherever it was heard across the length and breadth of the british empire--the death of cecil rhodes. under the báb-el-roub we rode into the city of crumbling walls and silent sandy roadways: somewhat of a deserted city, the great southern capital appeared to be at first; but then we were nowhere near its heart, and the half of it is gardens and quiet houses, while a small part only, is wholly full of vitality: the whole is crumbling to pieces, and strange of all strangest cities ever seen. we rode straight to kaid maclean's house, lent us by lady maclean--the best house in morocco city, over-looking one of the many market-places, and that open space in which story-tellers and snake-charmers, surrounded by a dense circle of admirers, cater to an attentive throng. the house was empty, and we "camped" in several of the rooms, lunching in a long gallery which looked straight out on to the atlas mountains: the mules went into a capacious stable; the servants made themselves comfortable in the kitchens. it is hard to find house-room in marrakesh: of course a hotel is unheard of, nor is camping-ground to be met with easily. there are no foreign consuls in this far-off city, and no english element beyond the two or three missionaries who live there. travellers have generally to depend upon the loan of some house for the time being, from a holy shar[=i]f or moor of some standing; but the house may be anywhere, and comfortable or otherwise. since the sultan was at fez, his army and his commander-in-chief, kaid maclean, were at fez too: hence the reason of the macleans' house standing empty, within which we were so fortunate as to find ourselves. marrakesh cannot be described: it must be seen. it is more suggestive, more intangible, more elusive--that is to say, its eastern medley of a population is so, and its crumbling tapia-walled houses are so--than any other moorish city. more ghosts should stalk the half-deserted yellow roadways of marrakesh, more mysteries be shrouded within the windowless walls, than a man of western civilization could conceive. it is a vast city--other writers have chronicled the number of square miles which it accounts for--and yet, in spite of its size, the sum-total of souls it contains is not overwhelming. there are gardens everywhere, stretch after stretch of palm-trees, acre after acre of fruit-trees, and wedged among them all, lie the flat roofs, swarm the endless throng which spells humanity; and the oddest, most varied humanity--arabs and negroes, men from the sus, from the sahara, from draa, berber hillmen, tribesmen from the atlas, a tumultuous multitude, a hive of bees of whom no census has ever been made. we were among them all, the first time we rode through the city. no one walks in marrakesh: as a matter of fact i did later on, often enough, sometimes alone, getting somewhat jostled in the narrow ways--beyond that in no way inconvenienced. but every one who can, is on a mule or a long-tailed countrybred, pushing along at a foot's pace, crying out now and then, and avoiding this pair of black toes, that coffee-coloured bare heel. beyond the wall, covered with nails, whereon heads are fastened after rebellions have been quenched and the time of punishment and warning has come, we rode into the land of little shops. here, in another instance, marrakesh is unique: the narrow streets were in great part entirely roofed in overhead either by vines or by bamboos; the brilliant sunlight streamed through the spaces between the vines and canes, and chequered the seething white throng which eternally passed underneath it. from an open street we plunged into the cool shade of one of these arcades. and how it moved! nothing ever stood still in the marrakesh soks. life "travels" for ever and for ever there. between the shops, themselves teeming with bustle and incident, moved up and down, the throng of white, draped, dignified figures, calling, heaving, struggling, jostling sometimes, chattering always, blotched with shifting yellow sunlight and black shadow cast by the lattice roof overhead. it was a transformation scene; it was a weird dream--weird to the point of seeming unreal, unlike men and the haunts of men, though all the time rampant with _humans_. [illustration: _photo by a. cavilla, tangier._] the kutobea, marrakesh. [_to face p. ._] when the sultan went to fez, a party of soldiers and goldsmiths and craftsmen of all sorts went with him from the city of marrakesh, in number over forty thousand souls. but the exodus made no appreciable difference in the soks. not only the numbers, but the types of the stream of faces between which we rode were all striking, and each one so far removed from anything at all european. humanity can indeed be separated from humanity by gulfs impassable, or gulfs which may alone be bridged over by a violation of nature, on the part of the man upon the east bank or upon the west bank. the palm-trees wave above marrakesh, turtle-backed mosques and tall towers rise among the gardens and gleam in the sun, but above and beyond every other feature of the far-away fantastic southern capital one watch-tower rises over everything and rears itself into the sky--the kutobea, built, according to tradition, by fabir for the sultan el mansur. it stands in a vast empty space close to the great mosque: few people pass that way--their footfalls are almost unheard in the soft sand; and the lonely tower cuts the clear quiet sky. the kutobea is built of dark red stone. there is a pattern, alternately raised and sunk, on the faces of the minaret, the sunk part cut deep, the raised part carved and standing out. a broad band of wonderful black and green iridescent tiles, snakes round the top like some opulent spotted serpent. part of it has dropped away: the gilded brass balls, the cupola, are here and there tarnished; but the sun sets, and his indulgent rays swamp every defect, burnish and polish and gild corner-stone and fretted marble and emerald-green tile alike, until the "to-day" of the kutobea is as triumphant as its "yesterday" of many hundred years. the design of the tower itself--the minaret--is said to have come from constantinople, as did the giralda at seville, which it so resembles. of the mosque, beside the kutobea, nothing was to be seen except its walls, and through an open door avenues of pillars. the huge building has an arabic name meaning "the mosque of the books"; for what reason--who can tell?--tradition is silent. marrakesh itself is supposed to have been built upon the site of an immensely old structure, the ancient martok. as it is now, yusuf-ibn-tachfin founded it in , a city which covers almost as much ground as paris--a purely african city. fez, tetuan, tangier, have spanish blood in them: marrakesh is african to the core. arabs here are in a minority: the spare saharowi type, the shaved lip and cheeks and pointed chin-tuft of the berber race, men from the mysterious sandy steppes below cape bojador, soudanese blacks, men from wadnoon--one and all congregate in this city. even the music and songs are, naturally enough, all african, with the strange interval, the rhythm which halts and races where no european music ever halted or raced; and the tom-tom, the gimbri, the ear-piercing moorish flute, all fall upon the english ear as things intensely strange and strongly fascinating. marrakesh boasts no aristocracy: it is a city of the people. it has few shar[=i]fs: it is a land of "traders," speculating, toiling, intriguing; between its yellow adobe walls, and its whitewashed dazzling walls, amidst its dense metallic semi-tropical vegetation, up and down its sandy silent ways, they live and die. its fountains are beautiful: _shrab-u-schuf_ (drink and admire) is inscribed on one of them. but it is not by its architecture that marrakesh stands and falls; rather by a personality all its own--by its many ruined walls, by its deserted streets, by the hot pulse of life throbbing imperiously through its arteries crowded to suffocation with humanity, by its flaring african sunlight, by the figures which can never be other than picturesque, by a thousand impressions which can never die. and by reason of all this marrakesh is great. once upon a time it was impossible for an englishman to see the slave market. owing partly to the radical hatred of europeans, partly to the suspicious and seclusive nature of the moor, the presence of foreigners in the sacred slave market was tabooed. not that the nazarene was "taken up" or turned back if he showed his face inside the courtyard: on the contrary, he was allowed to walk in, and apparently no eye was aware of his presence. and yet in a few moments he would find himself alone. the slave market had vanished, had melted away: a line of disappearing backs was all which was to be seen. supposing a moor had connived at this attempt on the part of a nazarene to see slaves being sold, that moor disappeared, by order of the sultan, and there was a funeral later on in the day. however, while we were in marrakesh, less rigorous orders were in vogue. having come prepared to see the market disguised in native dress if necessary, we found that we were able to go there without much difficulty, and only escorted by one of the missionaries and a servant. though slaves are bought and sold through the length and breadth of morocco, it is not possible in any other city than marrakesh for the european to see or know much about it. in the coast towns the sales are conducted privately. in fez it is probable that they might be attended by others than moors; but at the time of writing i take it that no wise european, if such should be there at all in these unquiet times, would venture to put himself into a position likely to attract all the bullets and knives in fez in his direction. just at sunset-- . , i think--the slave market in marrakesh opens, and we went in. to some ears it would no doubt have sounded the strangest anomaly, that prayer to the most high god, with which the sale was prefaced; but a mussulman hallows every action, right or wrong, with a petition; besides which slavery is lawful and good in his eyes, is approved of and permitted by mohammed in the written book of the kor[=a]n; is, in short, a part of the scheme of nature which it were a serious mistake not to use and enjoy. so the line of auctioneers formed up, held out their hands, prayed, invoked a blessing over the proceedings, mumbling in sonorous tones for a few moments. then silence. it was over: the sale began. there is nothing more easy than to be theatrical and emotional in describing scenes of this sort--one has read of them scores of times: words such as "degrading" and "harrowing" rise up in the mind's eye, coupled with violent epithets and stinging clauses. and yet, finding oneself in the centre of another just such a scene, one realized how impossible the thing was, to understand, or to feel, beforehand, and how curiously it played upon the emotions. walking into the market with a sobriety, with a cold, critical interest such as a nero may have felt towards his victims, one divined early in the proceedings that the scene tended unduly to intensify emotion. truly no men think alike: a vast chasm yawns between the natures of the slave-trader and the european: that chasm is a universal education. to realize all which separates a native of africa from a frenchman or an englishman, and the difficulties which lie in the way of promoting an understanding between the two, visit such a place as the slave market in marrakesh. groups of slaves, more or less gorgeously dressed, some in rags where nothing better could be afforded, were sitting far back in little covered-in recesses which lined the square. all round the square stood, or sat upon their heels, intending purchasers, for the most part middle-aged elderly men, sleek and fat, in turbans and soft linen, white beyond reproach. each auctioneer, the prayer over, advanced to the groups of slaves, and led out one or perhaps two or three, and paraded them round and round the square under the eyes of the buyers. at last a bid was made: the auctioneer walked on, pushing the slaves in front of him, and calling out the amount of the bid. a higher bid was made: he shouted out that bid, and still walked on. then a purchaser signed to him that he wished to look at the slaves. the auctioneer at once marshalled the women or woman slave (there were many more women than men) up to the moor who wished to examine her. she squatted in front of him, while he looked at her teeth, felt her arms, neck, and legs, and in a low voice asked her a string of private questions. after a time the woman was allowed to get up, the auctioneer called out the latest bid for her, and walked her on. probably some one else would examine her "points," and another and another; and her price would go up till the auctioneer should have got what he wanted, and the woman would be handed over to her new master. some of the slaves walked round with a profoundly indifferent air--none of them looked in wild spirits; but, on the other hand, it was "kismet" rather than misery which was written on their faces. it is a rare thing for any slave to object violently or to make any scene: as a rule they knelt down obediently enough in front of the fat mohammedans, who thrust their fingers into their mouths, took them by the chin, and treated them with great familiarity. but, oddly enough, on one of the nights we attended the market a scene did occur. a middle-aged woman, absolutely refused to walk round--we were told probably because she had been parted from her child, and could not bear to be sold. the poor creature wept wildly, and hid her face in the red cloth round her head. she was, however, in the end forced along like a recalcitrant mule, her cloth torn off, herself made to kneel down at the bidding of a group of traders, and undergo the usual examination. some of the young girls looked shame-faced, shuffling along behind or in front of the auctioneers with bent heads. the sad middle-aged woman fetched in the end seven pounds ten shillings. a little child was going for three pounds ten. a girl of thirteen--that is, at her very best--was selling for fifteen pounds: she was of course unusually attractive. the slave trade of africa receives an apparent stamp of legality from the fact that religious warfare and the taking of prisoners in war and making them slaves are looked upon as divine institutions. there is no obligation on the mussulman to release slaves, and as long as wars and raids last, the mass of slaves in mohammedan countries tends rather to increase than otherwise, their progeny ever adding to the original number. there is no restriction as to the number of slaves or concubines which a moor may have: it entirely depends upon his purse. his women are his luxury, and an expensive one. a concubine may be sold at any moment, and the position is thus precarious and varied: it has one saving clause, which i have already explained--the woman who bears a son to her master is free, and at his death his property will be divided between the sons of concubines equally with the sons of his wife and wives. mussulman raids still continue against the negroes of central africa, against tribes in persia, in afghanistan, and other parts of the world; indeed, as long as mohammedanism lasts, there is very little chance of the abolition of slavery. [illustration: _photo by a. cavilla, tangier._] the wad-el-azell. [_to face p. ._] one afternoon we went over the garden belonging to the late basha of marrakesh--ben dowd--almost the only garden i have ever seen in morocco which had in it flowers; and these were roses from spain, valuable and beautiful, the pride of the basha. there was a charming summer-house half built, and a conservatory nearly finished, in different parts of the garden. in the midst of his prosperity, only eight months before, ben dowd had been arrested and put into prison. it was the old tale of jealousy. the grand wazeer was afraid of the basha, and in order to secure himself from harm succeeded in having ben dowd deposed and put entirely out of harm's way. though an explanation is always forthcoming for violent proceedings such as the above, it would be unwise to assume in morocco that the explanation had a grain of truth in it. wheels within wheels; intrigue after intrigue; lie, topped by lie, make up the sum of moorish diplomacy, and render the coil of politics in that country an absolutely fascinating study, not because it is so surreptitious, but because it is clever as well as cunning, and all the time involves bigger interests than ever appear on the tapis--interests which concern france, austria, england, germany, and other powers, all of whom struggle for a finger in the seething pie. to return to ben dowd. he was "detained" in a house--not ignominiously committed to the common gaol, an unusual respite--allowed twelve shillings a day, and his wife's company. he was in fez with these restrictions at the time we were looking over his gardens; and half of his wives were left behind at his own house, costing him a pound a day, we were told, in the face of which his allowance seemed inadequate. when the government seized him, no money was found in his house; but three hundred thousand dollars' worth of goods in the shape of carpets, mirrors, gilt bedsteads, etc., were confiscated. his post, however, is still vacant: he is a good man, and possibly the government will repent of its hasty step, and in due time restore such a valuable servant to favour. on the other hand, ben dowd may be ruined for life. the bashas and kaids of morocco were all gnashing their teeth, while we were at marrakesh, over the new system of taxation, which the sultan and a certain progressive member of his government, are endeavouring to introduce into the country. the main idea in these new regulations is, that governors will be paid specified salaries by the government--that they will collect taxes as usual, but send the amount of money collected intact to court, not, as has been the custom hitherto, docking off the half, it may be, and pocketing it as their own pay. again, each province has been lately inspected by a certain number of trustworthy men, who have fixed its rate of taxation. the countryman is to pay so much upon his possessions--for example, ninepence for a cow, three shillings for a horse, twopence-halfpenny for an olive-tree, three shillings for a camel, no more and no less--instead of having the utmost squeezed out of him, which has been the practice of the governors up till now. the scheme sounds excellent. a letter has been read aloud in every city and country market-place, apprising the people of the new law, and they are delighted in proportion, but scarcely believe that the government will be strong enough to enforce it. indeed, it is hardly probable that the new taxation system can succeed unless two important steps are first taken--the tribes must be disarmed, and a new set of governors be appointed to take the place of the old. as long as the tribesmen are armed, there can never be law and order, any more than there can be settled peace upon the indian frontier under the same conditions. at one moment the tribes will side with the government, at another they will take the part of a governor, at another they will attack a neighbouring tribe. it is all very well to tax such men justly and to treat them like civilized beings, instead of trampling them underfoot, preventing their becoming rich, and holding them to be ignorant devils; but they are not civilized, unfortunately--they have not sufficient education to know when they are well off and to profit by it. every man of them has a gun, and bloodshed and plunder are life itself to him. treat him well, he bides his time, grows rich with the rest of his tribe; together they descend upon their neighbours, avenge an old wrong, loot to their hearts' content, perhaps attack the sultan himself. but disarm one and all such men, and in the far future a peaceable agricultural folk may reign in their stead. it would be a work of time, but it has been effected before in the annals of history. the second condition, which would go far towards the working of the new system of taxation, is the appointment of new governors. the salary which the governors are to receive, is a comparatively small one, compared with the vast sums which they have been in the habit of accumulating, by means of extortion and by defrauding the government. it is hardly fair to expect a man to cut down his expenses, give up half his wives, sell his slaves, and fall in the estimation of those under him. the thing must assuredly lead to dispute, born of peculation, and fighting must be the inevitable result. but if, on the other hand, new men are appointed, who from the first suit their expenditure to their means, a more peaceful working basis will be established. the old oriental policy of the "balance of jealousies" will doubtless play its useful part: that is to say, each governor will watch his next-door neighbour like a cat watching a mouse; and if he detect any underhand dealings, or evasions, or infringements of the new law, he will report at once to the sultan, and thereby gain _kudos_, perhaps a substantial reward, for himself. in this way the government may receive support at the hands of the men whom it is keeping in order. chapter xii the thursday market--we might have gone to glaouia--leave marrakesh and set out on our last march for the coast--flowers in morocco--on the wrong trail--arab tents--good-bye to el moghreb. chapter xii the best that we find in our travels is an honest friend. he is a fortunate voyager who finds many. we travel, indeed, to find them. they are the end and the reward of life. they keep us worthy of ourselves; and when we are alone, we are only nearer to the absent. the great thursday market is one of those things in marrakesh which, once seen, is stamped deeper than a hundred other memories upon the mind. it is held in a sun-baked open space outside the gate of the thursday market, just beyond the city walls, within view of the plains and a distant low range of mountains. thousands and thousands of tall palms, groves of them, wave in the wind all over the surrounding country: a few great watercourses, worn and eaten out of the red soil, burrow between the forests on their way down to the great river. to reach the market we rode out along a road thronged with people selling all sorts of goods, from splendid old flintlock guns from the sus chased with silver and gold and going at three pounds, to striped carpets strong and violent in colouring at seven-and-sixpence each, and second-hand clothes of the most varied description. at last, topping a little hill, we rode down into the market: it is, more correctly speaking, a horse fair,--mules were also for sale. the horses down in the south are without doubt very different from the poor little ponies bred up in the north; but even these, in comparison, for instance, with a thoroughbred hunter at home, fell far short of what my defective imagination had led me to expect of arab stallions in morocco. for the most part there was nothing for sale except great heavy brutes with small heads and proud arched necks. every one of them fell away in the hindquarters. as usual the sale was prefaced by a prayer: hard bargaining, sharp practice, and much or little swindling, inseparable from horse-dealing, must all of it, first of all, be watered by prayer. therefore the horsemen formed into a line; the central figure chanted some verses from the kor[=a]n; the rest held out their hands palms upwards, then joined in a sort of amen, the instant afterwards sticking their spurs into their horses and dashing forward, charging in a line over the plain between two rows of spectators, and pulling the horses up on to their haunches at the end, red with spur-marks and white with foam. this was repeated two or three times, the short space in which the riders pulled up out of a full gallop being sometimes almost incredible; then a great circle was formed of would-be purchasers and onlookers, and the horses were ridden into the circle and then round and round to display themselves, each rider at the same time _auctioning his own horse_, yelling out the bids for it, as they rose, at the top of his voice. when the last bid was made, and he could get no more, the rider, after shouting the price, added that he "would not consult the absent one," meaning thereby that the owner of the horse, whether himself or not, would raise no objection to the animal's being sold for that price. unless this sentence had been pronounced, the purchaser could not have been certain that the owner would not say afterwards he did not intend to sell for that sum. most of the horses fetched from three pounds twelve to four pounds ten. mules were sold in the same way--the prayer, the parade round the circle, each rider seated almost on his mule's tail, urging him on, with hands and heels, to pace his best, the mule's nose up in the heavens. some of them were splendid animals, which i would have given anything to have possessed--perfectly made, looking more intelligent than many humans, and full of pluck and staying power: these fetched rather more than double, what the best horse in the whole market sold for. but in criticising the horses, i speak of what i saw on this occasion: there may be, and no doubt are, fine arabs to be had in southern morocco--at least so i am told--but i came across only what may be called "a cart-horse stamp." and yet they look very fine, these same sensible-looking beasts, with their great eyes, and flowing manes and tails, and proud carriage. there is something, too, eternally fascinating in the beautiful seat of an arab on his horse--not of a fat sheikh or a rich basha or a thriving merchant, but that of the lean and wiry arab horseman born and bred, who, as he thunders past at full gallop, puts himself into a dozen positions, is at home in them all, shoots behind him, above him, below him, without drawing rein, turning in any direction, while he makes the whole air ring with his wild cries. the moorish saddle of course helps his grip; but beyond that, there is something cat-like in the lithe swing of his body, and it is that body's right and natural function to be upon a horse. the white turban, the flowing white garments, the gorgeously coloured saddle, the great silvered stirrups, are all part of the whole--and an attractive whole--born of the limitless desert, the great far-reaching sky, the pure wind: it is arabian, that is all--_and so much_. meanwhile, camels were selling in another corner of the market, being made to lie down and rise and generally show themselves off: they were fetching from three pounds ten upwards. cows, goats, and sheep were less interesting; but the throng of men which filled up the fair was, as ever, more than a study. above and beyond all, stood out the wild inhabitants of the atlas, and men from the sus, wearing black camel's-hair jellabs with a great russet-red or saffron-yellow patch let into the backs of them. the origin of this striking "badge" is not known, but the jellabs themselves looked absolutely in keeping with the lawless ruffians, on whose shoulders they hung, and the wild blotch of bizarre colour was "just themselves." bay, is the colour which in a horse the moor chooses first--the pearl of colours, sober and most hardy; while a light chestnut brings ill luck, though a dark chestnut is the colour of the wind, can "travel," and was mohammed's favourite. a horse must have the colour of its saddle in harmony with itself--an apple-green saddle for a black horse, scarlet for a white, the whole beautifully worked and embossed in silk, and when on the horse's back, should be set, perhaps, upon as many as _nine_ different coloured saddle-cloths, one on top of each other. [illustration: _photo by a. cavilla, tangier._] the sultan's garden. [_to face p. ._] of all filthy quarters in the filthiest of cities, i think the jewish quarter in marrakesh has a fair chance of ranking first,--outside it, rubbish, a manure-heap eighty feet high, which no one troubles to remove; inside the walls, black mud, feet deep, streets which are sewers, collections of dead dogs, rotting vegetables, refuse of all sorts; amongst it all, a dirty people, callous beyond belief as regards sanitation, with sore heads, sore eyes, matted rags. not a butcher's shop which is not black with flies and "high" with rotten meat: flies lie upon every article of food. and in the very vortex of this muck-heap--astounding to the traveller--are content to live wealthy jews, happy to flourish all their lives shoulder to shoulder with unutterable squalor. we went over a house belonging to a jew millionaire, well built, lavishly decorated, as luxurious as money and morocco would permit, evidently the pride of the whole family. probably few of them went far outside the city walls: they were born to the mellah. his success as a trader might have given the head of the house a country place in england, shady lawns, a carriage and pair to drive in: he preferred his own muck-heap. but i cannot conceive upon what he spent his money, other than the glorification of the inside of his house. the sultan's palace looked deserted: it is long, however, since he left it, and high time he was in fez again; for fez is more in touch with europe--fez means a shade more progression and civilization than life in morocco city. round the palace lay bales of goods which had been ordered by him and sent out from england--things such as waggons, motor-cars possibly, which are supposed so much to shock his narrow-minded subjects. they imagine that his shar[=i]fian majesty wastes vast sums of money; whereas for a great monarch, the ruler of an empire, his private bills are probably absurdly small. he may have fireworks let off every night for ten minutes, horrifying marrakesh; but the cost of his amusements, considering his position, must be curiously reasonable: so one considered, as one looked at the "parcels" awaiting his return to the capital, which lay in the immense courtyard outside his palace, where "powder play" is held, and where he receives foreign ambassadors, marching through the great gateway which leads to his own private rooms, over which is inscribed in arabic an odd sentence; it reads literally, "what god wills: there is no power but god." the days passed, and our time in marrakesh drew to an end. in spite of all that had been told us in tangier, of the difficulties and dangers which would attend an expedition into the atlas mountains, in spite of the verdict that we should not be given a permit, should be "stopped and not allowed to continue the journey," we found that, once upon the scene of action, there would have been little difficulty in getting at least as far as glaouia, and in pushing up through one or two other passes. the ride to glaouia might take five or six days: there were several other places and a district or two which would have been worth visiting ten times over. the missionaries in marrakesh were willing to make all arrangements: one of them would have gone with us, and under that escort it would have been possible to travel into the atlas without risk. we should have gone "privately," without troubling any one, without formality; and in all probability no one would have troubled about us: that, after all, is the only way to travel satisfactorily in morocco, not with half a dozen soldiers and a vast noise. but for this year at any rate our travels in morocco had reached their limit. r. was not strong enough to face more marching: the hot sun, long rides, and general "roughing it" had told upon her, and the responsibility of taking her on farther afield, into remote regions of uncertain climate, was too great. [illustration: _photo by a. cavilla, tangier._] the river tensif outside marrakesh. [_to face p. ._] early one morning we set forth upon our last march, back again to the coast, by the track which leads eventually to mazagan, a seaport some distance farther north than mogador. here we hoped to pick up a steamer, and proceed, _viâ_ tangier, across to gibraltar, where it would be possible to get a p. & o. boat and head for home. the march to mazagan was easy, and contained little incident. after leaving the plains of marrakesh and its waving palm-trees, and seeing the tall kutobea disappear at last, we found ourselves in the "little mountains," and along the rough road began to fall in continually with parties of tribesmen, arab country people, all mounted, who had been commandeered to accompany the sultan as far as fez, and who were now coming back to their homes. splendid bronzed fellows they were, dark brick-dust colour, wrapped in long white cloaks, with the hood of an under garment pulled down over their faces: sometimes a white cloth swathed their heads; their chins were hidden in soft folds which reached up to their hawk-eyes, veiling the face, like true sons of the desert, as a protection against sun and wind. guns were slung across their shoulders: they wore long yellow riding-boots and spurs, with half a dozen saddle-cloths; and all rode horses, strong little beasts, well groomed, some hog-maned, but usually with great locks of hair sweeping over their necks, and their tails almost touching the ground behind. on grey or white countrybreds as a rule, they wound along the mountain path in single file, these tall white-cloaked horsemen, in nowise differing from their ancestors of a thousand years ago--arabs of unbroken descent: as they emerged from between the wild hills it would have been hard to find a more picturesque sight. one of the few peaceful camping-grounds between marrakesh and mazagan was at a little distance outside an arab village of about thirty little pointed thatched huts, enclosed within a zareba of thorn-bushes: it was called smeera. we camped near some trees and water: the fig-trees were full of crows, which came in to roost in thousands, and the little owl (_athene noctua_) haunted the place. in the early half-light of the morning this wise-looking little bird was found, when we awoke, to be sitting upon the edge of the flap of the tent in the doorway, gazing in upon us with round yellow eyes; nor was it the least nervous. i recollect how, the evening before, there sat outside smeera, as so often may be seen outside the like villages, away beyond the huts and the zareba, where it was very quiet, upon some flat grey stones, eight or twelve village men--arabs. sitting there in the sunset, wrapped in their white hooded mantles, this conclave of wise white owls, easily to be mistaken for grey stones, so rigid are their backs--of what do they talk as the hours go by? there is no joke nor song nor a drop of liquor going, as in a "public," where our labourers at home would naturally congregate. but this charmed circle sits on, staring into the west: the tall bearded wheat rustles in the wind close to them; the illimitable plain stretches away to the horizon, flat as their own uneventful lives; the sun drops behind the soft straight line of earth; they do not move,--wondrous picturesque figures, long white folds, peaked hoods, sitting, their knees drawn up to their chins, for how long? what is time to an arab? one evening our camel never turned up, and we fully expected to have had to sleep without beds or any other of the night's usual adjuncts. we had started that morning at seven, had ridden till twelve, had halted for an hour and a half, starting again at half-past one, and riding till half-past five; and all the way, after a mile out of sok-el-tleta, where we watered the mules at a pond and the trail forked, we were on the wrong road. only the man with the camel knew the mazagan line of march thoroughly well: he had explained it beforehand to omar. omar made a mistake, and the camel and attendants were behind ourselves. however, news travels oddly fast in uncivilized countries, and the camel-driver heard after a time that the "advance squadron" was on the wrong trail. he set out after us, and ran and walked, and caught us at three o'clock in the afternoon. the wretched camel followed his steps all the way, with mulai ombach in charge of our baggage, three donkeys, and a boy, who were afraid of being cut off from us, and dared not risk a night by themselves. the camel-driver put us right, omar and saïd were well cursed, and we began a toilsome journey across rough country, hoping to hit the right trail in time. we found ourselves in the wildest and dirtiest of arab encampments now and again, where infuriated dogs, unaccustomed to visitors, rushed out and almost bit us upon our mules, amidst a hail of stones from omar and saïd. a valley luxuriating knee-deep in flowers--the flower valley we called it--was the one redeeming feature of that march. there are certain times for seeing the wild flowers in morocco--perhaps april in the south is the best month: so far we had not been as much struck by them as report would lead one to expect. and yet they were most beautiful. picture corn-fields full of love-in-a-mist; orchards of fig-trees, with the grass ablaze with golden pyrethrums; red mallow standing up in the barley; the ground carpeted with blue-and-white convolvulus; masses of carmine-coloured convolvulus densely festooned over the thorn-hedges; on the barest, stoniest of soil stretches of cistus, pale pink to faded mauve; asphodels everywhere; sometimes the wild spring form of the cultivated artichoke, the small variety of the ice-plant, the larkspur, the lupin, and several varieties of lavender. all these we met with, over and over again: rarer plants were to be found for the looking. r. collected specimens of them all, to be classified by the authorities at kew gardens on our return. the flower valley yielded one or two which we had not seen before, and we would have lingered there, but that time was precious and we had no notion of our exact whereabouts. it was a case of going on and on and meeting no one: evening began to draw near, and still we were off the right track, while our baggage might be anywhere. there was nothing for it but to push forward and trust to luck: in time we cut into innumerable little paths, which snaked side by side in the same direction across the plain, pointing towards the coast, and these we surmised to be the trail to mazagan, which proved to be correct. but at that moment, though we were anything but certain, it had become absolutely necessary to halt for the night. it was dark, and the mules were done. an arab village lay on a hillside not far off, and we made for it. omar and saïd had with them on their mules our tent and two or three necessaries for cooking: we had therefore a roof over our heads, and in time a fire was made, odds and ends were scraped up, and we ate a meal of sorts sitting on the ground beside a candle stuck on a stone. the night grew very cold: there was, however, a bit of thin carpet, which we proposed to wrap ourselves in to sleep. now and then one of us looked out between the flaps of the tent into the darkness and watched--a case of "sister ann! sister ann! do you see any one coming?" [illustration: one of our last camps. loading the camel. [_to face p. ._] we had, however, grown tired of looking out, and were just arranging ourselves on the ground, when familiar noises sounded outside, and omar's voice crying joyfully, "le chameau arrive!" perhaps, above all else which was interesting on the road to mazagan, the little arab settlements, composed entirely of tents, interested us most. in them, was lived the truly nomad, gipsy life of the wandering arab, who is a herdsman by heritage, and in following that vocation _a roamer par excellence_. they live, these arabs, in tents: the sides are made of straw and wattle hurdles; over the top is stretched an immense piece of brown or black camel's-hair cloth. the tents are barely five feet high in the middle, less at the edges: squat brown mushrooms they look, or something like the keels of boats turned bottom upwards. all of them were open in front, "very public" the world would say; which primitive and open-air mode of living was indeed their great feature. some of them were divided off down the middle by a hurdle, thus forming two "rooms": the hurdles were occasionally faggots, without straw. around the tents lay the flocks, chewing the cud or browsing on the scanty grass-land: children ran out to us with bowls of milk: when the grass gave out within reach all round, the tents were taken down, the hillsides deserted, and the families wandered in search of pastures new, carrying a few chickens, some pots and pans, two or three bundles of rags, and leaving behind a good many parasites and a bare patch. thus arab life in southern morocco--a thriftless, desultory existence, yet with the charm of continual change and of living with the earth. "to take no thought for the morrow" is the practice of all moors, whether arabs or berbers: no moor spends money on anything which will not bring him in immediate profit, and this accounts for the fact that trees and forests are never planted, or schemes started for working mines, or roads made, or bridges built; even if the capital were forthcoming, what would be the use of spending money only to be repaid little by little, year by year?--a man may die before he profits for all his trouble! after all, argues the moor, who could wish to alter morocco? is it not perfect as it is?--veritably, "_the tail of the peacock_," the sun of the universe! its very imperfections are among those things which in this fanatical mohammedan land so fascinate the traveller. its sad colours, its air steeped in mystery, its courtly unknowable people, its wild tribes, its white shut houses, its concealed women, its mad fanaticism, its magnificent stoicism--one and all are sufficient to hold the european, and to call him back again long after el moghreb has forgotten his face. another of those chains has been forged which bind certain places and certain countries to a soul, each henceforth belonging the one to the other, and each gaining a little something thereby; nor can the links of these chains be broken, since unseen possessions, such as they, are among those things which no power on earth can touch, which can neither be given nor taken away. it's north you may run to the rime-ringed sun, or south to the blind horn's hate; or east all the way into mississippi bay, or west to the golden gate, where the blindest bluffs hold good, dear lass, and the wildest tales are true, and the men bulk big on the old trail, our own trail, the out trail; and life runs large on the long trail--the trail that is always new. _printed by hazell, watson & viney, ld., london and aylesbury._ a selection from messrs. hutchinson & co.'s new books. _a work on arctic exploration of international importance._ on the "polar star" in the arctic sea. by h.r.h. the duke of the abruzzi. the story of the first italian expedition to the north pole. translated by william le queux. _in handsome volumes, with over illustrations in the text, and with full-page photogravure plates, panoramas, maps, etc._, s. _net._ * * * * * _an important new work by a most successful biographer._ the sailor king: william iv., his court and his subjects. by fitzgerald molloy. author of "the queen's comrade," "the gorgeous lady blessington," etc. _in volumes, cloth gilt, with full-page illustrations, including photogravure plates_, s. _net._ * * * * * _a deeply interesting and superbly illustrated work._ warwick castle and its earls. from saxon times to the present day. by the countess of warwick. _in large volumes, cloth gilt and gilt top_, s. _net. with about illustrations, including photogravure portraits of the present earl and countess of warwick_. * * * * * _the biography of a great diplomatist._ the life of the marquess of dufferin and ava. by c. e. black. _in large handsome volume, cloth gilt, fully illustrated,_ s. _net._ * * * * * celebrities and i. by henriette corkran. _in cloth gilt_, s. _net_. 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(president of the zoological society of london). _each volume in crown to, handsome cloth gilt and gilt top, fully illustrated with coloured and other plates,_ s. d. _net._ the first volume now ready. wild fruits of the country side. by f. e. hulme, f.l.s., f.s.a., author of "familiar wild flowers," etc. _with fine coloured plates by the author._ "a charming book, illustrated with very attractive drawings. a very pleasing and interesting volume."--_spectator._ * * * * * other volumes in the press. british mammals. by sir harry johnston, g.c.m.g., author of "the uganda protectorate." _with coloured plates from drawings by the author, and with many other illustrations from the author's drawings and from photographs._ * * * * * british fresh-water fish. by the right hon. sir herbert maxwell, bart., f.r.s., author of "salmon and sea trout." _with numerous coloured plates and other illustrations._ * * * * * new six-shilling novels. _each in cloth gilt._ * * * * * alain tanger's wife. by j. h. voxall, m.p. "the interest is infectious; there is no denying the charm of the story." daily mail. ferelith. by lord kilmarnock. "an entirely new plot, and assuredly one of the most startling ones ever invented. the tale itself is told with a quiet dignity and restraint."--_newcastle leader._ souls. by "rita." "brightly and cleverly written; full of amusing episodes and dialogue."--_daily telegraph._ the seven secrets. by wm. le queux. "no reader can fail to admire the ingenuity with which mr. w. le queux has constructed the plot of his latest novel, the secret of which is admirably preserved."--_manchester guardian._ the golden kingdom. by andrew balfour. "mr. balfour proves himself in 'the golden kingdom' to be a capital storyteller. he is a stevensonian both in matter and in manner, but with considerable ingenuity of his own in devising situations, and considerable ability in the developing and setting forth of a tale of romantic adventure."--_athenæum._ the lady of the cameo. by tom gallon. the eternal woman. by dorothea gerard. chasma. by h. w. g. hyrst. a parson's lass. by godfrey burchett. the vice-chancellor's ward. by christian tearle. the man with the wooden face. by mrs. fred reynolds. london: hutchinson & co., paternoster row. transcriber's notes: . obvious punctuation errors repaired. . this text contains diacritical marks and symbols, where possible these are represented in the text by the following symbols. diacritical mark above below -------------------------- ------ ------ macron (straight line) [=x] [x=] . list of corrections: page , "colourness" changed to "colourless" page , "venalty" changed to "venality" page , "matresses" changed to "mattresses" page , "exemple" changed to "example" page , "hillali" changed to "hilalli" page , "a.m." changed to "p.m." page , "morocoo" changed to "morocco" page , "trumpter" changed to "trumpeter" page , "farthur" changed to "farther" page , "staple" changed to "stable" page , "floor" changed to "flour" page , "votex" changed to "vortex" page , "dozon" changed to "dozen" captain brassbound's conversion by bernard shaw act i on the heights overlooking the harbor of mogador, a seaport on the west coast of morocco, the missionary, in the coolness of the late afternoon, is following the precept of voltaire by cultivating his garden. he is an elderly scotchman, spiritually a little weatherbeaten, as having to navigate his creed in strange waters crowded with other craft but still a convinced son of the free church and the north african mission, with a faithful brown eye, and a peaceful soul. physically a wiry small-knit man, well tanned, clean shaven, with delicate resolute features and a twinkle of mild humor. he wears the sun helmet and pagri, the neutral-tinted spectacles, and the white canvas spanish sand shoes of the modern scotch missionary: but instead of a cheap tourist's suit from glasgow, a grey flannel shirt with white collar, a green sailor knot tie with a cheap pin in it, he wears a suit of clean white linen, acceptable in color, if not in cut, to the moorish mind. the view from the garden includes much atlantic ocean and a long stretch of sandy coast to the south, swept by the north east trade wind, and scantily nourishing a few stunted pepper trees, mangy palms, and tamarisks. the prospect ends, as far as the land is concerned, in little hills that come nearly to the sea: rudiments, these, of the atlas mountains. the missionary, having had daily opportunities of looking at this seascape for thirty years or so, pays no heed to it, being absorbed in trimming a huge red geranium bush, to english eyes unnaturally big, which, with a dusty smilax or two, is the sole product of his pet flower-bed. he is sitting to his work on a moorish stool. in the middle of the garden there is a pleasant seat in the shade of a tamarisk tree. the house is in the south west corner of the garden, and the geranium bush in the north east corner. at the garden-door of the house there appears presently a man who is clearly no barbarian, being in fact a less agreeable product peculiar to modern commercial civilization. his frame and flesh are those of an ill-nourished lad of seventeen; but his age is inscrutable: only the absence of any sign of grey in his mud colored hair suggests that he is at all events probably under forty, without prejudice to the possibility of his being under twenty. a londoner would recognize him at once as an extreme but hardy specimen of the abortion produced by nature in a city slum. his utterance, affectedly pumped and hearty, and naturally vulgar and nasal, is ready and fluent: nature, a board school education, and some kerbstone practice having made him a bit of an orator. his dialect, apart from its base nasal delivery, is not unlike that of smart london society in its tendency to replace diphthongs by vowels (sometimes rather prettily) and to shuffle all the traditional vowel pronunciations. he pronounces ow as ah, and i as aw, using the ordinary ow for o, i for a, a for u, and e for a, with this reservation, that when any vowel is followed by an r he signifies its presence, not by pronouncing the r, which he never does under these circumstances, but by prolonging and modifyinq the vowel, sometimes even to the extreme degree of pronouncing it properly. as to his yol for l (a compendious delivery of the provincial eh-al), and other metropolitan refinements, amazing to all but cockneys, they cannot be indicated, save in the above imperfect manner, without the aid of a phonetic alphabet. he is dressed in somebody else's very second best as a coast-guardsman, and gives himself the airs of a stage tar with sufficient success to pass as a possible fish porter of bad character in casual employment during busy times at billingsgate. his manner shows an earnest disposition to ingratiate himself with the missionary, probably for some dishonest purpose. the man. awtenoon, mr. renkin. (the missionary sits up quickly, and turns, resigning himself dutifully to the interruption.) yr honor's eolth. rankin (reservedly). good afternoon, mr. drinkwotter. drinkwater. you're not best pleased to be hinterrupted in yr bit o gawdnin bow the lawk o me, gavner. rankin. a missionary knows nothing of leks of that soart, or of disleks either, mr. drinkwotter. what can i do for ye? drinkwater (heartily). nathink, gavner. awve brort noos fer yer. rankin. well, sit ye doon. drinkwater. aw thenk yr honor. (he sits down on the seat under the tree and composes himself for conversation.) hever ear o jadge ellam? rankin. sir howrrd hallam? drinkwater. thet's im-enginest jadge in hingland!--awlus gives the ket wen it's robbry with voylence, bless is awt. aw sy nathink agin im: awm all fer lor mawseolf, aw em. rankin. well? drinkwater. hever ear of is sist-in-lor: lidy sisly winefleet? rankin. do ye mean the celebrated leddy--the traveller? drinkwater. yuss: should think aw doo. walked acrost harfricar with nathink but a little dawg, and wrowt abaht it in the dily mile (the daily mail, a popular london newspaper), she did. rankin. is she sir howrrd hallam's sister-in-law? drinkwater. deeceased wawfe's sister: yuss: thet's wot she is. rankin. well, what about them? drinkwater. wot abaht them! waw, they're eah. lannid aht of a steam yacht in mogador awber not twenty minnits agow. gorn to the british cornsl's. e'll send em orn to you: e ynt got naowheres to put em. sor em awr (hire) a harab an two krooboys to kerry their laggige. thort awd cam an teoll yer. rankin. thank you. it's verra kind of you, mr. drinkwotter. drinkwater. down't mention it, gavner. lor bless yer, wawn't it you as converted me? wot was aw wen aw cam eah but a pore lorst sinner? down't aw ow y'a turn fer thet? besawds, gavner, this lidy sisly winefleet mawt wor't to tike a walk crost morocker--a rawd inter the mahntns or sech lawk. weoll, as you knaow, gavner, thet cawn't be done eah withaht a hescort. rankin. it's impoassible: th' would oall b' murrdered. morocco is not lek the rest of africa. drinkwater. no, gavner: these eah moors ez their religion; an it mikes em dinegerous. hever convert a moor, gavner? rankin (with a rueful smile). no. drinkwater (solemnly). nor never will, gavner. rankin. i have been at work here for twenty-five years, mr. drinkwotter; and you are my first and only convert. drinkwater. down't seem naow good, do it, gavner? rankin. i don't say that. i hope i have done some good. they come to me for medicine when they are ill; and they call me the christian who is not a thief. that is something. drinkwater. their mawnds kennot rawse to christiennity lawk hahrs ken, gavner: thet's ah it is. weoll, ez haw was syin, if a hescort is wornted, there's maw friend and commawnder kepn brarsbahnd of the schooner thenksgivin, an is crew, incloodin mawseolf, will see the lidy an jadge ellam through henny little excursion in reason. yr honor mawt mention it. rankin. i will certainly not propose anything so dangerous as an excursion. drinkwater (virtuously). naow, gavner, nor would i awst you to. (shaking his head.) naow, naow: it is dinegerous. but hall the more call for a hescort if they should ev it hin their mawnds to gow. rankin. i hope they won't. drinkwater. an sow aw do too, gavner. rankin (pondering). 'tis strange that they should come to mogador, of all places; and to my house! i once met sir howrrd hallam, years ago. drinkwater (amazed). naow! didger? think o thet, gavner! waw, sow aw did too. but it were a misunnerstedin, thet wors. lef the court withaht a stine on maw kerrickter, aw did. rankin (with some indignation). i hope you don't think i met sir howrrd in that way. drinkwater. mawt yeppn to the honestest, best meanin pusson, aw do assure yer, gavner. rankin. i would have you to know that i met him privately, mr. drinkwotter. his brother was a dear friend of mine. years ago. he went out to the west indies. drinkwater. the wust hindies! jist acrost there, tather sawd thet howcean (pointing seaward)! dear me! we cams hin with vennity, an we deepawts in dawkness. down't we, gavner? rankin (pricking up his ears). eh? have you been reading that little book i gave you? drinkwater. aw hev, et odd tawms. very camfitn, gavner. (he rises, apprehensive lest further catechism should find him unprepared.) awll sy good awtenoon, gavner: you're busy hexpectin o sr ahrd an lidy sisly, ynt yer? (about to go.) rankin (stopping him). no, stop: we're oalways ready for travellers here. i have something else to say--a question to ask you. drinkwater (with a misgiving, which he masks by exaggerating his hearty sailor manner). an weollcome, yr honor. rankin. who is this captain brassbound? drinkwater (guiltily). kepn brarsbahnd! e's-weoll, e's maw kepn, gavner. rankin. yes. well? drinkwater (feebly). kepn of the schooner thenksgivin, gavner. rankin (searchingly). have ye ever haird of a bad character in these seas called black paquito? drinkwater (with a sudden radiance of complete enlightenment). aoh, nar aw tikes yer wiv me, yr honor. nah sammun es bin a teolln you thet kepn brarsbahnd an bleck pakeetow is hawdentically the sime pussn. ynt thet sow? rankin. that is so. (drinkwater slaps his knee triumphantly. the missionary proceeds determinedly) and the someone was a verra honest, straightforward man, as far as i could judge. drinkwater (embracing the implication). course a wors, gavner: ev aw said a word agin him? ev aw nah? rankin. but is captain brassbound black paquito then? drinkwater. waw, it's the nime is blessed mather give im at er knee, bless is little awt! ther ynt naow awm in it. she ware a wust hinjin--howver there agin, yer see (pointing seaward)--leastwaws, naow she worn't: she were a brazilian, aw think; an pakeetow's brazilian for a bloomin little perrit--awskin yr pawdn for the word. (sentimentally) lawk as a hinglish lidy mawt call er little boy birdie. rankin (not quite convinced). but why black paquito? drinkwater (artlessly). waw, the bird in its netral stite bein green, an e evin bleck air, y' knaow-- rankin (cutting him short). i see. and now i will put ye another question. what is captain brassbound, or paquito, or whatever he calls himself? drinkwater (officiously). brarsbahnd, gavner. awlus calls isseolf brarsbahnd. rankin. well. brassbound, then. what is he? drinkwater (fervently). you awsks me wot e is, gavner? rankin (firmly). i do. drinkwater (with rising enthusiasm). an shll aw teoll yer wot e is, yr honor? rankin (not at all impressed). if ye will be so good, mr. drinkwotter. drinkwater (with overwhelming conviction). then awll teoll you, gavner, wot he is. ee's a paffick genlmn: thet's wot e is. rankin (gravely). mr. drinkwotter: pairfection is an attribute, not of west coast captains, but of thr maaker. and there are gentlemen and gentlemen in the world, espaecially in these latitudes. which sort of gentleman is he? drinkwater. hinglish genlmn, gavner. hinglish speakin; hinglish fawther; west hinjin plawnter; hinglish true blue breed. (reflectively) tech o brahn from the mather, preps, she bein brazilian. rankin. now on your faith as a christian, felix drinkwotter, is captain brassbound a slaver or not? drinkwater (surprised into his natural cockney pertness). naow e ynt. rankin. are ye sure? drinkwater. waw, a sliver is abaht the wanne thing in the wy of a genlmn o fortn thet e ynt. rankin. i've haird that expression "gentleman of fortune" before, mr. drinkwotter. it means pirate. do ye know that? drinkwater. bless y'r awt, y' cawnt be a pawrit naradys. waw, the aw seas is wuss pleest nor piccadilly suckus. if aw was to do orn thet there hetlentic howcean the things aw did as a bwoy in the worterleoo rowd, awd ev maw air cat afore aw could turn maw ed. pawrit be blaowed!--awskink yr pawdn, gavner. nah, jest to shaow you ah little thet there striteforard man y' mide mention on knaowed wot e was atorkin abaht: oo would you spowse was the marster to wich kepn brarsbahnd served apprentice, as yr mawt sy? rankin. i don't know. drinkwater. gawdn, gavner, gawdn. gawdn o kawtoom--stetcher stends in trifawlgr square to this dy. trined bleck pakeetow in smawshin hap the slive riders, e did. promist gawdn e wouldn't never smaggle slives nor gin, an (with suppressed aggravation) wown't, gavner, not if we gows dahn on ahr bloomin bended knees to im to do it. rankin (drily). and do ye go down on your bended knees to him to do it? drinkwater (somewhat abashed). some of huz is hanconverted men, gavner; an they sy: you smaggles wanne thing, kepn; waw not hanather? rankin. we've come to it at last. i thought so. captain brassbound is a smuggler. drinkwater. weoll, waw not? waw not, gavner? ahrs is a free tride nition. it gows agin us as hinglishmen to see these bloomin furriners settin ap their castoms ahses and spheres o hinfluence and sich lawk hall owver arfricar. daown't harfricar belong as much to huz as to them? thet's wot we sy. ennywys, there ynt naow awm in ahr business. all we daz is hescort, tourist hor commercial. cook's hexcursions to the hatlas mahntns: thet's hall it is. waw, it's spreadin civlawzytion, it is. ynt it nah? rankin. you think captain brassbound's crew sufficiently equipped for that, do you? drinkwater. hee-quipped! haw should think sow. lawtnin rawfles, twelve shots in the meggezine! oo's to storp us? rankin. the most dangerous chieftain in these parts, the sheikh sidi el assif, has a new american machine pistol which fires ten bullets without loadin; and his rifle has sixteen shots in the magazine. drinkwater (indignantly). yuss; an the people that sells sich things into the ends o' them eathen bleck niggers calls theirseolves christians! it's a crool shime, sow it is. rankin. if a man has the heart to pull the trigger, it matters little what color his hand is, mr. drinkwotter. have ye anything else to say to me this afternoon? drinkwater (rising). nathink, gavner, cept to wishyer the bust o yolth, and a many cornverts. awtenoon, gavner. rankin. good afternoon to ye, mr. drinkwotter. as drinkwater turns to go, a moorish porter comes from the house with two krooboys. the porter (at the door, addressing rankin). bikouros (moroccan for epicurus, a general moorish name for the missionaries, who are supposed by the moors to have chosen their calling through a love of luxurious idleness): i have brought to your house a christian dog and his woman. drinkwater. there's eathen menners fer yer! calls sr ahrd ellam an lidy winefleet a christian dorg and is woman! if ee ed you in the dorck et the centl crimnal, you'd fawnd aht oo was the dorg and oo was is marster, pretty quick, you would. rankin. have you broat their boxes? the porter. by allah, two camel loads! rankin. have you been paid? the porter. only one miserable dollar, bikouros. i have brought them to your house. they will pay you. give me something for bringing gold to your door. drinkwater. yah! you oughter bin bawn a christian, you ought. you knaow too mach. rankin. you have broat onnly trouble and expense to my door, hassan; and you know it. have i ever charged your wife and children for my medicines? hassan (philosophically). it is always permitted by the prophet to ask, bikouros. (he goes cheerfully into the house with the krooboys.) drinkwater. jist thort eed trah it orn, a did. hooman nitre is the sime everywheres. them eathens is jast lawk you an' me, gavner. a lady and gentleman, both english, come into the garden. the gentleman, more than elderly, is facing old age on compulsion, not resignedly. he is clean shaven, and has a brainy rectangular forehead, a resolute nose with strongly governed nostrils, and a tightly fastened down mouth which has evidently shut in much temper and anger in its time. he has a habit of deliberately assumed authority and dignity, but is trying to take life more genially and easily in his character of tourist, which is further borne out by his white hat and summery racecourse attire. the lady is between thirty and forty, tall, very goodlooking, sympathetic, intelligent, tender and humorous, dressed with cunning simplicity not as a businesslike, tailor made, gaitered tourist, but as if she lived at the next cottage and had dropped in for tea in blouse and flowered straw hat. a woman of great vitality and humanity, who begins a casual acquaintance at the point usually attained by english people after thirty years acquaintance when they are capable of reaching it at all. she pounces genially on drinkwater, who is smirking at her, hat in hand, with an air of hearty welcome. the gentleman, on the other hand, comes down the side of the garden next the house, instinctively maintaining a distance between himself and the others. the lady (to drinkwater). how dye do? are you the missionary? drinkwater (modestly). naow, lidy, aw will not deceive you, thow the mistike his but netral. awm wanne of the missionary's good works, lidy--is first cornvert, a umble british seaman--countrymen o yours, lidy, and of is lawdship's. this eah is mr. renkin, the bust worker in the wust cowst vawnyawd. (introducing the judge) mr. renkin: is lawdship sr ahrd ellam. (he withdraws discreetly into the house.) sir howard (to rankin). i am sorry to intrude on you, mr. rankin; but in the absence of a hotel there seems to be no alternative. lady cicely (beaming on him). besides, we would so much rather stay with you, if you will have us, mr. rankin. sir howard (introducing her). my sister-in-law, lady cicely waynflete, mr. rankin. rankin. i am glad to be of service to your leddyship. you will be wishing to have some tea after your journey, i'm thinking. lady cicely. thoughtful man that you are, mr. rankin! but we've had some already on board the yacht. and i've arranged everything with your servants; so you must go on gardening just as if we were not here. sir howard. i am sorry to have to warn you, mr. rankin, that lady cicely, from travelling in africa, has acquired a habit of walking into people's houses and behaving as if she were in her own. lady cicely. but, my dear howard, i assure you the natives like it. rankin (gallantly). so do i. lady cicely (delighted). oh, that is so nice of you, mr. rankin. this is a delicious country! and the people seem so good! they have such nice faces! we had such a handsome moor to carry our luggage up! and two perfect pets of krooboys! did you notice their faces, howard? sir howard. i did; and i can confidently say, after a long experience of faces of the worst type looking at me from the dock, that i have never seen so entirely villainous a trio as that moor and the two krooboys, to whom you gave five dollars when they would have been perfectly satisfied with one. rankin (throwing up his hands). five dollars! 'tis easy to see you are not scotch, my leddy. lady cicely. oh, poor things, they must want it more than we do; and you know, howard, that mahometans never spend money in drink. rankin. excuse me a moment, my leddy. i have a word in season to say to that same moor. (he goes into the house.) lady cicely (walking about the garden, looking at the view and at the flowers). i think this is a perfectly heavenly place. drinkwater returns from the house with a chair. drinkwater (placing the chair for sir howard). awskink yr pawdn for the libbety, sr ahrd. sir howard (looking a him). i have seen you before somewhere. drinkwater. you ev, sr ahrd. but aw do assure yer it were hall a mistike. sir howard. as usual. (he sits down.) wrongfully convicted, of course. drinkwater (with sly delight). naow, gavner. (half whispering, with an ineffable grin) wrorngfully hacquittid! sir howard. indeed! that's the first case of the kind i have ever met. drinkwater. lawd, sr ahrd, wot jagginses them jurymen was! you an me knaowed it too, didn't we? sir howard. i daresay we did. i am sorry to say i forget the exact nature of the difficulty you were in. can you refresh my memory? drinkwater. owny the aw sperrits o youth, y' lawdship. worterleoo rowd kice. wot they calls ooliganism. sir howard. oh! you were a hooligan, were you? lady cicely (puzzled). a hooligan! drinkwater (deprecatingly). nime giv huz pore thortless leds baw a gent on the dily chrornicle, lidy. (rankin returns. drinkwater immediately withdraws, stopping the missionary for a moment near the threshold to say, touching his forelock) awll eng abaht within ile, gavner, hin kice aw should be wornted. (he goes into the house with soft steps.) lady cicely sits down on the bench under the tamarisk. rankin takes his stool from the flowerbed and sits down on her left, sir howard being on her right. lady cicely. what a pleasant face your sailor friend has, mr. rankin! he has been so frank and truthful with us. you know i don't think anybody can pay me a greater compliment than to be quite sincere with me at first sight. it's the perfection of natural good manners. sir howard. you must not suppose, mr. rankin, that my sister-in-law talks nonsense on purpose. she will continue to believe in your friend until he steals her watch; and even then she will find excuses for him. rankin (drily changing the subject). and how have ye been, sir howrrd, since our last meeting that morning nigh forty year ago down at the docks in london? sir howard (greatly surprised, pulling himself together) our last meeting! mr. rankin: have i been unfortunate enough to forget an old acquaintance? rankin. well, perhaps hardly an acquaintance, sir howrrd. but i was a close friend of your brother miles: and when he sailed for brazil i was one of the little party that saw him off. you were one of the party also, if i'm not mistaken. i took particular notice of you because you were miles's brother and i had never seen ye before. but ye had no call to take notice of me. sir howard (reflecting). yes: there was a young friend of my brother's who might well be you. but the name, as i recollect it, was leslie. rankin. that was me, sir. my name is leslie rankin; and your brother and i were always miles and leslie to one another. sir howard (pluming himself a little). ah! that explains it. i can trust my memory still, mr. rankin; though some people do complain that i am growing old. rankin. and where may miles be now, sir howard? sir howard (abruptly). don't you know that he is dead? rankin (much shocked). never haird of it. dear, dear: i shall never see him again; and i can scarcely bring his face to mind after all these years. (with moistening eyes, which at once touch lady cicely's sympathy) i'm right sorry--right sorry. sir howard (decorously subduing his voice). yes: he did not live long: indeed, he never came back to england. it must be nearly thirty years ago now that he died in the west indies on his property there. rankin (surprised). his proaperty! miles with a proaperty! sir howard. yes: he became a planter, and did well out there, mr. rankin. the history of that property is a very curious and interesting one--at least it is so to a lawyer like myself. rankin. i should be glad to hear it for miles's sake, though i am no lawyer, sir howrrd. lady cicely. i never knew you had a brother, howard. sir howard (not pleased by this remark). perhaps because you never asked me. (turning more blandly to rankin) i will tell you the story, mr. rankin. when miles died, he left an estate in one of the west indian islands. it was in charge of an agent who was a sharpish fellow, with all his wits about him. now, sir, that man did a thing which probably could hardly be done with impunity even here in morocco, under the most barbarous of surviving civilizations. he quite simply took the estate for himself and kept it. rankin. but how about the law? sir howard. the law, sir, in that island, consisted practically of the attorney general and the solicitor general; and these gentlemen were both retained by the agent. consequently there was no solicitor in the island to take up the case against him. rankin. is such a thing possible to-day in the british empire? sir howard (calmly). oh, quite. quite. lady cicely. but could not a firstrate solicitor have been sent out from london? sir howard. no doubt, by paying him enough to compensate him for giving up his london practice: that is, rather more than there was any reasonable likelihood of the estate proving worth. rankin. then the estate was lost? sir howard. not permanently. it is in my hands at present. rankin. then how did ye get it back? sir howard (with crafty enjoyment of his own cunning). by hoisting the rogue with his own petard. i had to leave matters as they were for many years; for i had my own position in the world to make. but at last i made it. in the course of a holiday trip to the west indies, i found that this dishonest agent had left the island, and placed the estate in the hands of an agent of his own, whom he was foolish enough to pay very badly. i put the case before that agent; and he decided to treat the estate as my property. the robber now found himself in exactly the same position he had formerly forced me into. nobody in the island would act against me, least of all the attorney and solicitor general, who appreciated my influence at the colonial office. and so i got the estate back. "the mills of the gods grind slowly," mr. rankin; "but they grind exceeding small." lady cicely. now i suppose if i'd done such a clever thing in england, you'd have sent me to prison. sir howard. probably, unless you had taken care to keep outside the law against conspiracy. whenever you wish to do anything against the law, cicely, always consult a good solicitor first. lady cicely. so i do. but suppose your agent takes it into his head to give the estate back to his wicked old employer! sir howard. i heartily wish he would. rankin (openeyed). you wish he would!! sir howard. yes. a few years ago the collapse of the west indian sugar industry converted the income of the estate into an annual loss of about pounds a year. if i can't sell it soon, i shall simply abandon it--unless you, mr. rankin, would like to take it as a present. rankin (laughing). i thank your lordship: we have estates enough of that sort in scotland. you're setting with your back to the sun, leddy ceecily, and losing something worth looking at. see there. (he rises and points seaward, where the rapid twilight of the latitude has begun.) lady cicely (getting up to look and uttering a cry of admiration). oh, how lovely! sir howard (also rising). what are those hills over there to the southeast? rankin. they are the outposts, so to speak, of the atlas mountains. lady cicely. the atlas mountains! where shelley's witch lived! we'll make an excursion to them to-morrow, howard. rankin. that's impoassible, my leddy. the natives are verra dangerous. lady cicely. why? has any explorer been shooting them? rankin. no. but every man of them believes he will go to heaven if he kills an unbeliever. lady cicely. bless you, dear mr. rankin, the people in england believe that they will go to heaven if they give all their property to the poor. but they don't do it. i'm not a bit afraid of that. rankin. but they are not accustomed to see women going about unveiled. lady cicely. i always get on best with people when they can see my face. sir howard. cicely: you are talking great nonsense and you know it. these people have no laws to restrain them, which means, in plain english, that they are habitual thieves and murderers. rankin. nay, nay: not exactly that. lady cicely (indignantly). of course not. you always think, howard, that nothing prevents people killing each other but the fear of your hanging them for it. but what nonsense that is! and how wicked! if these people weren't here for some good purpose, they wouldn't have been made, would they, mr. rankin? rankin. that is a point, certainly, leddy ceecily. sir howard. oh, if you are going to talk theology-- lady cicely. well, why not? theology is as respectable as law, i should think. besides, i'm only talking commonsense. why do people get killed by savages? because instead of being polite to them, and saying howdyedo? like me, people aim pistols at them. i've been among savages--cannibals and all sorts. everybody said they'd kill me. but when i met them, i said howdyedo? and they were quite nice. the kings always wanted to marry me. sir howard. that does not seem to me to make you any safer here, cicely. you shall certainly not stir a step beyond the protection of the consul, if i can help it, without a strong escort. lady cicely. i don't want an escort. sir howard. i do. and i suppose you will expect me to accompany you. rankin. 'tis not safe, leddy ceecily. really and truly, 'tis not safe. the tribes are verra fierce; and there are cities here that no christian has ever set foot in. if you go without being well protected, the first chief you meet well seize you and send you back again to prevent his followers murdering you. lady cicely. oh, how nice of him, mr. rankin! rankin. he would not do it for your sake, leddy ceecily, but for his own. the sultan would get into trouble with england if you were killed; and the sultan would kill the chief to pacify the english government. lady cicely. but i always go everywhere. i know the people here won't touch me. they have such nice faces and such pretty scenery. sir howard (to rankin, sitting down again resignedly). you can imagine how much use there is in talking to a woman who admires the faces of the ruffians who infest these ports, mr. rankin. can anything be done in the way of an escort? rankin. there is a certain captain brassbound here who trades along the coast, and occasionally escorts parties of merchants on journeys into the interior. i understand that he served under gordon in the soudan. sir howard. that sounds promising. but i should like to know a little more about him before i trust myself in his hands. rankin. i quite agree with you, sir howrrd. i'll send felix drinkwotter for him. (he claps his hands. an arab boy appears at the house door.) muley: is sailor man here? (muley nods.) tell sailor man bring captain. (muley nods and goes.) sir howard. who is drinkwater? rankin. his agent, or mate: i don't rightly know which. lady cicely. oh, if he has a mate named felix drinkwater, it must be quite a respectable crew. it is such a nice name. rankin. you saw him here just now. he is a convert of mine. lady cicely (delighted). that nice truthful sailor! sir howard (horrified). what! the hooligan! rankin (puzzled). hooligan? no, my lord: he is an englishman. sir howard. my dear mr. rankin, this man was tried before me on a charge of street ruffianism. rankin. so he told me. he was badly broat up, i am afraid. but he is now a converted man. lady cicely. of course he is. his telling you so frankly proves it. you know, really, howard, all those poor people whom you try are more sinned against than sinning. if you would only talk to them in a friendly way instead of passing cruel sentences on them, you would find them quite nice to you. (indignantly) i won't have this poor man trampled on merely because his mother brought him up as a hooligan. i am sure nobody could be nicer than he was when he spoke to us. sir howard. in short, we are to have an escort of hooligans commanded by a filibuster. very well, very well. you will most likely admire all their faces; and i have no doubt at all that they will admire yours. drinkwater comes from the house with an italian dressed in a much worn suit of blue serge, a dilapidated alpine hat, and boots laced with scraps of twine. he remains near the door, whilst drinkwater comes forward between sir howard and lady cicely. drinkwater. yr honor's servant. (to the italian) mawtzow: is lawdship sr ahrd ellam. (marzo touches his hat.) er lidyship lidy winefleet. (marzo touches his hat.) hawtellian shipmite, lidy. hahr chef. lady cicely (nodding affably to marzo). howdyedo? i love italy. what part of it were you born in? drinkwater. worn't bawn in hitly at all, lidy. bawn in ettn gawdn (hatton garden). hawce barrer an street pianner hawtellian, lidy: thet's wot e is. kepn brarsbahnd's respects to yr honors; an e awites yr commawnds. rankin. shall we go indoors to see him? sir howard. i think we had better have a look at him by daylight. rankin. then we must lose no time: the dark is soon down in this latitude. (to drinkwater) will ye ask him to step out here to us, mr. drinkwotter? drinkwater. rawt you aw, gavner. (he goes officiously into the house.) lady cicely and rankin sit down as before to receive the captain. the light is by this time waning rapidly, the darkness creeping west into the orange crimson. lady cicely (whispering). don't you feel rather creepy, mr. rankin? i wonder what he'll be like. rankin. i misdoubt me he will not answer, your leddyship. there is a scuffling noise in the house; and drinkwater shoots out through the doorway across the garden with every appearance of having been violently kicked. marzo immediately hurries down the garden on sir howard's right out of the neighborhood of the doorway. drinkwater (trying to put a cheerful air on much mortification and bodily anguish). narsty step to thet ere door tripped me hap, it did. (raising his voice and narrowly escaping a squeak of pain) kepn brarsbahnd. (he gets as far from the house as possible, on rankin's left. rankin rises to receive his guest.) an olive complexioned man with dark southern eyes and hair comes from the house. age about . handsome features, but joyless; dark eyebrows drawn towards one another; mouth set grimly; nostrils large and strained: a face set to one tragic purpose. a man of few words, fewer gestures, and much significance. on the whole, interesting, and even attractive, but not friendly. he stands for a moment, saturnine in the ruddy light, to see who is present, looking in a singular and rather deadly way at sir howard; then with some surprise and uneasiness at lady cicely. finally he comes down into the middle of the garden, and confronts rankin, who has been glaring at him in consternation from the moment of his entrance, and continues to do so in so marked a way that the glow in brassbound's eyes deepens as he begins to take offence. brassbound. well, sir, have you stared your fill at me? rankin (recovering himself with a start). i ask your pardon for my bad manners, captain brassbound. ye are extraordinair lek an auld college friend of mine, whose face i said not ten minutes gone that i could no longer bring to mind. it was as if he had come from the grave to remind me of it. brassbound. why have you sent for me? rankin. we have a matter of business with ye, captain. brassbound. who are "we"? rankin. this is sir howrrd hallam, who will be well known to ye as one of her majesty's judges. brassbound (turning the singular look again on sir howard). the friend of the widow! the protector of the fatherless! sir howard (startled). i did not know i was so favorably spoken of in these parts, captain brassbound. we want an escort for a trip into the mountains. brassbound (ignoring this announcement). who is the lady? rankin. lady ceecily waynflete, his lordship's sister-in-law. lady cicely. howdyedo, captain brassbound? (he bows gravely.) sir howard (a little impatient of these questions, which strike him as somewhat impertinent). let us come to business, if you please. we are thinking of making a short excursion to see the country about here. can you provide us with an escort of respectable, trustworthy men? brassbound. no. drinkwater (in strong remonstrance). nah, nah, nah! nah look eah, kepn, y'knaow-- brassbound (between his teeth). hold your tongue. drinkwater (abjectly). yuss, kepn. rankin. i understood it was your business to provide escorts, captain brassbound. brassbound. you were rightly informed. that is my business. lady cicely. then why won't you do it for us? brassbound. you are not content with an escort. you want respectable, trustworthy men. you should have brought a division of london policemen with you. my men are neither respectable nor trustworthy. drinkwater (unable to contain himself). nah, nah, look eah, kepn. if you want to be moddist, be moddist on your aown accahnt, nort on mawn. brassbound. you see what my men are like. that rascal (indicating marzo) would cut a throat for a dollar if he had courage enough. marzo. i not understand. i no spik englis. brassbound. this thing (pointing to drinkwater) is the greatest liar, thief, drunkard, and rapscallion on the west coast. drinkwater (affecting an ironic indifference). gow orn, gow orn. sr ahrd ez erd witnesses to maw kerrickter afoah. e knaows ah mech to believe of em. lady cicely. captain brassbound: i have heard all that before about the blacks; and i found them very nice people when they were properly treated. drinkwater (chuckling: the italian is also grinning). nah, kepn, nah! owp yr prahd o y'seolf nah. brassbound. i quite understand the proper treatment for him, madam. if he opens his mouth again without my leave, i will break every bone in his skin. lady cicely (in her most sunnily matter-of-fact way). does captain brassbound always treat you like this, mr. drinkwater? drinkwater hesitates, and looks apprehensively at the captain. brassbound. answer, you dog, when the lady orders you. (to lady cicely) do not address him as mr. drinkwater, madam: he is accustomed to be called brandyfaced jack. drinkwater (indignantly). eah, aw sy! nah look eah, kepn: maw nime is drinkworter. you awsk em et sin jorn's in the worterleoo rowd. orn maw grenfawther's tombstown, it is. brassbound. it will be on your own tombstone, presently, if you cannot hold your tongue. (turning to the others) let us understand one another, if you please. an escort here, or anywhere where there are no regular disciplined forces, is what its captain makes it. if i undertake this business, i shall be your escort. i may require a dozen men, just as i may require a dozen horses. some of the horses will be vicious; so will all the men. if either horse or man tries any of his viciousness on me, so much the worse for him; but it will make no difference to you. i will order my men to behave themselves before the lady; and they shall obey their orders. but the lady will please understand that i take my own way with them and suffer no interference. lady cicely. captain brassbound: i don't want an escort at all. it will simply get us all into danger; and i shall have the trouble of getting it out again. that's what escorts always do. but since sir howard prefers an escort, i think you had better stay at home and let me take charge of it. i know your men will get on perfectly well if they're properly treated. drinkwater (with enthusiasm). feed aht o yr and, lidy, we would. brassbound (with sardonic assent). good. i agree. (to drinkwater) you shall go without me. drinkwater. (terrified). eah! wot are you a syin orn? we cawn't gow withaht yer. (to lady cicely) naow, lidy: it wouldn't be for yr hown good. yer cawn't hexpect a lot o poor honeddikited men lawk huz to ran ahrseolvs into dineger withaht naow kepn to teoll us wot to do. naow, lidy: hoonawted we stend: deevawdid we fall. lady cicely. oh, if you prefer your captain, have him by all means. do you like to be treated as he treats you? drinkwater (with a smile of vanity). weoll, lidy: y cawn't deenaw that e's a paffick genlmn. bit hawbitrairy, preps; but hin a genlmn you looks for sich. it tikes a hawbitrairy wanne to knock aht them eathen shikes, aw teoll yer. brassbound. that's enough. go. drinkwater. weoll, aw was hownly a teolln the lidy thet-- (a threatening movement from brassbound cuts him short. he flies for his life into the house, followed by the italian.) brassbound. your ladyship sees. these men serve me by their own free choice. if they are dissatisfied, they go. if i am dissatisfied, they go. they take care that i am not dissatisfied. sir howard (who has listened with approval and growing confidence). captain brassbound: you are the man i want. if your terms are at all reasonable, i will accept your services if we decide to make an excursion. you do not object, cicely, i hope. lady cicely. oh no. after all, those men must really like you, captain brassbound. i feel sure you have a kind heart. you have such nice eyes. sir howard (scandalized). my dear cicely: you really must restrain your expressions of confidence in people's eyes and faces. (to brassbound) now, about terms, captain? brassbound. where do you propose to go? sir howard. i hardly know. where can we go, mr. rankin? rankin. take my advice, sir howrrd. don't go far. brassbound. i can take you to meskala, from which you can see the atlas mountains. from meskala i can take you to an ancient castle in the hills, where you can put up as long as you please. the customary charge is half a dollar a man per day and his food. i charge double. sir howard. i suppose you answer for your men being sturdy fellows, who will stand to their guns if necessary. brassbound. i can answer for their being more afraid of me than of the moors. lady cicely. that doesn't matter in the least, howard. the important thing, captain brassbound, is: first, that we should have as few men as possible, because men give such a lot of trouble travelling. and then, they must have good lungs and not be always catching cold. above all, their clothes must be of good wearing material. otherwise i shall be nursing and stitching and mending all the way; and it will be trouble enough, i assure you, to keep them washed and fed without that. brassbound (haughtily). my men, madam, are not children in the nursery. lady cicely (with unanswerable conviction). captain brassbound: all men are children in the nursery. i see that you don't notice things. that poor italian had only one proper bootlace: the other was a bit of string. and i am sure from mr. drinkwater's complexion that he ought to have some medicine. brassbound (outwardly determined not to be trifled with: inwardly puzzled and rather daunted). madam: if you want an escort, i can provide you with an escort. if you want a sunday school treat, i can not provide it. lady cicely (with sweet melancholy). ah, don't you wish you could, captain? oh, if i could only show you my children from waynflete sunday school! the darlings would love this place, with all the camels and black men. i'm sure you would enjoy having them here, captain brassbound; and it would be such an education for your men! (brassbound stares at her with drying lips.) sir howard. cicely: when you have quite done talking nonsense to captain brassbound, we can proceed to make some definite arrangement with him. lady cicely. but it's arranged already. we'll start at eight o'clock to-morrow morning, if you please, captain. never mind about the italian: i have a big box of clothes with me for my brother in rome; and there are some bootlaces in it. now go home to bed and don't fuss yourself. all you have to do is to bring your men round; and i'll see to the rest. men are always so nervous about moving. goodnight. (she offers him her hand. surprised, he pulls off his cap for the first time. some scruple prevents him from taking her hand at once. he hesitates; then turns to sir howard and addresses him with warning earnestness.) brassbound. sir howard hallam: i advise you not to attempt this expedition. sir howard. indeed! why? brassbound. you are safe here. i warn you, in those hills there is a justice that is not the justice of your courts in england. if you have wronged a man, you may meet that man there. if you have wronged a woman, you may meet her son there. the justice of those hills is the justice of vengeance. sir howard (faintly amused). you are superstitious, captain. most sailors are, i notice. however, i have complete confidence in your escort. brassbound (almost threateningly). take care. the avenger may be one of the escort. sir howard. i have already met the only member of your escort who might have borne a grudge against me, captain; and he was acquitted. brassbound. you are fated to come, then? sir howard (smiling). it seems so. brassbound. on your head be it! (to lady cicely, accepting her hand at last) goodnight. he goes. it is by this time starry night. act ii midday. a roam in a moorish castle. a divan seat runs round the dilapidated adobe walls, which are partly painted, partly faced with white tiles patterned in green and yellow. the ceiling is made up of little squares, painted in bright colors, with gilded edges, and ornamented with gilt knobs. on the cement floor are mattings, sheepskins, and leathern cushions with geometrical patterns on them. there is a tiny moorish table in the middle; and at it a huge saddle, with saddle cloths of various colors, showing that the room is used by foreigners accustomed to chairs. anyone sitting at the table in this seat would have the chief entrance, a large horseshoe arch, on his left, and another saddle seat between him and the arch; whilst, if susceptible to draughts, he would probably catch cold from a little moorish door in the wall behind him to his right. two or three of brassbound's men, overcome by the midday heat, sprawl supine on the floor, with their reefer coats under their heads, their knees uplifted, and their calves laid comfortably on the divan. those who wear shirts have them open at the throat for greater coolness. some have jerseys. all wear boots and belts, and have guns ready to their hands. one of them, lying with his head against the second saddle seat, wears what was once a fashionable white english yachting suit. he is evidently a pleasantly worthless young english gentleman gone to the bad, but retaining sufficient self-respect to shave carefully and brush his hair, which is wearing thin, and does not seem to have been luxuriant even in its best days. the silence is broken only by the snores of the young gentleman, whose mouth has fallen open, until a few distant shots half waken him. he shuts his mouth convulsively, and opens his eyes sleepily. a door is violently kicked outside; and the voice of drinkwater is heard raising urgent alarm. drinkwater. wot ow! wike ap there, will yr. wike ap. (he rushes in through the horseshoe arch, hot and excited, and runs round, kicking the sleepers) nah then. git ap. git ap, will yr, kiddy redbrook. (he gives the young qentleman a rude shove.) redbook (sitting up). stow that, will you. what's amiss? drinkwater (disgusted). wot's amiss! didn't eah naow fawrin, i spowse. redbrook. no. drinkwater (sneering). naow. thort it sifer nort, didn't yr? redbrook (with crisp intelligence). what! you're running away, are you? (he springs up, crying) look alive, johnnies: there's danger. brandyfaced jack's on the run. (they spring up hastily, grasping their guns.) drinkwater. dineger! yuss: should think there wors dineger. it's howver, thow, as it mowstly his baw the tawm you're awike. (they relapse into lassitude.) waw wasn't you on the look-aht to give us a end? bin hattecked baw the benny seeras (beni siras), we ev, an ed to rawd for it pretty strite, too, aw teoll yr. mawtzow is it: the bullet glawnst all rahnd is bloomin brisket. brarsbahnd e dropt the shike's oss at six unnern fifty yawds. (bustling them about) nah then: git the plice ready for the british herristoracy, lawd ellam and lidy wineflete. redbook. lady faint, eh? drinkwater. fynt! not lawkly. wornted to gow an talk, to the benny seeras: blaow me if she didn't! huz wot we was frahtnd of. tyin up mawtzow's wound, she is, like a bloomin orspittle nass. (sir howard, with a copious pagri on his white hat, enters through the horseshoe arch, followed by a couple of men supporting the wounded marzo, who, weeping and terrorstricken by the prospect of death and of subsequent torments for which he is conscious of having eminently qualified himself, has his coat off and a bandage round his chest. one of his supporters is a blackbearded, thickset, slow, middle-aged man with an air of damaged respectability, named--as it afterwards appears--johnson. lady cicely walks beside marzo. redbrook, a little shamefaced, crosses the room to the opposite wall as far away as possible from the visitors. drinkwater turns and receives them with jocular ceremony.) weolcome to brarsbahnd cawstl, sr ahrd an lidy. this eah is the corfee and commercial room. sir howard goes to the table and sits on the saddle, rather exhausted. lady cicely comes to drinkwater. lady cicely. where is marzo's bed? drinkwater. is bed, lidy? weoll: e ynt petickler, lidy. e ez is chawce of henny flegstown agin thet wall. they deposit marzo on the flags against the wall close to the little door. he groans. johnson phlegmatically leaves him and joins redbrook. lady cicely. but you can't leave him there in that state. drinkwater. ow: e's hall rawt. (strolling up callously to marzo) you're hall rawt, ynt yer, mawtzow? (marzo whimpers.) corse y'aw. lady cicely (to sir howard). did you ever see such a helpless lot of poor creatures? (she makes for the little door.) drinkwater. eah! (he runs to the door and places himself before it.) where mawt yr lidyship be gowin? lady cicely. i'm going through every room in this castle to find a proper place to put that man. and now i'll tell you where you're going. you're going to get some water for marzo, who is very thirsty. and then, when i've chosen a room for him, you're going to make a bed for him there. drinkwater (sarcastically). ow! henny ather little suvvice? mike yrseolf at owm, y' knaow, lidy. lady cicely (considerately). don't go if you'd rather not, mr. drinkwater. perhaps you're too tired. (turning to the archway) i'll ask captain brassbound: he won't mind. drinkwater (terrified, running after her and getting between her and the arch). naow, naow! naow, lidy: doesn't you goes disturbin the kepn. awll see to it. lady cicely (gravely). i was sure you would, mr. drinkwater. you have such a kind face. (she turns back and goes out through the small door.) drinkwater (looking after her). garn! sir howard (to drinkwater). will you ask one of your friends to show me to my room whilst you are getting the water? drinkwater (insolently). yr room! ow: this ynt good enaf fr yr, ynt it? (ferociously) oo a you orderin abaht, ih? sir howard (rising quietly, and taking refuge between redbrook and johnson, whom he addresses). can you find me a more private room than this? johnson (shaking his head). i've no orders. you must wait til the capn comes, sir. drinkwater (following sir howard). yuss; an whawl you're witin, yll tike your horders from me: see? johnson (with slow severity, to drinkwater). look here: do you see three genlmen talkin to one another here, civil and private, eh? drinkwater (chapfallen). no offence, miste jornsn-- johnson (ominously). ay; but there is offence. where's your manners, you guttersnipe? (turning to sir howard) that's the curse o this kind o life, sir: you got to associate with all sorts. my father, sir, was capn johnson o hull--owned his own schooner, sir. we're mostly gentlemen here, sir, as you'll find, except the poor ignorant foreigner and that there scum of the submerged tenth. (contemptuously looking at drinkwater) he ain't nobody's son: he's only a offspring o coster folk or such. drinkwater (bursting into tears). clawss feelin! thet's wot it is: clawss feelin! wot are yer, arter all, bat a bloomin gang o west cowst cazhls (casual ward paupers)? (johnson is scandalized; and there is a general thrill of indignation.) better ev naow fembly, an rawse aht of it, lawk me, than ev a specble one and disgrice it, lawk you. johnson. brandyfaced jack: i name you for conduct and language unbecoming to a gentleman. those who agree will signify the same in the usual manner. all (vehemently). aye. drinkwater (wildly). naow. johnson. felix drinkwater: are you goin out, or are you goin to wait til you're chucked out? you can cry in the passage. if you give any trouble, you'll have something to cry for. they make a threatenng movement towards drinkwater. drinkwater (whimpering). you lee me alown: awm gowin. there's n'maw true demmecrettick feelin eah than there is in the owl bloomin m division of noontn corzwy coppers (newington causeway policemen). as he slinks away in tears towards the arch, brassbound enters. drinkwater promptly shelters himself on the captain's left hand, the others retreating to the opposite side as brassbound advances to the middle of the room. sir howard retires behind them and seats himself on the divan, much fatigued. brassbound (to drinkwater). what are you snivelling at? drinkwater. you awsk the wust cowst herristorcracy. they fawnds maw cornduck hanbecammin to a genlmn. brassbound is about to ask johnson for an explanation, when lady cicely returns through the little door, and comes between brassbound and drinkwater. lady cicely (to drinkwater). have you fetched the water? drinkwater. yuss: nah you begin orn me. (he weeps afresh.) lady cicely (surprised). oh! this won't do, mr. drinkwater. if you cry, i can't let you nurse your friend. drinkwater (frantic). thet'll brike maw awt, wown't it nah? (with a lamentable sob, he throws himself down on the divan, raging like an angry child.) lady cicely (after contemplating him in astonishment for a moment). captain brassbound: are there any charwomen in the atlas mountains? brassbound. there are people here who will work if you pay them, as there are elsewhere. lady cicely. this castle is very romantic, captain; but it hasn't had a spring cleaning since the prophet lived in it. there's only one room i can put that wounded man into. it's the only one that has a bed in it: the second room on the right out of that passage. brassbound (haughtily). that is my room, madam. lady cicely (relieved). oh, that's all right. it would have been so awkward if i had had to ask one of your men to turn out. you won't mind, i know. (all the men stare at her. even drinkwater forgets his sorrows in his stupefaction.) brassbound. pray, madam, have you made any arrangements for my accommodation? lady cicely (reassuringly). yes: you can have my room instead wherever it may be: i'm sure you chose me a nice one. i must be near my patient; and i don't mind roughing it. now i must have marzo moved very carefully. where is that truly gentlemanly mr. johnson?--oh, there you are, mr. johnson. (she runs to johnson, past brassbound, who has to step back hastily out of her way with every expression frozen out of his face except one of extreme and indignant dumbfoundedness). will you ask your strong friend to help you with marzo: strong people are always so gentle. johnson. let me introdooce mr. redbrook. your ladyship may know his father, the very rev. dean redbrook. (he goes to marzo.) redbrook. happy to oblige you, lady cicely. lady cicely (shaking hands). howdyedo? of course i knew your father--dunham, wasn't it? were you ever called-- redbrook. the kid? yes. lady cicely. but why-- redbrook (anticipating the rest of the question). cards and drink, lady sis. (he follows johnson to the patient. lady cicely goes too.) now, count marzo. (marzo groans as johnson and redbrook raise him.) lady cicely. now they're not hurting you, marzo. they couldn't be more gentle. marzo. drink. lady cicely. i'll get you some water myself. your friend mr. drinkwater was too overcome--take care of the corner--that's it--the second door on the right. (she goes out with marzo and his bearers through the little door.) brassbound (still staring). well, i am damned--! drinkwater (getting up). weoll, blimey! brassbound (turning irritably on him). what did you say? drinkwater. weoll, wot did yer sy yrseolf, kepn? fust tawm aw yever see y' afride of ennybody. (the others laugh.) brassbound. afraid! drinkwater (maliciously). she's took y' bed from hander yr for a bloomin penny hawcemen. if y' ynt afride, let's eah yer speak ap to er wen she cams bawck agin. brassbound (to sir howard). i wish you to understand, sir howard, that in this castle, it is i who give orders, and no one else. will you be good enough to let lady cicely waynflete know that. sir howard (sitting up on the divan and pulling himself together). you will have ample opportunity for speaking to lady cicely yourself when she returns. (drinkwater chuckles: and the rest grin.) brassbound. my manners are rough, sir howard. i have no wish to frighten the lady. sir howard. captain brassbound: if you can frighten lady cicely, you will confer a great obligation on her family. if she had any sense of danger, perhaps she would keep out of it. brassbound. well, sir, if she were ten lady cicelys, she must consult me while she is here. drinkwater. thet's rawt, kepn. let's eah you steblish yr hawthority. (brassbound turns impatiently on him: he retreats remonstrating) nah, nah, nah! sir howard. if you feel at all nervous, captain brassbound, i will mention the matter with pleasure. brassbound. nervous, sir! no. nervousness is not in my line. you will find me perfectly capable of saying what i want to say--with considerable emphasis, if necessary. (sir howard assents with a polite but incredulous nod.) drinkwater. eah, eah! lady cicely returns with johnson and redbrook. she carries a jar. lady cicely (stopping between the door and the arch). now for the water. where is it? redbrook. there's a well in the courtyard. i'll come and work the bucket. lady cicely. so good of you, mr. redbrook. (she makes for the horseshoe arch, followed by redbrook.) drinkwater. nah, kepn brassbound: you got sathink to sy to the lidy, ynt yr? lady cicely (stopping). i'll come back to hear it presently, captain. and oh, while i remember it (coming forward between brassbound and drinkwater), do please tell me captain, if i interfere with your arrangements in any way. it i disturb you the least bit in the world, stop me at once. you have all the responsibility; and your comfort and your authority must be the first thing. you'll tell me, won't you? brassbound (awkwardly, quite beaten). pray do as you please, madam. lady cicely. thank you. that's so like you, captain. thank you. now, mr. redbrook! show me the way to the well. (she follows redbrook out through the arch.) drinkwater. yah! yah! shime! beat baw a woman! johnson (coming forward on brassbound's right). what's wrong now? drinkwater (with an air of disappointment and disillusion). down't awsk me, miste jornsn. the kepn's naow clawss arter all. brassbound (a little shamefacedly). what has she been fixing up in there, johnson? johnson. well: marzo's in your bed. lady wants to make a kitchen of the sheikh's audience chamber, and to put me and the kid handy in his bedroom in case marzo gets erysipelas and breaks out violent. from what i can make out, she means to make herself matron of this institution. i spose it's all right, isn't it? drinkwater. yuss, an horder huz abaht as if we was keb tahts! an the kepn afride to talk bawck at er! lady cicely returns with redbrook. she carries the jar full of water. lady cicely (putting down the jar, and coming between brassbound and drinkwater as before). and now, captain, before i go to poor marzo, what have you to say to me? brassbound. i! nothing. drinkwater. down't fank it, gavner. be a men! lady cicely (looking at drinkwater, puzzled). mr. drinkwater said you had. brassbound (recovering himself). it was only this. that fellow there (pointing to drinkwater) is subject to fits of insolence. if he is impertinent to your ladyship, or disobedient, you have my authority to order him as many kicks as you think good for him; and i will see that he gets them. drinkwater (lifting up his voice in protest). nah, nah-- lady cicely. oh, i couldn't think of such a thing, captain brassbound. i am sure it would hurt mr. drinkwater. drinkwater (lachrymosely). lidy's hinkyp'ble o sich bawbrous usage. lady cicely. but there's one thing i should like, if mr. drinkwater won't mind my mentioning it. it's so important if he's to attend on marzo. brassbound. what is that? lady cicely. well--you won't mind, mr. drinkwater, will you? drinkwater (suspiciously). wot is it? lady cicely. there would be so much less danger of erysipelas if you would be so good as to take a bath. drinkwater (aghast). a bawth! brassbound (in tones of command). stand by, all hands. (they stand by.) take that man and wash him. (with a roar of laughter they seize him.) drinkwater (in an agony of protest). naow, naow. look eah-- brassbound (ruthlessly). in cold water. drinkwater (shrieking). na-a-a-a-ow. aw eawn't, aw toel yer. naow. aw sy, look eah. naow, naow, naow, naow, naow, naow!!! he is dragged away through the arch in a whirlwind of laughter, protests and tears. lady cicely. i'm afraid he isn't used to it, poor fellow; but really it will do him good, captain brassbound. now i must be off to my patient. (she takes up her jar and goes out by the little door, leaving brassbound and sir howard alone together.) sir howard (rising). and now, captain brass-- brassbound (cutting him short with a fierce contempt that astonishes him). i will attend to you presently. (calling) johnson. send me johnson there. and osman. (he pulls off his coat and throws it on the table, standing at his ease in his blue jersey.) sir howard (after a momentary flush of anger, with a controlled force that compels brassbound's attention in spite of himself). you seem to be in a strong position with reference to these men of yours. brassbound. i am in a strong position with reference to everyone in this castle. sir howard (politely but threateningly). i have just been noticing that you think so. i do not agree with you. her majesty's government, captain brassbound, has a strong arm and a long arm. if anything disagreeable happens to me or to my sister-in-law, that arm will be stretched out. if that happens you will not be in a strong position. excuse my reminding you of it. brassbound (grimly). much good may it do you! (johnson comes in through the arch.) where is osman, the sheikh's messenger? i want him too. johnson. coming, captain. he had a prayer to finish. osman, a tall, skinny, whiteclad, elderly moor, appears in the archway. brassbound. osman ali (osman comes forward between brassbound and johnson): you have seen this unbeliever (indicating sir howard) come in with us? osman. yea, and the shameless one with the naked face, who flattered my countenance and offered me her hand. johnson. yes; and you took it too, johnny, didn't you? brassbound. take horse, then; and ride fast to your master the sheikh sidi el assif. osman (proudly). kinsman to the prophet. brassbound. tell him what you have seen here. that is all. johnson: give him a dollar; and note the hour of his going, that his master may know how fast he rides. osman. the believer's word shall prevail with allah and his servant sidi el assif. brassbound. off with you. osman. make good thy master's word ere i go out from his presence, o johnson el hull. johnson. he wants the dollar. brassbound gives osman a coin. osman (bowing). allah will make hell easy for the friend of sidi el assif and his servant. (he goes out through the arch.) brassbound (to johnson). keep the men out of this until the sheikh comes. i have business to talk over. when he does come, we must keep together all: sidi el assif's natural instinct will be to cut every christian throat here. johnson. we look to you, captain, to square him, since you invited him over. brassbound. you can depend on me; and you know it, i think. johnson (phlegmatically). yes: we know it. (he is going out when sir howard speaks.) sir howard. you know also, mr. johnson, i hope, that you can depend on me. johnson (turning). on you, sir? sir howard. yes: on me. if my throat is cut, the sultan of morocco may send sidi's head with a hundred thousand dollars blood-money to the colonial office; but it will not be enough to save his kingdom--any more than it would saw your life, if your captain here did the same thing. johnson (struck). is that so, captain? brassbound. i know the gentleman's value--better perhaps than he knows it himself. i shall not lose sight of it. johnson nods gravely, and is going out when lady cicely returns softly by the little door and calls to him in a whisper. she has taken off her travelling things and put on an apron. at her chatelaine is a case of sewing materials. lady cicely. mr. johnson. (he turns.) i've got marzo to sleep. would you mind asking the gentlemen not to make a noise under his window in the courtyard. johnson. right, maam. (he goes out.) lady cicely sits down at the tiny table, and begins stitching at a sling bandage for marzo's arm. brassbound walks up and down on her right, muttering to himself so ominously that sir howard quietly gets out of his way by crossing to the other side and sitting down on the second saddle seat. sir howard. are you yet able to attend to me for a moment, captain brassbound? brassbound (still walking about). what do you want? sir howard. well, i am afraid i want a little privacy, and, if you will allow me to say so, a little civility. i am greatly obliged to you for bringing us safely off to-day when we were attacked. so far, you have carried out your contract. but since we have been your guests here, your tone and that of the worst of your men has changed--intentionally changed, i think. brassbound (stopping abruptly and flinging the announcement at him). you are not my guest: you are my prisoner. sir howard. prisoner! lady cicely, after a single glance up, continues stitching, apparently quite unconcerned. brassbound. i warned you. you should have taken my warning. sir howard (immediately taking the tone of cold disgust for moral delinquency). am i to understand, then, that you are a brigand? is this a matter of ransom? brassbound (with unaccountable intensity). all the wealth of england shall not ransom you. sir howard. then what do you expect to gain by this? brassbound. justice on a thief and a murderer. lady cicely lays down her work and looks up anxiously. sir howard (deeply outraged, rising with venerable dignity). sir: do you apply those terms to me? brassbound. i do. (he turns to lady cicely, and adds, pointing contemptuously to sir howard) look at him. you would not take this virtuously indignant gentleman for the uncle of a brigand, would you? sir howard starts. the shock is too much for him: he sits down again, looking very old; and his hands tremble; but his eyes and mouth are intrepid, resolute, and angry. lady cicely. uncle! what do you mean? brassbound. has he never told you about my mother? this fellow who puts on ermine and scarlet and calls himself justice. sir howard (almost voiceless). you are the son of that woman! brassbound (fiercely). "that woman!" (he makes a movement as if to rush at sir howard.) lady cicely (rising quickly and putting her hand on his arm). take care. you mustn't strike an old man. brassbound (raging). he did not spare my mother--"that woman," he calls her--because of her sex. i will not spare him because of his age. (lowering his tone to one of sullen vindictiveness) but i am not going to strike him. (lady cicely releases him, and sits down, much perplexed. brassbound continues, with an evil glance at sir howard) i shall do no more than justice. sir howard (recovering his voice and vigor). justice! i think you mean vengeance, disguised as justice by your passions. brassbound. to many and many a poor wretch in the dock you have brought vengeance in that disguise--the vengeance of society, disguised as justice by its passions. now the justice you have outraged meets you disguised as vengeance. how do you like it? sir howard. i shall meet it, i trust, as becomes an innocent man and an upright judge. what do you charge against me? brassbound. i charge you with the death of my mother and the theft of my inheritance. sir howard. as to your inheritance, sir, it was yours whenever you came forward to claim it. three minutes ago i did not know of your existence. i affirm that most solemnly. i never knew--never dreamt--that my brother miles left a son. as to your mother, her case was a hard one--perhaps the hardest that has come within even my experience. i mentioned it, as such, to mr. rankin, the missionary, the evening we met you. as to her death, you know--you must know--that she died in her native country, years after our last meeting. perhaps you were too young to know that she could hardly have expected to live long. brassbound. you mean that she drank. sir howard. i did not say so. i do not think she was always accountable for what she did. brassbound. yes: she was mad too; and whether drink drove her to madness or madness drove her to drink matters little. the question is, who drove her to both? sir howard. i presume the dishonest agent who seized her estate did. i repeat, it was a hard case--a frightful injustice. but it could not be remedied. brassbound. you told her so. when she would not take that false answer you drove her from your doors. when she exposed you in the street and threatened to take with her own hands the redress the law denied her, you had her imprisoned, and forced her to write you an apology and leave the country to regain her liberty and save herself from a lunatic asylum. and when she was gone, and dead, and forgotten, you found for yourself the remedy you could not find for her. you recovered the estate easily enough then, robber and rascal that you are. did he tell the missionary that, lady cicely, eh? lady cicely (sympathetically). poor woman! (to sir howard) couldn't you have helped her, howard? sir howard. no. this man may be ignorant enough to suppose that when i was a struggling barrister i could do everything i did when i was attorney general. you know better. there is some excuse for his mother. she was an uneducated brazilian, knowing nothing of english society, and driven mad by injustice. brassbound. your defence-- sir howard (interrupting him determinedly). i do not defend myself. i call on you to obey the law. brassbound. i intend to do so. the law of the atlas mountains is administered by the sheikh sidi el assif. he will be here within an hour. he is a judge like yourself. you can talk law to him. he will give you both the law and the prophets. sir howard. does he know what the power of england is? brassbound. he knows that the mahdi killed my master gordon, and that the mahdi died in his bed and went to paradise. sir howard. then he knows also that england's vengeance was on the mahdi's track. brassbound. ay, on the track of the railway from the cape to cairo. who are you, that a nation should go to war for you? if you are missing, what will your newspapers say? a foolhardy tourist. what will your learned friends at the bar say? that it was time for you to make room for younger and better men. you a national hero! you had better find a goldfield in the atlas mountains. then all the governments of europe will rush to your rescue. until then, take care of yourself; for you are going to see at last the hypocrisy in the sanctimonious speech of the judge who is sentencing you, instead of the despair in the white face of the wretch you are recommending to the mercy of your god. sir howard (deeply and personally offended by this slight to his profession, and for the first time throwing away his assumed dignity and rising to approach brassbound with his fists clenched; so that lady cicely lifts one eye from her work to assure herself that the table is between them). i have no more to say to you, sir. i am not afraid of you, nor of any bandit with whom you may be in league. as to your property, it is ready for you as soon as you come to your senses and claim it as your father's heir. commit a crime, and you will become an outlaw, and not only lose the property, but shut the doors of civilization against yourself for ever. brassbound. i will not sell my mother's revenge for ten properties. lady cicely (placidly). besides, really, howard, as the property now costs pounds a year to keep up instead of bringing in anything, i am afraid it would not be of much use to him. (brassbound stands amazed at this revelation.) sir howard (taken aback). i must say, cicely, i think you might have chosen a more suitable moment to mention that fact. brassbound (with disgust). agh! trickster! lawyer! even the price you offer for your life is to be paid in false coin. (calling) hallo there! johnson! redbrook! some of you there! (to sir howard) you ask for a little privacy: you shall have it. i will not endure the company of such a fellow-- sir howard (very angry, and full of the crustiest pluck). you insult me, sir. you are a rascal. you are a rascal. johnson, redbrook, and a few others come in through the arch. brassbound. take this man away. johnson. where are we to put him? brassbound. put him where you please so long as you can find him when he is wanted. sir howard. you will be laid by the heels yet, my friend. redbrook (with cheerful tact). tut tut, sir howard: what's the use of talking back? come along: we'll make you comfortable. sir howard goes out through the arch between johnson and redbrook, muttering wrathfully. the rest, except brassbound and lady cicely, follow. brassbound walks up and down the room, nursing his indignation. in doing so he unconsciously enters upon an unequal contest with lady cicely, who sits quietly stitching. it soon becomes clear that a tranquil woman can go on sewing longer than an angry man can go on fuming. further, it begins to dawn on brassbound's wrath-blurred perception that lady cicely has at some unnoticed stage in the proceedings finished marzo's bandage, and is now stitching a coat. he stops; glances at his shirtsleeves; finally realizes the situation. brassbound. what are you doing there, madam? lady cicely. mending your coat, captain brassbound. brassbound. i have no recollection of asking you to take that trouble. lady cicely. no: i don't suppose you even knew it was torn. some men are born untidy. you cannot very well receive sidi el--what's his name?--with your sleeve half out. brassbound (disconcerted). i--i don't know how it got torn. lady cicely. you should not get virtuously indignant with people. it bursts clothes more than anything else, mr. hallam. brassbound (flushing, quickly). i beg you will not call me mr. hallam. i hate the name. lady cicely. black paquito is your pet name, isn't it? brassbound (huffily). i am not usually called so to my face. lady cicely (turning the coat a little). i'm so sorry. (she takes another piece of thread and puts it into her needle, looking placidly and reflectively upward meanwhile.) do you know, you are wonderfully like your uncle. brassbound. damnation! lady cicely. eh? brassbound. if i thought my veins contained a drop of his black blood, i would drain them empty with my knife. i have no relations. i had a mother: that was all. lady cicely (unconvinced) i daresay you have your mother's complexion. but didn't you notice sir howard's temper, his doggedness, his high spirit: above all, his belief in ruling people by force, as you rule your men; and in revenge and punishment, just as you want to revenge your mother? didn't you recognize yourself in that? brassbound (startled). myself!--in that! lady cecily (returning to the tailoring question as if her last remark were of no consequence whatever). did this sleeve catch you at all under the arm? perhaps i had better make it a little easier for you. brassbound (irritably). let my coat alone. it will do very well as it is. put it down. lady cicily. oh, don't ask me to sit doing nothing. it bores me so. brassbound. in heaven's name then, do what you like! only don't worry me with it. lady cicely. i'm so sorry. all the hallams are irritable. brassbound (penning up his fury with difficulty). as i have already said, that remark has no application to me. lady cicely (resuming her stitching). that's so funny! they all hate to be told that they are like one another. brassbound (with the beginnings of despair in his voice). why did you come here? my trap was laid for him, not for you. do you know the danger you are in? lady cicely. there's always a danger of something or other. do you think it's worth bothering about? brassbound (scolding her). do i think! do you think my coat's worth mending? lady cicely (prosaically). oh yes: it's not so far gone as that. brassbound. have you any feeling? or are you a fool? lady cicely. i'm afraid i'm a dreadful fool. but i can't help it. i was made so, i suppose. brassbound. perhaps you don't realize that your friend my good uncle will be pretty fortunate if he is allowed to live out his life as a slave with a set of chains on him? lady cicely. oh, i don't know about that, mr. h--i mean captain brassbound. men are always thinking that they are going to do something grandly wicked to their enemies; but when it comes to the point, really bad men are just as rare as really good ones. brassbound. you forget that i am like my uncle, according to you. have you any doubt as to the reality of his badness? lady cicely. bless me! your uncle howard is one of the most harmless of men--much nicer than most professional people. of course he does dreadful things as a judge; but then if you take a man and pay him , pounds a year to be wicked, and praise him for it, and have policemen and courts and laws and juries to drive him into it so that he can't help doing it, what can you expect? sir howard's all right when he's left to himself. we caught a burglar one night at waynflete when he was staying with us; and i insisted on his locking the poor man up until the police came, in a room with a window opening on the lawn. the man came back next day and said he must return to a life of crime unless i gave him a job in the garden; and i did. it was much more sensible than giving him ten years penal servitude: howard admitted it. so you see he's not a bit bad really. brassbound. he had a fellow feeling for a thief, knowing he was a thief himself. do you forget that he sent my mother to prison? lady cicely (softly). were you very fond of your poor mother, and always very good to her? brassbound (rather taken aback). i was not worse than other sons, i suppose. lady cicely (opening her eyes very widely). oh! was that all? brassbound (exculpating himself, full of gloomy remembrances). you don't understand. it was not always possible to be very tender with my mother. she had unfortunately a very violent temper; and she--she-- lady cicely. yes: so you told howard. (with genuine pity for him) you must have had a very unhappy childhood. brassbound (grimily). hell. that was what my childhood was. hell. lady cicely. do you think she would really have killed howard, as she threatened, if he hadn't sent her to prison? brassbound (breaking out again, with a growing sense of being morally trapped). what if she did? why did he rob her? why did he not help her to get the estate, as he got it for himself afterwards? lady cicely. he says he couldn't, you know. but perhaps the real reason was that he didn't like her. you know, don't you, that if you don't like people you think of all the reasons for not helping them, and if you like them you think of all the opposite reasons. brassbound. but his duty as a brother! lady cicely. are you going to do your duty as a nephew? brassbound. don't quibble with me. i am going to do my duty as a son; and you know it. lady cicely. but i should have thought that the time for that was in your mother's lifetime, when you could have been kind and forbearing with her. hurting your uncle won't do her any good, you know. brassbound. it will teach other scoundrels to respect widows and orphans. do you forget that there is such a thing as justice? lady cicely (gaily shaking out the finished coat). oh, if you are going to dress yourself in ermine and call yourself justice, i give you up. you are just your uncle over again; only he gets £ , a year for it, and you do it for nothing. (she holds the coat up to see whether any further repairs are needed.) brassbound (sulkily). you twist my words very cleverly. but no man or woman has ever changed me. lady cicely. dear me! that must be very nice for the people you deal with, because they can always depend on you; but isn't it rather inconvenient for yourself when you change your mind? brassbound. i never change my mind. lady cicely (rising with the coat in her hands). oh! oh!! nothing will ever persuade me that you are as pigheaded as that. brassbound (offended). pigheaded! lady cicely (with quick, caressing apology). no, no, no. i didn't mean that. firm! unalterable! resolute! ironwilled! stonewall jackson! that's the idea, isn't it? brassbound (hopelessly). you are laughing at me. lady cicely. no: trembling, i assure you. now will you try this on for me: i'm so afraid i have made it too tight under the arm. (she holds it behind him.) brassbound (obeying mechanically). you take me for a fool i think. (he misses the sleeve.) lady cicely. no: all men look foolish when they are feeling for their sleeves. brassbound. agh! (he turns and snatches the coat from her; then puts it on himself and buttons the lowest button.) lady cicely (horrified). stop. no. you must never pull a coat at the skirts, captain brassbound: it spoils the sit of it. allow me. (she pulls the lappels of his coat vigorously forward) put back your shoulders. (he frowns, but obeys.) that's better. (she buttons the top button.) now button the rest from the top down. does it catch you at all under the arm? brassbound (miserably--all resistance beaten out of him). no. lady cicely. that's right. now before i go back to poor marzo, say thank you to me for mending your jacket, like a nice polite sailor. brassbound (sitting down at the table in great agitation). damn you! you have belittled my whole life to me. (he bows his head on his hands, convulsed.) lady cicely (quite understanding, and putting her hand kindly on his shoulder). oh no. i am sure you have done lots of kind things and brave things, if you could only recollect them. with gordon for instance? nobody can belittle that. he looks up at her for a moment; then kisses her hand. she presses his and turns away with her eyes so wet that she sees drinkwater, coming in through the arch just then, with a prismatic halo round him. even when she sees him clearly, she hardly recognizes him; for he is ludicrously clean and smoothly brushed; and his hair, formerly mud color, is now a lively red. drinkwater. look eah, kepn. (brassbound springs up and recovers himself quickly.) eahs the bloomin shike jest appeahd on the orawzn wiv abaht fifty men. thy'll be eah insawd o ten minnits, they will. lady cicely. the sheikh! brassbound. sidi el assif and fifty men! (to lady cicely) you were too late: i gave you up my vengeance when it was no longer in my hand. (to drinkwater) call all hands to stand by and shut the gates. then all here to me for orders; and bring the prisoner. drinkwater. rawt, kepn. (he runs out.) lady cicely. is there really any danger for howard? brassbound. yes. danger for all of us unless i keep to my bargain with this fanatic. lady cicely. what bargain? brassbound. i pay him so much a head for every party i escort through to the interior. in return he protects me and lets my caravans alone. but i have sworn an oath to him to take only jews and true believers--no christians, you understand. lady cicely. then why did you take us? brassbound. i took my uncle on purpose--and sent word to sidi that he was here. lady cicely. well, that's a pretty kettle of fish, isn't it? brassbound. i will do what i can to save him--and you. but i fear my repentance has come too late, as repentance usually does. lady cicely (cheerfully). well, i must go and look after marzo, at all events. (she goes out through the little door. johnson, redbrook and the rest come in through the arch, with sir howard, still very crusty and determined. he keeps close to johnson, who comes to brassbound's right, redbrook taking the other side.) brassbound. where's drinkwater? johnson. on the lookout. look here, capn: we don't half like this job. the gentleman has been talking to us a bit; and we think that he is a gentleman, and talks straight sense. redbrook. righto, brother johnson. (to brassbound) won't do, governor. not good enough. brassbound (fiercely). mutiny, eh? redbrook. not at all, governor. don't talk tommy rot with brother sidi only five minutes gallop off. can't hand over an englishman to a nigger to have his throat cut. brassbound (unexpectedly acquiescing). very good. you know, i suppose, that if you break my bargain with sidi, you'll have to defend this place and fight for your lives in five minutes. that can't be done without discipline: you know that too. i'll take my part with the rest under whatever leader you are willing to obey. so choose your captain and look sharp about it. (murmurs of surprise and discontent.) voices. no, no. brassbound must command. brassbound. you're wasting your five minutes. try johnson. johnson. no. i haven't the head for it. brassbound. well, redbrook. redbrook. not this johnny, thank you. haven't character enough. brassbound. well, there's sir howard hallam for you! he has character enough. a voice. he's too old. all. no, no. brassbound, brassbound. johnson. there's nobody but you, captain. redrrook. the mutiny's over, governor. you win, hands down. brassbound (turning on them). now listen, you, all of you. if i am to command here, i am going to do what i like, not what you like. i'll give this gentleman here to sidi or to the devil if i choose. i'll not be intimidated or talked back to. is that understood? redbrook (diplomatically). he's offered a present of five hundred quid if he gets safe back to mogador, governor. excuse my mentioning it. sir howard. myself and lady cicely. brassbound. what! a judge compound a felony! you greenhorns, he is more likely to send you all to penal servitude if you are fools enough to give him the chance. voices. so he would. whew! (murmurs of conviction.) redbrook. righto, governor. that's the ace of trumps. brassbound (to sir howard). now, have you any other card to play? any other bribe? any other threat? quick. time presses. sir howard. my life is in the hands of providence. do your worst. brassbound. or my best. i still have that choice. drinkwater (running in). look eah, kepn. eah's anather lot cammin from the sahth heast. hunnerds of em, this tawm. the owl dezzit is lawk a bloomin awd pawk demonstrition. aw blieve it's the kidy from kintorfy. (general alarm. all look to brassbound.) brassbound (eagerly). the cadi! how far off? drinkwater. matter o two mawl. brassbound. we're saved. open the gates to the sheikh. drinkwater (appalled, almost in tears). naow, naow. lissn, kepn (pointing to sir howard): e'll give huz fawv unnerd red uns. (to the others) ynt yer spowk to im, miste jornsn--miste redbrook-- brassbound (cutting him short). now then, do you understand plain english? johnson and redbrook: take what men you want and open the gates to the sheikh. let him come straight to me. look alive, will you. johnson. ay ay, sir. redbrook. righto, governor. they hurry out, with a few others. drinkwater stares after them, dumbfounded by their obedience. brassbound (taking out a pistol). you wanted to sell me to my prisoner, did you, you dog. drinkwater (falling on his knees with a yell). naow! (brassbound turns on him as if to kick him. he scrambles away and takes refuge behind sir howard.) brassbound. sir howard hallam: you have one chance left. the cadi of kintafi stands superior to the sheikh as the responsible governor of the whole province. it is the cadi who will be sacrificed by the sultan if england demands satisfaction for any injury to you. if we can hold the sheikh in parley until the cadi arrives, you may frighten the cadi into forcing the sheikh to release you. the cadi's coming is a lucky chance for you. sir howard. if it were a real chance, you would not tell me of it. don't try to play cat and mouse with me, man. drinkwater (aside to sir howard, as brassbound turns contemptuously away to the other side of the room). it ynt mach of a chawnst, sr ahrd. but if there was a ganbowt in mogador awbr, awd put a bit on it, aw would. johnson, redbrook, and the others return, rather mistrustfully ushering in sidi el assif, attended by osman and a troop of arabs. brassbound's men keep together on the archway side, backing their captain. sidi's followers cross the room behind the table and assemble near sir howard, who stands his ground. drinkwater runs across to brassbound and stands at his elbow as he turns to face sidi. sidi el aasif, clad in spotless white, is a nobly handsome arab, hardly thirty, with fine eyes, bronzed complexion, and instinctively dignified carriage. he places himself between the two groups, with osman in attendance at his right hand. osman (pointing out sir howard). this is the infidel cadi. (sir howard bows to sidi, but, being an infidel, receives only the haughtiest stare in acknowledgement.) this (pointing to brassbound) is brassbound the franguestani captain, the servant of sidi. drinkwater (not to be outdone, points out the sheikh and osman to brassbound). this eah is the commawnder of the fythful an is vizzeer rosman. sidi. where is the woman? osman. the shameless one is not here. brassbound. sidi el assif, kinsman of the prophet: you are welcome. redbrook (with much aplomb). there is no majesty and no might save in allah, the glorious, the great! drinkwater. eah, eah! osman (to sidi). the servant of the captain makes his profession of faith as a true believer. sidi. it is well. brassbound (aside to redbrook). where did you pick that up? redrrook (aside to brassbound). captain burton's arabian nights--copy in the library of the national liberal club. lady cicely (calling without). mr. drinkwater. come and help me with marzo. (the sheikh pricks up his ears. his nostrils and eyes expand.) osman. the shameless one! brassbound (to drinkwater, seizing him by the collar and slinging him towards the door). off with you. drinkwater goes out through the little door. osman. shall we hide her face before she enters? sidi. no. lady cicely, who has resumed her travelling equipment, and has her hat slung across her arm, comes through the little door supporting marzo, who is very white, but able to get about. drinkwater has his other arm. redbrook hastens to relieve lady cicely of marzo, taking him into the group behind brassbound. lady cicely comes forward between brassbound and the sheikh, to whom she turns affably. lady cicely (proffering her hand). sidi el assif, isn't it? how dye do? (he recoils, blushing somewhat.) osman (scandalized). woman; touch not the kinsman of the prophet. lady cicely. oh, i see. i'm being presented at court. very good. (she makes a presentation curtsey.) redbrook. sidi el assif: this is one of the mighty women sheikhs of franguestan. she goes unveiled among kings; and only princes may touch her hand. lady cicely. allah upon thee, sidi el assif! be a good little sheikh, and shake hands. sidi (timidly touching her hand). now this is a wonderful thing, and worthy to be chronicled with the story of solomon and the queen of sheba. is it not so, osman ali? osman. allah upon thee, master! it is so. sidi. brassbound ali: the oath of a just man fulfils itself without many words. the infidel cadi, thy captive, falls to my share. brassbound (firmly). it cannot be, sidi el assif. (sidi's brows contract gravely.) the price of his blood will be required of our lord the sultan. i will take him to morocco and deliver him up there. sidi (impressively). brassbound: i am in mine own house and amid mine own people. i am the sultan here. consider what you say; for when my word goes forth for life or death, it may not be recalled. brassbound. sidi el assif: i will buy the man from you at what price you choose to name; and if i do not pay faithfully, you shall take my head for his. sidi. it is well. you shall keep the man, and give me the woman in payment. sir howard and brassbound (with the same impulse). no, no. lady cicely (eagerly). yes, yes. certainly, mr. sidi. certainly. sidi smiles gravely. sir howard. impossible. brassbound. you don't know what you're doing. lady cicely. oh, don't i? i've not crossed africa and stayed with six cannibal chiefs for nothing. (to the sheikh) it's all right, mr. sidi: i shall be delighted. sir howard. you are mad. do you suppose this man will treat you as a european gentleman would? lady cicely. no: he'll treat me like one of nature's gentlemen: look at his perfectly splendid face! (addressing osman as if he were her oldest and most attached retainer.) osman: be sure you choose me a good horse; and get a nice strong camel for my luggage. osman, after a moment of stupefaction, hurries out. lady cicely puts on her hat and pins it to her hair, the sheikh gazing at her during the process with timid admiration. drinkwater (chuckling). she'll mawch em all to church next sunder lawk a bloomin lot o' cherrity kids: you see if she doesn't. lady cicely (busily). goodbye, howard: don't be anxious about me; and above all, don't bring a parcel of men with guns to rescue me. i shall be all right now that i am getting away from the escort. captain brassbound: i rely on you to see that sir howard gets safe to mogador. (whispering) take your hand off that pistol. (he takes his hand out of his pocket, reluctantly.) goodbye. a tumult without. they all turn apprehensively to the arch. osman rushes in. osman. the cadi, the cadi. he is in anger. his men are upon us. defend-- the cadi, a vigorous, fatfeatured, choleric, whitehaired and bearded elder, rushes in, cudgel in hand, with an overwhelming retinue, and silences osman with a sounding thwack. in a moment the back of the room is crowded with his followers. the sheikh retreats a little towards his men; and the cadi comes impetuously forward between him and lady cicely. the cadi. now woe upon thee, sidi el assif, thou child of mischief! sidi (sternly). am i a dog, muley othman, that thou speakest thus to me? the cadi. wilt thou destroy thy country, and give us all into the hands of them that set the sea on fire but yesterday with their ships of war? where are the franguestani captives? lady cicely. here we are, cadi. how dye do? the cadi. allah upon thee, thou moon at the full! where is thy kinsman, the cadi of franguestan? i am his friend, his servant. i come on behalf of my master the sultan to do him honor, and to cast down his enemies. sir howard. you are very good, i am sure. sidi (graver than ever). muley othman-- tae cadi (fumbling in his breast). peace, peace, thou inconsiderate one. (he takes out a letter.) brassbound. cadi-- the cadi. oh thou dog, thou, thou accursed brassbound, son of a wanton: it is thou hast led sidi el assif into this wrongdoing. read this writing that thou hast brought upon me from the commander of the warship. brassbound. warship! (he takes the letter and opens it, his men whispering to one another very low-spiritedly meanwhile.) redbrook. warship! whew! johnson. gunboat, praps. drinkwater. lawk bloomin worterleoo buses, they are, on this cowst. brassbound folds up the letter, looking glum. sir howard (sharply). well, sir, are we not to have the benefit of that letter? your men are waiting to hear it, i think. brassbound. it is not a british ship. (sir howard's face falls.) lady cicely. what is it, then? brassbound. an american cruiser. the santiago. the cadi (tearing his beard). woe! alas! it is where they set the sea on fire. sidi. peace, muley othman: allah is still above us. johnson. would you mind readin it to us, capn? brassbound (grimly). oh, i'll read it to you. "mogador harbor. sept. . captain hamlin kearney, of the cruiser santiago, presents the compliments of the united states to the cadi muley othman el kintafi, and announces that he is coming to look for the two british travellers sir howard hallam and lady cicely waynflete, in the cadi's jurisdiction. as the search will be conducted with machine guns, the prompt return of the travellers to mogador harbor will save much trouble to all parties." the cadi. as i live, o cadi, and thou, moon of loveliness, ye shall be led back to mogador with honor. and thou, accursed brassbound, shall go thither a prisoner in chains, thou and thy people. (brassbound and his men make a movement to defend themselves.) seize them. lady cicely. oh, please don't fight. (brassbound, seeing that his men are hopelessly outnumbered, makes no resistance. they are made prisoners by the cadi's followers.) sidi (attempting to draw his scimitar). the woman is mine: i will not forego her. (he is seized and overpowered after a homeric struggle.) sir howard (drily). i told you you were not in a strong position, captain brassbound. (looking implacably at him.) you are laid by the heels, my friend, as i said you would be. lady cicely. but i assure you-- brassbound (interrupting her). what have you to assure him of? you persuaded me to spare him. look at his face. will you be able to persuade him to spare me? act iii torrid forenoon filtered through small moorish windows high up in the adobe walls of the largest room in leslie rankin's house. a clean cool room, with the table (a christian article) set in the middle, a presidentially elbowed chair behind it, and an inkstand and paper ready for the sitter. a couple of cheap american chairs right and left of the table, facing the same way as the presidential chair, give a judicial aspect to the arrangement. rankin is placing a little tray with a jug and some glasses near the inkstand when lady cicely's voice is heard at the door, which is behind him in the corner to his right. lade cicely. good morning. may i come in? rankin. certainly. (she comes in, to the nearest end of the table. she has discarded all travelling equipment, and is dressed exactly as she might be in surrey on a very hot day.) sit ye doon, leddy ceecily. lady cicely (sitting down). how nice you've made the room for the inquiry! rankin (doubtfully). i could wish there were more chairs. yon american captain will preside in this; and that leaves but one for sir howrrd and one for your leddyship. i could almost be tempted to call it a maircy that your friend that owns the yacht has sprained his ankle and cannot come. i misdoubt me it will not look judeecial to have captain kearney's officers squatting on the floor. lady cicely. oh, they won't mind. what about the prisoners? rankin. they are to be broat here from the town gaol presently. lady cicely. and where is that silly old cadi, and my handsome sheikh sidi? i must see them before the inquiry,or they'll give captain kearney quite a false impression of what happened. rankin. but ye cannot see them. they decamped last night, back to their castles in the atlas. lady cicely (delighted). no! rankin. indeed and they did. the poor cadi is so terrified by all he has haird of the destruction of the spanish fleet, that he daren't trust himself in the captain's hands. (looking reproachfully at her) on your journey back here, ye seem to have frightened the poor man yourself, leddy ceecily, by talking to him about the fanatical chreestianity of the americans. ye have largely yourself to thank if he's gone. lady cicely. allah be praised! what a weight off our minds, mr. rankin! rankin (puzzled). and why? do ye not understand how necessary their evidence is? lady cicely. their evidence! it would spoil everything. they would perjure themselves out of pure spite against poor captain brassbound. rankin (amazed). do ye call him poor captain brassbound! does not your leddyship know that this brasshound is--heaven forgive me for judging him!--a precious scoundrel? did ye not hear what sir howrrd told me on the yacht last night? lady cicely. all a mistake, mr. rankin: all a mistake, i assure you. you said just now, heaven forgive you for judging him! well, that's just what the whole quarrel is about. captain brassbound is just like you: he thinks we have no right to judge one another; and its sir howard gets £ , a year for doing nothing else but judging people, he thinks poor captain brassbound a regular anarchist. they quarreled dreadfully at the castle. you mustn't mind what sir howard says about him: you really mustn't. rankin. but his conduct-- lady cicely. perfectly saintly, mr. rankin. worthy of yourself in your best moments. he forgave sir howard, and did all he could to save him. rankin. ye astoanish me, leddy ceecily. lady cicely. and think of the temptation to behave badly when he had us all there helpless! rankin. the temptation! ay: that's true. ye're ower bonny to be cast away among a parcel o lone, lawless men, my leddy. lady cicely (naively). bless me, that's quite true; and i never thought of it! oh, after that you really must do all you can to help captain brassbound. rankin (reservedly). no: i cannot say that, leddy ceecily. i doubt he has imposed on your good nature and sweet disposeetion. i had a crack with the cadi as well as with sir howrrd; and there is little question in my mind but that captain brassbound is no better than a breegand. lady cicely (apparently deeply impressed). i wonder whether he can be, mr. rankin. if you think so, that's heavily against him in my opinion, because you have more knowledge of men than anyone else here. perhaps i'm mistaken. i only thought you might like to help him as the son of your old friend. rankin (startled). the son of my old friend! what d'ye mean? lady cicely. oh! didn't sir howard tell you that? why, captain brassbound turns out to be sir howard's nephew, the son of the brother you knew. rankin (overwhelmed). i saw the likeness the night he came here! it's true: it's true. uncle and nephew! lady cicely. yes: that's why they quarrelled so. rankin (with a momentary sense of ill usage). i think sir howrrd might have told me that. lady cicely. of course he ought to have told you. you see he only tells one side of the story. that comes from his training as a barrister. you mustn't think he's naturally deceitful: if he'd been brought up as a clergyman, he'd have told you the whole truth as a matter of course. rankin (too much perturbed to dwell on his grievance). leddy ceecily: i must go to the prison and see the lad. he may have been a bit wild; but i can't leave poor miles's son unbefriended in a foreign gaol. lady cicely (rising, radiant). oh, how good of you! you have a real kind heart of gold, mr. rankin. now, before you go, shall we just put our heads together, and consider how to give miles's son every chance--i mean of course every chance that he ought to have. rankin (rather addled). i am so confused by this astoanishing news-- lady cicely. yes, yes: of course you are. but don't you think he would make a better impression on the american captain if he were a little more respectably dressed? rankin. mebbe. but how can that be remedied here in mogador? lady cicely. oh, i've thought of that. you know i'm going back to england by way of rome, mr. rankin; and i'm bringing a portmanteau full of clothes for my brother there: he's ambassador, you know, and has to be very particular as to what he wears. i had the portmanteau brought here this morning. now would you mind taking it to the prison, and smartening up captain brassbound a little. tell him he ought to do it to show his respect for me; and he will. it will be quite easy: there are two krooboys waiting to carry the portmanteau. you will: i know you will. (she edges him to the door.) and do you think there is time to get him shaved? rankin (succumbing, half bewildered). i'll do my best. lady cicely. i know you will. (as he is going out) oh! one word, mr. rankin. (he comes back.) the cadi didn't know that captain brassbound was sir howard's nephew, did he? rankin. no. lady cicely. then he must have misunderstood everything quite dreadfully. i'm afraid, mr. rankin--though you know best, of course--that we are bound not to repeat anything at the inquiry that the cadi said. he didn't know, you see. rankin (cannily). i take your point, leddy ceecily. it alters the case. i shall certainly make no allusion to it. lady cicely (magnanimously). well, then, i won't either. there! they shake hands on it. sir howard comes in. sir howard. good morning mr. rankin. i hope you got home safely from the yacht last night. rankin. quite safe, thank ye, sir howrrd. lady cicely. howard, he's in a hurry. don't make him stop to talk. sir howard. very good, very good. (he comes to the table and takes lady cicely's chair.) rankin. oo revoir, leddy ceecily. lady cicely. bless you, mr. rankin. (rankin goes out. she comes to the other end of the table, looking at sir howard with a troubled, sorrowfully sympathetic air, but unconsciously making her right hand stalk about the table on the tips of its fingers in a tentative stealthy way which would put sir howard on his guard if he were in a suspicious frame of mind, which, as it happens, he is not.) i'm so sorry for you, howard, about this unfortunate inquiry. sir howard (swinging round on his chair, astonished). sorry for me! why? lady cicely. it will look so dreadful. your own nephew, you know. sir howard. cicely: an english judge has no nephews, no sons even, when he has to carry out the law. lady cicely. but then he oughtn't to have any property either. people will never understand about the west indian estate. they'll think you're the wicked uncle out of the babes in the wood. (with a fresh gush of compassion) i'm so so sorry for you. sir howard (rather stiffly). i really do not see how i need your commiseration, cicely. the woman was an impossible person, half mad, half drunk. do you understand what such a creature is when she has a grievance, and imagines some innocent person to be the author of it? lady cicely (with a touch of impatience). oh, quite. that'll be made clear enough. i can see it all in the papers already: our half mad, half drunk sister-in-law, making scenes with you in the street, with the police called in, and prison and all the rest of it. the family will be furious. (sir howard quails. she instantly follows up her advantage with) think of papa! sir howard. i shall expect lord waynflete to look at the matter as a reasonable man. lady cicely. do you think he's so greatly changed as that, howard? sir howard (falling back on the fatalism of the depersonalized public man). my dear cicely: there is no use discussing the matter. it cannot be helped, however disagreeable it may be. lady cicely. of course not. that's what's so dreadful. do you think people will understand? sir howard. i really cannot say. whether they do or not, i cannot help it. lady cicely. if you were anybody but a judge, it wouldn't matter so much. but a judge mustn't even be misunderstood. (despairingly) oh, it's dreadful, howard: it's terrible! what would poor mary say if she were alive now? sir howard (with emotion). i don't think, cicely, that my dear wife would misunderstand me. lady cicely. no: she'd know you mean well. and when you came home and said, "mary: i've just told all the world that your sister-in-law was a police court criminal, and that i sent her to prison; and your nephew is a brigand, and i'm sending him to prison." she'd have thought it must be all right because you did it. but you don't think she would have liked it, any more than papa and the rest of us, do you? sir howard (appalled). but what am i to do? do you ask me to compound a felony? lady cicely (sternly). certainly not. i would not allow such a thing, even if you were wicked enough to attempt it. no. what i say is, that you ought not to tell the story yourself sir howard. why? lady cicely. because everybody would say you are such a clever lawyer you could make a poor simple sailor like captain kearney believe anything. the proper thing for you to do, howard, is to let me tell the exact truth. then you can simply say that you are bound to confirm me. nobody can blame you for that. sir howard (looking suspiciously at her). cicely: you are up to some devilment. lady cicely (promptly washing her hands of his interests). oh, very well. tell the story yourself, in your own clever way. i only proposed to tell the exact truth. you call that devilment. so it is, i daresay, from a lawyer's point of view. sir howard. i hope you're not offended. lady cicely (with the utmost goodhumor). my dear howard, not a bit. of course you're right: you know how these things ought to be done. i'll do exactly what you tell me, and confirm everything you say. sir howard (alarmed by the completeness of his victory). oh, my dear, you mustn't act in my interest. you must give your evidence with absolute impartiality. (she nods, as if thoroughly impressed and reproved, and gazes at him with the steadfast candor peculiar to liars who read novels. his eyes turn to the ground; and his brow clouds perplexedly. he rises; rubs his chin nervously with his forefinger; and adds) i think, perhaps, on reflection, that there is something to be said for your proposal to relieve me of the very painful duty of telling what has occurred. ladi cicely (holding off). but you'd do it so very much better. sir howard. for that very reason, perhaps, it had better come from you. lady cicely (reluctantly). well, if you'd rather. sir howard. but mind, cicely, the exact truth. lady cicely (with conviction). the exact truth. (they shake hands on it.) sir howard (holding her hand). fiat justitia: ruat coelum! lady cicely. let justice be done, though the ceiling fall. an american bluejacket appears at the door. bluejacket. captain kearney's cawmpliments to lady waynflete; and may he come in? lady cicely. yes. by all means. where are the prisoners? bluejacket. party gawn to the jail to fetch em, marm. lady cicely. thank you. i should like to be told when they are coming, if i might. bluejacket. you shall so, marm. (he stands aside, saluting, to admit his captain, and goes out.) captain hamlin kearney is a robustly built western american, with the keen, squeezed, wind beaten eyes and obstinately enduring mouth of his profession. a curious ethnological specimen, with all the nations of the old world at war in his veins, he is developing artificially in the direction of sleekness and culture under the restraints of an overwhelming dread of european criticism, and climatically in the direction of the indiginous north american, who is already in possession of his hair, his cheekbones, and the manlier instincts in him, which the sea has rescued from civilization. the world, pondering on the great part of its own future which is in his hands, contemplates him with wonder as to what the devil he will evolve into in another century or two. meanwhile he presents himself to lady cicely as a blunt sailor who has something to say to her concerning her conduct which he wishes to put politely, as becomes an officer addressing a lady, but also with an emphatically implied rebuke, as an american addressing an english person who has taken a liberty. lady cicely (as he enters). so glad you've come, captain kearney. kearney (coming between sir howard and lady cicely). when we parted yesterday ahfternoon, lady waynflete, i was unaware that in the course of your visit to my ship you had entirely altered the sleeping arrangements of my stokers. i thahnk you. as captain of the ship, i am customairily cawnsulted before the orders of english visitors are carried out; but as your alterations appear to cawndooce to the comfort of the men, i have not interfered with them. lady cicely. how clever of you to find out! i believe you know every bolt in that ship. kearney softens perceptibly. sir howard. i am really very sorry that my sister-in-law has taken so serious a liberty, captain kearney. it is a mania of hers--simply a mania. why did your men pay any attention to her? kearney (with gravely dissembled humor). well, i ahsked that question too. i said, why did you obey that lady's orders instead of waiting for mine? they said they didn't see exactly how they could refuse. i ahsked whether they cawnsidered that discipline. they said, well, sir, will you talk to the lady yourself next time? lady cicely. i'm so sorry. but you know, captain, the one thing that one misses on board a man-of-war is a woman. kearney. we often feel that deprivation verry keenly, lady waynflete. lady cicely. my uncle is first lord of the admiralty; and i am always telling him what a scandal it is that an english captain should be forbidden to take his wife on board to look after the ship. kearney. stranger still, lady waynflete, he is not forbidden to take any other lady. yours is an extraordinairy country--to an amerrican. lady cicely. but it's most serious, captain. the poor men go melancholy mad, and ram each other's ships and do all sorts of things. sir howard. cicely: i beg you will not talk nonsense to captain kearney. your ideas on some subjects are really hardly decorous. lady cicely (to kearney). that's what english people are like, captain kearney. they won't hear of anything concerning you poor sailors except nelson and trafalgar. you understand me, don't you? kearney (gallantly). i cawnsider that you have more sense in your wedding ring finger than the british ahdmiralty has in its whole cawnstitootion, lady waynflete. lady cicely. of course i have. sailors always understand things. the bluejacket reappears. bluejacket (to lady cicely). prisoners coming up the hill, marm. kearney (turning sharply on him). who sent you in to say that? bluejacket (calmly). british lady's orders, sir. (he goes out, unruffled, leaving kearney dumbfounded.) sir howard (contemplating kearney's expression with dismay). i am really very sorry, captain kearney. i am quite aware that lady cicely has no right whatever to give orders to your men. lady cicely. i didn't give orders: i just asked him. he has such a nice face! don't you think so, captain kearney? (he gasps, speechless.) and now will you excuse me a moment. i want to speak to somebody before the inquiry begins. (she hurries out.) kearney. there is sertnly a wonderful chahrn about the british aristocracy, sir howard hallam. are they all like that? (he takes the presidential chair.) sir howard (resuming his seat on kearney's right). fortunately not, captain kearney. half a dozen such women would make an end of law in england in six months. the bluejacket comes to the door again. bluejacket. all ready, sir. kearney. verry good. i'm waiting. the bluejacket turns and intimates this to those without. the officers of the santiago enter. sir howard (rising and bobbing to them in a judicial manner). good morning, gentlemen. they acknowledge the greeting rather shyly, bowing or touching their caps, and stand in a group behind kearney. kearney (to sir howard). you will be glahd to hear that i have a verry good account of one of our prisoners from our chahplain, who visited them in the gaol. he has expressed a wish to be cawnverted to episcopalianism. sir howard (drily). yes, i think i know him. kearney. bring in the prisoners. bluejacket (at the door). they are engaged with the british lady, sir. shall i ask her-- kearney (jumping up and exploding in storm piercing tones). bring in the prisoners. tell the lady those are my orders. do you hear? tell her so. (the bluejacket goes out dubiously. the officers look at one another in mute comment on the unaccountable pepperiness of their commander.) sir howard (suavely). mr. rankin will be present, i presume. kearney (angrily). rahnkin! who is rahnkin? sir howard. our host the missionary. kearney (subsiding unwillingly). oh! rahnkin, is he? he'd better look sharp or he'll be late. (again exploding.) what are they doing with those prisoners? rankin hurries in, and takes his place near sir howard. sir howard. this is mr. rankin, captain kearney. rankin. excuse my delay, captain kearney. the leddy sent me on an errand. (kearney grunts.) i thought i should be late. but the first thing i heard when i arrived was your officer giving your compliments to leddy ceecily, and would she kindly allow the prisoners to come in, as you were anxious to see her again. then i knew i was in time. kearney. oh, that was it, was it? may i ask, sir, did you notice any sign on lady waynflete's part of cawmplying with that verry moderate request? lady cicely (outside). coming, coming. the prisoners are brought in by a guard of armed bluejackets. drinkwater first, again elaborately clean, and conveying by a virtuous and steadfast smirk a cheerful confidence in his innocence. johnson solid and inexpressive, redbrook unconcerned and debonair, marzo uneasy. these four form a little group together on the captain's left. the rest wait unintelligently on providence in a row against the wall on the same side, shepherded by the bluejackets. the first bluejacket, a petty officer, posts himself on the captain's right, behind rankin and sir howard. finally brassbound appears with lady cicely on his arm. he is in fashionable frock coat and trousers, spotless collar and cuffs, and elegant boots. he carries a glossy tall hat in his hand. to an unsophisticated eye, the change is monstrous and appalling; and its effect on himself is so unmanning that he is quite out of countenance--a shaven samson. lady cicely, however, is greatly pleased with it; and the rest regard it as an unquestionable improvement. the officers fall back gallantly to allow her to pass. kearney rises to receive her, and stares with some surprise at brassbound as he stops at the table on his left. sir howard rises punctiliously when kearney rises and sits when he sits. kearney. is this another gentleman of your party, lady waynflete? i presume i met you lahst night, sir, on board the yacht. brassbound. no. i am your prisoner. my name is brassbound. drinkwater (officiously). kepn brarsbahnd, of the schooner thenksgiv-- redbrook (hastily). shut up, you fool. (he elbows drinkwater into the background.) kearney (surprised and rather suspicious). well, i hardly understahnd this. however, if you are captain brassbound, you can take your place with the rest. (brassbound joins redbrook and johnson. kearney sits down again, after inviting lady cicely, with a solemn gesture, to take the vacant chair.) now let me see. you are a man of experience in these matters, sir howard hallam. if you had to conduct this business, how would you start? lady cicely. he'd call on the counsel for the prosecution, wouldn't you, howard? sir howard. but there is no counsel for the prosecution, cicely. lady cicely. oh yes there is. i'm counsel for the prosecution. you mustn't let sir howard make a speech, captain kearney: his doctors have positively forbidden anything of that sort. will you begin with me? kearney. by your leave, lady waynfiete, i think i will just begin with myself. sailor fashion will do as well here as lawyer fashion. lady cicely. ever so much better, dear captain kearney. (silence. kearney composes himself to speak. she breaks out again). you look so nice as a judge! a general smile. drinkwater splutters into a half suppressed laugh. redbrook (in a fierce whisper). shut up, you fool, will you? (again he pushes him back with a furtive kick.) sir howard (remonstrating). cicely! kearney (grimly keeping his countenance). your ladyship's cawmpliments will be in order at a later stage. captain brassbound: the position is this. my ship, the united states cruiser santiago, was spoken off mogador latest thursday by the yacht redgauntlet. the owner of the aforesaid yacht, who is not present through having sprained his ankle, gave me sertn information. in cawnsequence of that information the santiago made the twenty knots to mogador harbor inside of fifty-seven minutes. before noon next day a messenger of mine gave the cadi of the district sertn information. in cawnsequence of that information the cadi stimulated himself to some ten knots an hour, and lodged you and your men in mogador jail at my disposal. the cadi then went back to his mountain fahstnesses; so we shall not have the pleasure of his company here to-day. do you follow me so far? brassbound. yes. i know what you did and what the cadi did. the point is, why did you do it? kearney. with doo patience we shall come to that presently. mr. rahnkin: will you kindly take up the parable? rankin. on the very day that sir howrrd and lady cicely started on their excursion i was applied to for medicine by a follower of the sheikh sidi el assif. he told me i should never see sir howrrd again, because his master knew he was a christian and would take him out of the hands of captain brassbound. i hurried on board the yacht and told the owner to scour the coast for a gunboat or cruiser to come into the harbor and put persuasion on the authorities. (sir howard turns and looks at rankin with a sudden doubt of his integrity as a witness.) kearney. but i understood from our chahplain that you reported captain brassbound as in league with the sheikh to deliver sir howard up to him. rankin. that was my first hasty conclusion, captain kearney. but it appears that the compact between them was that captain brassbound should escort travellers under the sheikh's protection at a certain payment per head, provided none of them were christians. as i understand it, he tried to smuggle sir howrrd through under this compact, and the sheikh found him out. drinkwater. rawt, gavner. thet's jest ah it wors. the kepn-- redbrook (again suppressing him). shut up, you fool, i tell you. sir howard (to rankin). may i ask have you had any conversation with lady cicely on this subject? rankin (naively). yes. (sir howard qrunts emphatically, as who should say "i thought so." rankin continues, addressing the court) may i say how sorry i am that there are so few chairs, captain and gentlemen. kearney (with genial american courtesy). oh, that's all right, mr. rahnkin. well, i see no harm so far: it's human fawlly, but not human crime. now the counsel for the prosecution can proceed to prosecute. the floor is yours, lady waynflete. lady cicely (rising). i can only tell you the exact truth-- drinkwater (involuntarily). naow, down't do thet, lidy-- redbrook (as before). shut up, you fool, will you? lady cicely. we had a most delightful trip in the hills; and captain brassbound's men could not have been nicer--i must say that for them--until we saw a tribe of arabs--such nice looking men!--and then the poor things were frightened. kearney. the arabs? lady cicely. no: arabs are never frightened. the escort, of course: escorts are always frightened. i wanted to speak to the arab chief; but captain brassbound cruelly shot his horse; and the chief shot the count; and then-- kearney. the count! what count? lady cicely. marzo. that's marzo (pointing to marzo, who grins and touches his forehead). kearney (slightly overwhelmed by the unexpected profusion of incident and character in her story). well, what happened then? lady cicely. then the escort ran away--all escorts do--and dragged me into the castle, which you really ought to make them clean and whitewash thoroughly, captain kearney. then captain brassbound and sir howard turned out to be related to one another (sensation); and then of course, there was a quarrel. the hallams always quarrel. sir howard (rising to protest). cicely! captain kearney: this man told me-- lady cicely (swiftly interrupting him). you mustn't say what people told you: it's not evidence. (sir howard chokes with indignation.) kearney (calmly). allow the lady to proceed, sir howard hallam. sir howard (recovering his self-control with a gulp, and resuming his seat). i beg your pardon, captain kearney. lady cicely. then sidi came. kearney. sidney! who was sidney? lady cicely. no, sidi. the sheikh. sidi el assif. a noble creature, with such a fine face! he fell in love with me at first sight-- sir howard (remonstrating). cicely! lady cicely. he did: you know he did. you told me to tell the exact truth. kearney. i can readily believe it, madam. proceed. lady cicely. well, that put the poor fellow into a most cruel dilemma. you see, he could claim to carry off sir howard, because sir howard is a christian. but as i am only a woman, he had no claim to me. kearney (somewhat sternly, suspecting lady cicely of aristocratic atheism). but you are a christian woman. lady cicely. no: the arabs don't count women. they don't believe we have any souls. rankin. that is true, captain: the poor benighted creatures! lady cicely. well, what was he to do? he wasn't in love with sir howard; and he was in love with me. so he naturally offered to swop sir howard for me. don't you think that was nice of him, captain kearney? kearney. i should have done the same myself, lady waynflete. proceed. lady cicely. captain brassbound, i must say, was nobleness itself, in spite of the quarrel between himself and sir howard. he refused to give up either of us, and was on the point of fighting for us when in came the cadi with your most amusing and delightful letter, captain, and bundled us all back to mogador after calling my poor sidi the most dreadful names, and putting all the blame on captain brassbound. so here we are. now, howard, isn't that the exact truth, every word of it? sir howard. it is the truth, cicely, and nothing but the truth. but the english law requires a witness to tell the whole truth. lady cicely. what nonsense! as if anybody ever knew the whole truth about anything! (sitting down, much hurt and discouraged.) i'm sorry you wish captain kearney to understand that i am an untruthful witness. sir howard. no: but-- lady cicely. very well, then: please don't say things that convey that impression. kearney. but sir howard told me yesterday that captain brassbound threatened to sell him into slavery. lady cicely (springing up again). did sir howard tell you the things he said about captain brassbound's mother? (renewed sensation.) i told you they quarrelled, captain kearney. i said so, didn't i? redbrook (crisply). distinctly. (drinkwater opens his mouth to corroborate.) shut up, you fool. lady cicely. of course i did. now, captain kearney, do you want me--does sir howard want me--does anybody want me to go into the details of that shocking family quarrel? am i to stand here in the absence of any individual of my own sex and repeat the language of two angry men? kearney (rising impressively). the united states navy will have no hahnd in offering any violence to the pure instincts of womanhood. lady waynflete: i thahnk you for the delicacy with which you have given your evidence. (lady cicely beams on him gratefully and sits down triumphant.) captain brassbound: i shall not hold you respawnsible for what you may have said when the english bench addressed you in the language of the english forecastle-- (sir howard is about to protest.) no, sir howard hallam: excuse me. in moments of pahssion i have called a man that myself. we are glahd to find real flesh and blood beneath the ermine of the judge. we will all now drop a subject that should never have been broached in a lady's presence. (he resumes his seat, and adds, in a businesslike tone) is there anything further before we release these men? bluejacket. there are some dawcuments handed over by the cadi, sir. he reckoned they were sort of magic spells. the chahplain ordered them to be reported to you and burnt, with your leave, sir. kearney. what are they? bluejacket (reading from a list). four books, torn and dirty, made up of separate numbers, value each wawn penny, and entitled sweeny todd, the demon barber of london; the skeleton horseman-- drinkwater (rushing forward in painful alarm, and anxiety). it's maw lawbrary, gavner. down't burn em. kearney. you'll be better without that sort of reading, my man. drinkwater (in intense distress, appealing to lady cicely) down't let em burn em, lidy. they dasn't if you horder them not to. (with desperate eloquence) yer dunno wot them books is to me. they took me aht of the sawdid reeyellities of the worterleoo rowd. they formed maw mawnd: they shaowed me sathink awgher than the squalor of a corster's lawf-- redbrook (collaring him). oh shut up, you fool. get out. hold your ton-- drinkwater (frantically breaking from him). lidy, lidy: sy a word for me. ev a feelin awt. (his tears choke him: he clasps his hands in dumb entreaty.) lady cicely (touched). don't burn his books. captain. let me give them back to him. kearney. the books will be handed over to the lady. drinkwater (in a small voice). thenkyer, lidy. (he retires among his comrades, snivelling subduedly.) redbrook (aside to him as he passes). you silly ass, you. (drinkwater sniffs and does not reply.) kearney. i suppose you and your men accept this lady's account of what passed, captain brassbound. brassbound (gloomily). yes. it is true--as far as it goes. kearney (impatiently). do you wawnt it to go any further? marzo. she leave out something. arab shoot me. she nurse me. she cure me. kearney. and who are you, pray? marzo (seized with a sanctimonious desire to demonstrate his higher nature). only dam thief. dam liar. dam rascal. she no lady. johnson (revolted by the seeming insult to the english peerage from a low italian). what? what's that you say? marzo. no lady nurse dam rascal. only saint. she saint. she get me to heaven--get us all to heaven. we do what we like now. lady cicely. indeed you will do nothing of the sort marzo, unless you like to behave yourself very nicely indeed. what hour did you say we were to lunch at, captain kearney? kearney. you recall me to my dooty, lady waynflete. my barge will be ready to take off you and sir howard to the santiago at one o'clawk. (he rises.) captain brassbound: this innquery has elicited no reason why i should detain you or your men. i advise you to ahct as escort in future to heathens exclusively. mr. rahnkin: i thahnk you in the name of the united states for the hospitahlity you have extended to us today; and i invite you to accompany me bahck to my ship with a view to lunch at half-past one. gentlemen: we will wait on the governor of the gaol on our way to the harbor (he goes out, following his officers, and followed by the bluejackets and the petty officer.) sir howard (to lady cicely). cicely: in the course of my professional career i have met with unscrupulous witnesses, and, i am sorry to say, unscrupulous counsel also. but the combination of unscrupulous witness and unscrupulous counsel i have met to-day has taken away my breath you have made me your accomplice in defeating justice. lady cicely. yes: aren't you glad it's been defeated for once? (she takes his arm to go out with him.) captain brassbound: i will come back to say goodbye before i go. (he nods gloomily. she goes out with sir howard, following the captain and his staff.) rankin (running to brassbound and taking both his hands). i'm right glad ye're cleared. i'll come back and have a crack with ye when yon lunch is over. god bless ye. (hs goes out quickly.) brassbound and his men, left by themselves in the room, free and unobserved, go straight out of their senses. they laugh; they dance; they embrace one another; they set to partners and waltz clumsily; they shake hands repeatedly and maudlinly. three only retain some sort of self-possession. marzo, proud of having successfully thrust himself into a leading part in the recent proceedings and made a dramatic speech, inflates his chest, curls his scanty moustache, and throws himself into a swaggering pose, chin up and right foot forward, despising the emotional english barbarians around him. brassbound's eyes and the working of his mouth show that he is infected with the general excitement; but he bridles himself savagely. redbrook, trained to affect indifference, grins cynically; winks at brassbound; and finally relieves himself by assuming the character of a circus ringmaster, flourishing an imaginary whip and egging on the rest to wilder exertions. a climax is reached when drinkwater, let loose without a stain on his character for the second time, is rapt by belief in his star into an ecstasy in which, scorning all partnership, he becomes as it were a whirling dervish, and executes so miraculous a clog dance that the others gradually cease their slower antics to stare at him. brassbound (tearing off his hat and striding forward as drinkwater collapses, exhausted, and is picked up by redbrook). now to get rid of this respectable clobber and feel like a man again. stand by, all hands, to jump on the captain's tall hat. (he puts the hat down and prepares to jump on it. the effect is startling, and takes him completely aback. his followers, far from appreciating his iconoclasm, are shocked into scandalized sobriety, except redbrook, who is immensely tickled by their prudery.) drinkwater. naow, look eah, kepn: that ynt rawt. dror a lawn somewhere. johnson. i say nothin agen a bit of fun, capn, but let's be gentlemen. redbrook. i suggest to you, brassbound, that the clobber belongs to lady sis. ain't you going to give it back to her? brassbound (picking up the hat and brushing the dust off it anxiously). that's true. i'm a fool. all the same, she shall not see me again like this. (he pulls off the coat and waistcoat together.) does any man here know how to fold up this sort of thing properly? redbrook. allow me, governor. (he takes the coat and waistcoat to the table, and folds them up.) brassbound (loosening his collar and the front of his shirt). brandyfaced jack: you're looking at these studs. i know what's in your mind. drinkwater (indignantly). naow yer down't: nort a bit on it. wot's in maw mawnd is secrifawce, seolf-secrifawce. brassbound. if one brass pin of that lady's property is missing, i'll hang you with my own hands at the gaff of the thanksgiving--and would, if she were lying under the guns of all the fleets in europe. (he pulls off the shirt and stands in his blue jersey, with his hair ruffled. he passes his hand through it and exclaims) now i am half a man, at any rate. redbrook. a horrible combination, governor: churchwarden from the waist down, and the rest pirate. lady sis won't speak to you in it. brassbound. i'll change altogether. (he leaves the room to get his own trousers.) redbrook (softly). look here, johnson, and gents generally. (they gather about him.) spose she takes him back to england! marzo (trying to repeat his success). im! im only dam pirate. she saint, i tell you--no take any man nowhere. johnson (severely). don't you be a ignorant and immoral foreigner. (the rebuke is well received; and marzo is hustled into the background and extinguished.) she won't take him for harm; but she might take him for good. and then where should we be? drinkwater. brarsbahnd ynt the ownly kepn in the world. wot mikes a kepn is brines an knollidge o lawf. it ynt thet ther's naow sitch pusson: it's thet you dunno where to look fr im. (the implication that he is such a person is so intolerable that they receive it with a prolonged burst of booing.) brassbound (returning in his own clothes, getting into his jacket as he comes). stand by, all. (they start asunder guiltily, and wait for orders.) redbrook: you pack that clobber in the lady's portmanteau, and put it aboard the yacht for her. johnson: you take all hands aboard the thanksgiving; look through the stores: weigh anchor; and make all ready for sea. then send jack to wait for me at the slip with a boat; and give me a gunfire for a signal. lose no time. johnson. ay, ay, air. all aboard, mates. all. ay, ay. (they rush out tumultuously.) when they are gone, brassbound sits down at the end of the table, with his elbows on it and his head on his fists, gloomily thinking. then he takes from the breast pocket of his jacket a leather case, from which he extracts a scrappy packet of dirty letters and newspaper cuttings. these he throws on the table. next comes a photograph in a cheap frame. he throws it down untenderly beside the papers; then folds his arms, and is looking at it with grim distaste when lady cicely enters. his back is towards her; and he does not hear her. perceiving this, she shuts the door loudly enough to attract his attention. he starts up. lady cicely (coming to the opposite end of the table). so you've taken off all my beautiful clothes! brassbound. your brother's, you mean. a man should wear his own clothes; and a man should tell his own lies. i'm sorry you had to tell mine for me to-day. lady cicely. oh, women spend half their lives telling little lies for men, and sometimes big ones. we're used to it. but mind! i don't admit that i told any to-day. brassbound. how did you square my uncle? lady cicely. i don't understand the expression. brassbound. i mean-- lady cicely. i'm afraid we haven't time to go into what you mean before lunch. i want to speak to you about your future. may i? brassbound (darkening a little, but politely). sit down. (she sits down. so does he.) lady cicely. what are your plans? brassbound. i have no plans. you will hear a gun fired in the harbor presently. that will mean that the thanksgiving's anchor's weighed and that she is waiting for her captain to put out to sea. and her captain doesn't know now whether to turn her head north or south. lady cicely. why not north for england? brassbound. why not south for the pole? lady cicely. but you must do something with yourself. brassbound (settling himself with his fists and elbows weightily on the table and looking straight and powerfully at her). look you: when you and i first met, i was a man with a purpose. i stood alone: i saddled no friend, woman or man, with that purpose, because it was against law, against religion, against my own credit and safety. but i believed in it; and i stood alone for it, as a man should stand for his belief, against law and religion as much as against wickedness and selfishness. whatever i may be, i am none of your fairweather sailors that'll do nothing for their creed but go to heaven for it. i was ready to go to hell for mine. perhaps you don't understand that. lady cicely. oh bless you, yes. it's so very like a certain sort of man. brassbound. i daresay but i've not met many of that sort. anyhow, that was what i was like. i don't say i was happy in it; but i wasn't unhappy, because i wasn't drifting. i was steering a course and had work in hand. give a man health and a course to steer; and he'll never stop to trouble about whether he's happy or not. lady cicely. sometimes he won't even stop to trouble about whether other people are happy or not. brassbound. i don't deny that: nothing makes a man so selfish as work. but i was not self-seeking: it seemed to me that i had put justice above self. i tell you life meant something to me then. do you see that dirty little bundle of scraps of paper? lady cicely. what are they? brassbound. accounts cut out of newspapers. speeches made by my uncle at charitable dinners, or sentencing men to death--pious, highminded speeches by a man who was to me a thief and a murderer! to my mind they were more weighty, more momentous, better revelations of the wickedness of law and respectability than the book of the prophet amos. what are they now? (he quietly tears the newspaper cuttings into little fragments and throws them away, looking fixedly at her meanwhile.) lady cicely. well, that's a comfort, at all events. brassbound. yes; but it's a part of my life gone: your doing, remember. what have i left? see here! (he take up the letters) the letters my uncle wrote to my mother, with her comments on their cold drawn insolence, their treachery and cruelty. and the piteous letters she wrote to him later on, returned unopened. must they go too? lady cicely (uneasily). i can't ask you to destroy your mother's letters. brassbound. why not, now that you have taken the meaning out of them? (he tears them.) is that a comfort too? lady cicely. it's a little sad; but perhaps it is best so. brassbound. that leaves one relic: her portrait. (he plucks the photograph out of its cheap case.) lady cicely (with vivid curiosity). oh, let me see. (he hands it to her. before she can control herself, her expression changes to one of unmistakable disappointment and repulsion.) brassbound (with a single sardonic cachinnation). ha! you expected something better than that. well, you're right. her face does not look well opposite yours. lady cicely (distressed). i said nothing. brassbound. what could you say? (he takes back the portrait: she relinquishes it without a word. he looks at it; shakes his head; and takes it quietly between his finger and thumb to tear it.) lady cicely (staying his hand). oh, not your mother's picture! brassbound. if that were your picture, would you like your son to keep it for younger and better women to see? lady cicely (releasing his hand). oh, you are dreadful! tear it, tear it. (she covers her eyes for a moment to shut out the sight.) brassbound (tearing it quietly). you killed her for me that day in the castle; and i am better without her. (he throws away the fragments.) now everything is gone. you have taken the old meaning out of my life; but you have put no new meaning into it. i can see that you have some clue to the world that makes all its difficulties easy for you; but i'm not clever enough to seize it. you've lamed me by showing me that i take life the wrong way when i'm left to myself. lady cicely. oh no. why do you say that? brassbound. what else can i say? see what i've done! my uncle is no worse a man than myself--better, most likely; for he has a better head and a higher place. well, i took him for a villain out of a storybook. my mother would have opened anybody else's eyes: she shut mine. i'm a stupider man than brandyfaced jack even; for he got his romantic nonsense out of his penny numbers and such like trash; but i got just the same nonsense out of life and experience. (shaking his head) it was vulgar--vulgar. i see that now; for you've opened my eyes to the past; but what good is that for the future? what am i to do? where am i to go? lady cicely. it's quite simple. do whatever you like. that's what i always do. brassbound. that answer is no good to me. what i like is to have something to do; and i have nothing. you might as well talk like the missionary and tell me to do my duty. lady cicely (quickly). oh no thank you. i've had quite enough of your duty, and howard's duty. where would you both be now if i'd let you do it? brassbound. we'd have been somewhere, at all events. it seems to me that now i am nowhere. lady cicely. but aren't you coming back to england with us? brassbound. what for? lady cicely. why, to make the most of your opportunities. brassbound. what opportunities? lady cicely. don't you understand that when you are the nephew of a great bigwig, and have influential connexions, and good friends among them, lots of things can be done for you that are never done for ordinary ship captains? brassbound. ah; but i'm not an aristocrat, you see. and like most poor men, i'm proud. i don't like being patronized. lady cicely. what is the use of saying that? in my world, which is now your world--our world--getting patronage is the whole art of life. a man can't have a career without it. brassbound. in my world a man can navigate a ship and get his living by it. lady cicely. oh, i see you're one of the idealists--the impossibilists! we have them, too, occasionally, in our world. there's only one thing to be done with them. brassbound. what's that? lady cicely. marry them straight off to some girl with enough money for them, and plenty of sentiment. that's their fate. brassbound. you've spoiled even that chance for me. do you think i could look at any ordinary woman after you? you seem to be able to make me do pretty well what you like; but you can't make me marry anybody but yourself. lady cicely. do you know, captain paquito, that i've married no less than seventeen men (brassbound stares) to other women. and they all opened the subject by saying that they would never marry anybody but me. brassbound. then i shall be the first man you ever found to stand to his word. lady cicely (part pleased, part amused, part sympathetic). do you really want a wife? brassbound. i want a commander. don't undervalue me: i am a good man when i have a good leader. i have courage: i have determination: i'm not a drinker: i can command a schooner and a shore party if i can't command a ship or an army. when work is put upon me, i turn neither to save my life nor to fill my pocket. gordon trusted me; and he never regretted it. if you trust me, you shan't regret it. all the same, there's something wanting in me: i suppose i'm stupid. lady cicely. oh, you're not stupid. brassbound. yes i am. since you saw me for the first time in that garden, you've heard me say nothing clever. and i've heard you say nothing that didn't make me laugh, or make me feel friendly, as well as telling me what to think and what to do. that's what i mean by real cleverness. well, i haven't got it. i can give an order when i know what order to give. i can make men obey it, willing or unwilling. but i'm stupid, i tell you: stupid. when there's no gordon to command me, i can't think of what to do. left to myself, i've become half a brigand. i can kick that little gutterscrub drinkwater; but i find myself doing what he puts into my head because i can't think of anything else. when you came, i took your orders as naturally as i took gordon's, though i little thought my next commander would be a woman. i want to take service under you. and there's no way in which that can be done except marrying you. will you let me do it? lady cicely. i'm afraid you don't quite know how odd a match it would be for me according to the ideas of english society. brassbound. i care nothing about english society: let it mind its own business. lady cicely (rising, a little alarmed). captain paquito: i am not in love with you. brassbound (also rising, with his gaze still steadfastly on her). i didn't suppose you were: the commander is not usually in love with his subordinate. lady cicely. nor the subordinate with the commander. brassbound (assenting firmly). nor the subordinate with the commander. lady cicely (learning for the first time in her life what terror is, as she finds that he is unconsciously mesmerizing her). oh, you are dangerous! brassbound. come: are you in love with anybody else? that's the question. lady cicely (shaking her head). i have never been in love with any real person; and i never shall. how could i manage people if i had that mad little bit of self left in me? that's my secret. brassbound. then throw away the last bit of self. marry me. lady cicely (vainly struggling to recall her wandering will). must i? brassbound. there is no must. you can. i ask you to. my fate depends on it. lady cicely. it's frightful; for i don't mean to--don't wish to. brassbound. but you will. lady cicely (quite lost, slowly stretches out her hand to give it to him). i-- (gunfire from the thanksgiving. his eyes dilate. it wakes her from her trance) what is that? brassbound. it is farewell. rescue for you--safety, freedom! you were made to be something better than the wife of black paquito. (he kneels and takes her hands) you can do no more for me now: i have blundered somehow on the secret of command at last (he kisses her hands): thanks for that, and for a man's power and purpose restored and righted. and farewell, farewell, farewell. lady cicely (in a strange ecstasy, holding his hands as he rises). oh, farewell. with my heart's deepest feeling, farewell, farewell. brassbound. with my heart's noblest honor and triumph, farewell. (he turns and flies.) lady cicely. how glorious! how glorious! and what an escape! curtain notes to captain brassbound's conversion sources of the play i claim as a notable merit in the authorship of this play that i have been intelligent enough to steal its scenery, its surroundings, its atmosphere, its geography, its knowledge of the east, its fascinating cadis and kearneys and sheikhs and mud castles from an excellent book of philosophic travel and vivid adventure entitled mogreb-el-acksa (morocco the most holy) by cunninghame graham. my own first hand knowledge of morocco is based on a morning's walk through tangier, and a cursory observation of the coast through a binocular from the deck of an orient steamer, both later in date than the writing of the play. cunninghame graham is the hero of his own book; but i have not made him the hero of my play, because so incredible a personage must have destroyed its likelihood--such as it is. there are moments when i do not myself believe in his existence. and yet he must be real; for i have seen him with these eyes; and i am one of the few men living who can decipher the curious alphabet in which he writes his private letters. the man is on public record too. the battle of trafalgar square, in which he personally and bodily assailed civilization as represented by the concentrated military and constabular forces of the capital of the world, can scarcely be forgotten by the more discreet spectators, of whom i was one. on that occasion civilization, qualitatively his inferior, was quantitatively so hugely in excess of him that it put him in prison, but had not sense enough to keep him there. yet his getting out of prison was as nothing compared to his getting into the house of commons. how he did it i know not; but the thing certainly happened, somehow. that he made pregnant utterances as a legislator may be taken as proved by the keen philosophy of the travels and tales he has since tossed to us; but the house, strong in stupidity, did not understand him until in an inspired moment he voiced a universal impulse by bluntly damning its hypocrisy. of all the eloquence of that silly parliament, there remains only one single damn. it has survived the front bench speeches of the eighties as the word of cervantes survives the oraculations of the dons and deys who put him, too, in prison. the shocked house demanded that he should withdraw his cruel word. "i never withdraw," said he; and i promptly stole the potent phrase for the sake of its perfect style, and used it as a cockade for the bulgarian hero of arms and the man. the theft prospered; and i naturally take the first opportunity of repeating it. in what other lepantos besides trafalgar square cunninghame graham has fought, i cannot tell. he is a fascinating mystery to a sedentary person like myself. the horse, a dangerous animal whom, when i cannot avoid, i propitiate with apples and sugar, he bestrides and dominates fearlessly, yet with a true republican sense of the rights of the fourlegged fellowcreature whose martyrdom, and man's shame therein, he has told most powerfully in his calvary, a tale with an edge that will cut the soft cruel hearts and strike fire from the hard kind ones. he handles the other lethal weapons as familiarly as the pen: medieval sword and modern mauser are to him as umbrellas and kodaks are to me. his tales of adventure have the true cervantes touch of the man who has been there--so refreshingly different from the scenes imagined by bloody-minded clerks who escape from their servitude into literature to tell us how men and cities are conceived in the counting house and the volunteer corps. he is, i understand, a spanish hidalgo: hence the superbity of his portrait by lavery (velasquez being no longer available). he is, i know, a scotch laird. how he contrives to be authentically the two things at the same time is no more intelligible to me than the fact that everything that has ever happened to him seems to have happened in paraguay or texas instead of in spain or scotland. he is, i regret to add, an impenitent and unashamed dandy: such boots, such a hat, would have dazzled d'orsay himself. with that hat he once saluted me in regent st. when i was walking with my mother. her interest was instantly kindled; and the following conversation ensued. "who is that?" "cunninghame graham." "nonsense! cunninghame graham is one of your socialists: that man is a gentleman." this is the punishment of vanity, a fault i have myself always avoided, as i find conceit less troublesome and much less expensive. later on somebody told him of tarudant, a city in morocco in which no christian had ever set foot. concluding at once that it must be an exceptionally desirable place to live in, he took ship and horse: changed the hat for a turban; and made straight for the sacred city, via mogador. how he fared, and how he fell into the hands of the cadi of kintafi, who rightly held that there was more danger to islam in one cunninghame graham than in a thousand christians, may be learnt from his account of it in mogreb-el-acksa, without which captain brassbound's conversion would never have been written. i am equally guiltless of any exercise of invention concerning the story of the west indian estate which so very nearly serves as a peg to hang captain brassbound. to mr. frederick jackson of hindhead, who, against all his principles, encourages and abets me in my career as a dramatist, i owe my knowledge of those main facts of the case which became public through an attempt to make the house of commons act on them. this being so, i must add that the character of captain brassbound's mother, like the recovery of the estate by the next heir, is an interpolation of my own. it is not, however, an invention. one of the evils of the pretence that our institutions represent abstract principles of justice instead of being mere social scaffolding is that persons of a certain temperament take the pretence seriously, and when the law is on the side of injustice, will not accept the situation, and are driven mad by their vain struggle against it. dickens has drawn the type in his man from shropshire in bleak house. most public men and all lawyers have been appealed to by victims of this sense of injustice--the most unhelpable of afflictions in a society like ours. english and american dialects the fact that english is spelt conventionally and not phonetically makes the art of recording speech almost impossible. what is more, it places the modern dramatist, who writes for america as well as england, in a most trying position. take for example my american captain and my english lady. i have spelt the word conduce, as uttered by the american captain, as cawndooce, to suggest (very roughly) the american pronunciation to english readers. then why not spell the same word, when uttered by lady cicely, as kerndewce, to suggest the english pronunciation to american readers? to this i have absolutely no defence: i can only plead that an author who lives in england necessarily loses his consciousness of the peculiarities of english speech, and sharpens his consciousness of the points in which american speech differs from it; so that it is more convenient to leave english peculiarities to be recorded by american authors. i must, however, most vehemently disclaim any intention of suggesting that english pronunciation is authoritative and correct. my own tongue is neither american english nor english english, but irish english; so i am as nearly impartial in the matter as it is in human nature to be. besides, there is no standard english pronunciation any more than there is an american one: in england every county has its catchwords, just as no doubt every state in the union has. i cannot believe that the pioneer american, for example, can spare time to learn that last refinement of modern speech, the exquisite diphthong, a farfetched combination of the french eu and the english e, with which a new yorker pronounces such words as world, bird &c. i have spent months without success in trying to achieve glibness with it. to felix drinkwater also i owe some apology for implying that all his vowel pronunciations are unfashionable. they are very far from being so. as far as my social experience goes (and i have kept very mixed company) there is no class in english society in which a good deal of drinkwater pronunciation does not pass unchallenged save by the expert phonetician. this is no mere rash and ignorant jibe of my own at the expense of my english neighbors. academic authority in the matter of english speech is represented at present by mr. henry sweet, of the university of oxford, whose elementarbuch des gesprochenen engliach, translated into his native language for the use of british islanders as a primer of spoken english, is the most accessible standard work on the subject. in such words as plum, come, humbug, up, gum, etc., mr. sweet's evidence is conclusive. ladies and gentlemen in southern england pronounce them as plam, kam, hambag, ap, gan, etc., exactly as felix drinkwater does. i could not claim mr. sweet's authority if i dared to whisper that such coster english as the rather pretty dahn tahn for down town, or the decidedly ugly cowcow for cocoa is current in very polite circles. the entire nation, costers and all, would undoubtedly repudiate any such pronunciation as vulgar. all the same, if i were to attempt to represent current "smart" cockney speech as i have attempted to represent drinkwater's, without the niceties of mr. sweet's romic alphabets, i am afraid i should often have to write dahn tahn and cowcow as being at least nearer to the actual sound than down town and cocoa. and this would give such offence that i should have to leave the country; for nothing annoys a native speaker of english more than a faithful setting down in phonetic spelling of the sounds he utters. he imagines that a departure from conventional spelling indicates a departure from the correct standard english of good society. alas! this correct standard english of good society is unknown to phoneticians. it is only one of the many figments that bewilder our poor snobbish brains. no such thing exists; but what does that matter to people trained from infancy to make a point of honor of belief in abstractions and incredibilities? and so i am compelled to hide lady cicely's speech under the veil of conventional orthography. i need not shield drinkwater, because he will never read my book. so i have taken the liberty of making a special example of him, as far as that can be done without a phonetic alphabet, for the benefit of the mass of readers outside london who still form their notions of cockney dialect on sam weller. when i came to london in , the sam weller dialect had passed away so completely that i should have given it up as a literary fiction if i had not discovered it surviving in a middlesex village, and heard of it from an essex one. some time in the eighties the late andrew tuer called attention in the pall mall gazette to several peculiarities of modern cockney, and to the obsolescence of the dickens dialect that was still being copied from book to book by authors who never dreamt of using their ears, much less of training them to listen. then came mr. anstey's cockney dialogues in punch, a great advance, and mr. chevalier's coster songs and patter. the tompkins verses contributed by mr. barry pain to the london daily chronicle have also done something to bring the literary convention for cockney english up to date. but tompkins sometimes perpetrates horrible solecisms. he will pronounce face as fits, accurately enough; but he will rhyme it quite impossibly to nice, which tompkins would pronounce as newts: for example mawl enn rowd for mile end road. this aw for i, which i have made drinkwater use, is the latest stage of the old diphthongal oi, which mr. chevalier still uses. irish, scotch and north country readers must remember that drinkwater's rs are absolutely unpronounced when they follow a vowel, though they modify the vowel very considerably. thus, luggage is pronounced by him as laggige, but turn is not pronounced as tern, but as teun with the eu sounded as in french. the london r seems thoroughly understood in america, with the result, however, that the use of the r by artemus ward and other american dialect writers causes irish people to misread them grotesquely. i once saw the pronunciation of malheureux represented in a cockney handbook by mal-err-err: not at all a bad makeshift to instruct a londoner, but out of the question elsewhere in the british isles. in america, representations of english speech dwell too derisively on the dropped or interpolated h. american writers have apparently not noticed the fact that the south english h is not the same as the never-dropped irish and american h, and that to ridicule an englishman for dropping it is as absurd as to ridicule the whole french and italian nation for doing the same. the american h, helped out by a general agreement to pronounce wh as hw, is tempestuously audible, and cannot be dropped without being immediately missed. the london h is so comparatively quiet at all times, and so completely inaudible in wh, that it probably fell out of use simply by escaping the ears of children learning to speak. however that may be, it is kept alive only by the literate classes who are reminded constantly of its existence by seeing it on paper. roughly speaking, i should say that in england he who bothers about his hs is a fool, and he who ridicules a dropped h a snob. as to the interpolated h, my experience as a london vestryman has convinced me that it is often effective as a means of emphasis, and that the london language would be poorer without it. the objection to it is no more respectable than the objection of a street boy to a black man or to a lady in knickerbockers. i have made only the most perfunctory attempt to represent the dialect of the missionary. there is no literary notation for the grave music of good scotch. blackdown, august proofreaders in morocco by edith wharton illustrated [illustration: _from a photograph from the service des beaux-arts au maroc_ fez elbah from the ramparts] [illustration] to general lyautey resident general of france in morocco and to madame lyautey thanks to whose kindness the journey i had so long dreamed of surpassed what i had dreamed preface i having begun my book with the statement that morocco still lacks a guide-book, i should have wished to take a first step toward remedying that deficiency. but the conditions in which i travelled, though full of unexpected and picturesque opportunities, were not suited to leisurely study of the places visited. the time was limited by the approach of the rainy season, which puts an end to motoring over the treacherous trails of the spanish zone. in , owing to the watchfulness of german submarines in the straits and along the northwest coast of africa, the trip by sea from marseilles to casablanca, ordinarily so easy, was not to be made without much discomfort and loss of time. once on board the steamer, passengers were often kept in port (without leave to land) for six or eight days; therefore for any one bound by a time-limit, as most war-workers were, it was necessary to travel across country, and to be back at tangier before the november rains. this left me only one month in which to visit morocco from the mediterranean to the high atlas, and from the atlantic to fez, and even had there been a djinn's carpet to carry me, the multiplicity of impressions received would have made precise observation difficult. the next best thing to a djinn's carpet, a military motor, was at my disposal every morning; but war conditions imposed restrictions, and the wish to use the minimum of petrol often stood in the way of the second visit which alone makes it possible to carry away a definite and detailed impression. these drawbacks were more than offset by the advantage of making my quick trip at a moment unique in the history of the country; the brief moment of transition between its virtually complete subjection to european authority, and the fast approaching hour when it is thrown open to all the banalities and promiscuities of modern travel. morocco is too curious, too beautiful, too rich in landscape and architecture, and above all too much of a novelty, not to attract one of the main streams of spring travel as soon as mediterranean passenger traffic is resumed. now that the war is over, only a few months' work on roads and railways divide it from the great torrent of "tourism"; and once that deluge is let loose, no eye will ever again see moulay idriss and fez and marrakech as i saw them. in spite of the incessant efforts of the present french administration to preserve the old monuments of morocco from injury, and her native arts and industries from the corruption of european bad taste, the impression of mystery and remoteness which the country now produces must inevitably vanish with the approach of the "circular ticket." within a few years far more will be known of the past of morocco, but that past will be far less visible to the traveller than it is to-day. excavations will reveal fresh traces of roman and phenician occupation; the remote affinities between copts and berbers, between bagdad and fez, between byzantine art and the architecture of the souss, will be explored and elucidated, but, while these successive discoveries are being made, the strange survival of mediaeval life, of a life contemporary with the crusaders, with saladin, even with the great days of the caliphate of bagdad, which now greets the astonished traveller, will gradually disappear, till at last even the mysterious autocthones of the atlas will have folded their tents and silently stolen away. ii authoritative utterances on morocco are not wanting for those who can read them in french, but they are to be found mainly in large and often inaccessible books, like m. doutté's "en tribu," the marquis de segonzac's remarkable explorations in the atlas, or foucauld's classic (but unobtainable) "reconnaissance au maroc", and few, if any, have been translated into english. m. louis châtelain has dealt with the roman ruins of volubilis and m. tranchant de lunel, m. raymond koechlin, m. gaillard, m. ricard, and many other french scholars, have written of moslem architecture and art in articles published either in "france-maroc," as introductions to catalogues of exhibitions, or in the reviews and daily papers. pierre loti and m. andré chevrillon have reflected, with the intensest visual sensibility, the romantic and ruinous morocco of yesterday, and in the volumes of the "conférences marocaines," published by the french government, the experts gathered about the resident-general have examined the industrial and agricultural morocco of tomorrow. lastly, one striking book sums up, with the clearness and consecutiveness of which french scholarship alone possesses the art, the chief things to be said on all these subjects, save that of art and archaeology. this is m. augustin bernard's volume, "le maroc," the one portable and compact yet full and informing book since leo africanus described the bazaars of fez. but m. augustin bernard deals only with the ethnology, the social, religious and political history, and the physical properties, of the country; and this, though "a large order," leaves out the visual and picturesque side, except in so far as the book touches on the always picturesque life of the people. for the use, therefore, of the happy wanderers who may be planning a moroccan journey, i have added to the record of my personal impressions a slight sketch of the history and art of the country. in extenuation of the attempt i must add that the chief merit of this sketch will be its absence of originality. its facts will be chiefly drawn from the pages of m. augustin bernard, m. h. saladin, and m. gaston migeon, and the rich sources of the "conférences marocaines" and the articles of "france-maroc." it will also be deeply indebted to information given on the spot by the brilliant specialists of the french administration, to the marquis de segonzac, with whom i had the good luck to travel from rabat to marrakech and back; to m. alfred de tarde, editor of "france-maroc"; to m. tranchant de lunel, director of the french school of fine arts in morocco; to m. goulven, the historian of portuguese mazagan, to m. louis châtelain, and to the many other cultivated and cordial french officials, military and civilian, who, at each stage of my journey, did their amiable best to answer my questions and open my eyes. note in the writing of proper names and of other arab words the french spelling has been followed. in the case of proper names, and names of cities and districts, this seems justified by the fact that they occur in a french colony, where french usage naturally prevails, and to spell _oudjda_ in the french way, and _koubba_, for instance, in the english form of _kubba_, would cause needless confusion as to their respective pronunciation. it seems therefore simpler, in a book written for the ordinary traveller, to conform altogether to french usage. table of contents preface i. rabat and salÉ ii. volubilis, moulay idriss and meknez iii. fez iv. marrakech v. harems and ceremonies vi. general lyautey's work in morocco vii. a sketch of moroccan history viii. note on moroccan architecture ix. books consulted index illustrations fez elbali from the ramparts general view from the kasbah of the oudayas--rabat interior court of the medersa of the oudayas--rabat entrance of the medersa--salÉ market-place outside the town--salÉ chella--ruins of mosque--salÉ the western portico of the basilica of antonius pius--volubilis moulay idriss the market-place--moulay idriss market-place on the day of the ritual dance of the hamadchas--moulay idriss the market-place procession of the confraternity of the hamadchas--moulay idriss gate: "bab-mansour"--meknez the ruins of the palace of moulay-ismael--meknez fez eldjid a reed-roofed street--fez the nedjarine fountain--fez the bazaars: a view of the souk el attarine and the quaisarya--fez the "little garden" in background, palace of the bahia--marrakech the great court, palace of the bahia--marrakech apartment of the grand vizier's favorite, palace of the bahia--marrakech a fondak--marrakech mausoleum of the saadian sultans showing the tombs--marrakech the sultan of morocco under the green umbrella a clan of mountaineers and their caÏd the sultan entering marrakech in state women watching a procession from a roof a street fountain--marrakech gate of the kasbah of the oudayas--rabat medersa bouanyana--fez the praying-chapel in the medersa el attarine--fez interior court of the medersa--salÉ the gate of the portuguese--marrakech map the part of morocco visited by mrs. wharton i rabat and salÉ i leaving tangier to step on board a steamer in a spanish port, and three hours later to land in _a country without a guide-book_, is a sensation to rouse the hunger of the repletest sight-seer. the sensation is attainable by any one who will take the trouble to row out into the harbour of algeciras and scramble onto a little black boat headed across the straits. hardly has the rock of gibraltar turned to cloud when one's foot is on the soil of an almost unknown africa. tangier, indeed, is in the guide-books; but, cuckoo-like, it has had to lays its eggs in strange nests, and the traveller who wants to find out about it must acquire a work dealing with some other country--spain or portugal or algeria. there is no guide-book to morocco, and no way of knowing, once one has left tangier behind, where the long trail over the rif is going to land one, in the sense understood by any one accustomed to european certainties. the air of the unforeseen blows on one from the roadless passes of the atlas. this feeling of adventure is heightened by the contrast between tangier--cosmopolitan, frowsy, familiar tangier, that every tourist has visited for the last forty years--and the vast unknown just beyond. one has met, of course, travellers who have been to fez; but they have gone there on special missions, under escort, mysteriously, perhaps perilously; the expedition has seemed, till lately, a considerable affair. and when one opens the records of moroccan travellers written within the last twenty years, how many, even of the most adventurous, are found to have gone beyond fez? and what, to this day, do the names of meknez and marrakech, of mogador, saffi or rabat, signify to any but a few students of political history, a few explorers and naturalists? not till within the last year has morocco been open to travel from tangier to the great atlas, and from moulay idriss to the atlantic. three years ago christians were being massacred in the streets of salé, the pirate town across the river from rabat, and two years ago no european had been allowed to enter the sacred city of moulay idriss, the burial-place of the lawful descendant of ali, founder of the idrissite dynasty. now, thanks to the energy and the imagination of one of the greatest of colonial administrators, the country, at least in the french zone, is as safe and open as the opposite shore of spain. all that remains is to tell the traveller how to find his way about it. ten years ago there was not a wheeled vehicle in morocco, now its thousands of miles of trail, and its hundreds of miles of firm french roads, are travelled by countless carts, omnibuses and motor-vehicles. there are light railways from rabat to fez in the west, and to a point about eighty-five kilometres from marrakech in the south, and it is possible to say that within a year a regular railway system will connect eastern morocco with western algeria, and the ports of tangier and casablanca with the principal points of the interior. what, then, prevents the tourist from instantly taking ship at bordeaux or algeciras and letting loose his motor on this new world? only the temporary obstacles which the war has everywhere put in the way of travel. till these are lifted it will hardly be possible to travel in morocco except by favour of the resident-general; but, normal conditions once restored, the country will be as accessible, from the straits of gibraltar to the great atlas, as algeria or tunisia. to see morocco during the war was therefore to see it in the last phase of its curiously abrupt transition from remoteness and danger to security and accessibility; at a moment when its aspect and its customs were still almost unaffected by european influences, and when the "christian" might taste the transient joy of wandering unmolested in cities of ancient mystery and hostility, whose inhabitants seemed hardly aware of his intrusion. ii the trail to el-ksar with such opportunities ahead it was impossible, that brilliant morning of september, , not to be off quickly from tangier, impossible to do justice to the pale-blue town piled up within brown walls against the thickly-foliaged gardens of "the mountain," to the animation of its market-place and the secret beauties of its steep arab streets. for tangier swarms with people in european clothes, there are english, french and spanish signs above its shops, and cab-stands in its squares; it belongs, as much as algiers, to the familiar dog-eared world of travel--and there, beyond the last dip of "the mountain," lies the world of mystery, with the rosy dawn just breaking over it. the motor is at the door and we are off. the so-called spanish zone, which encloses internationalized tangier in a wide circuit of territory, extends southward for a distance of about a hundred and fifteen kilometres. consequently, when good roads traverse it, french morocco will be reached in less than two hours by motor-travellers bound for the south. but for the present spanish enterprise dies out after a few miles of macadam (as it does even between madrid and toledo), and the tourist is committed to the _piste_. these _pistes_--the old caravan-trails from the south--are more available to motors in morocco than in southern algeria and tunisia, since they run mostly over soil which, though sandy in part, is bound together by a tough dwarf vegetation, and not over pure desert sand. this, however, is the utmost that can be said of the spanish _pistes_. in the french protectorate constant efforts are made to keep the trails fit for wheeled traffic, but spain shows no sense of a corresponding obligation. after leaving the macadamized road which runs south from tangier one seems to have embarked on a petrified ocean in a boat hardly equal to the adventure. then, as one leaps and plunges over humps and ruts, down sheer banks into rivers, and up precipices into sand-pits, one gradually gains faith in one's conveyance and in one's spinal column; but both must be sound in every joint to resist the strain of the long miles to arbaoua, the frontier post of the french protectorate. luckily there are other things to think about. at the first turn out of tangier, europe and the european disappear, and as soon as the motor begins to dip and rise over the arid little hills beyond the last gardens one is sure that every figure on the road will be picturesque instead of prosaic, every garment graceful instead of grotesque. one knows, too, that there will be no more omnibuses or trams or motorcyclists, but only long lines of camels rising up in brown friezes against the sky, little black donkeys trotting across the scrub under bulging pack-saddles, and noble draped figures walking beside them or majestically perching on their rumps. and for miles and miles there will be no more towns--only, at intervals on the naked slopes, circles of rush-roofed huts in a blue stockade of cactus, or a hundred or two nomad tents of black camel's hair resting on walls of wattled thorn and grouped about a terebinth-tree and a well. [illustration: map of morocco] between these nomad colonies lies the _bled_, the immense waste of fallow land and palmetto desert: an earth as void of life as the sky above it of clouds. the scenery is always the same; but if one has the love of great emptinesses, and of the play of light on long stretches of parched earth and rock, the sameness is part of the enchantment. in such a scene every landmark takes on an extreme value. for miles one watches the little white dome of a saint's grave rising and disappearing with the undulations of the trail; at last one is abreast of it, and the solitary tomb, alone with its fig-tree and its broken well-curb, puts a meaning into the waste. the same importance, but intensified, marks the appearance of every human figure. the two white-draped riders passing single file up the red slope to that ring of tents on the ridge have a mysterious and inexplicable importance: one follows their progress with eyes that ache with conjecture. more exciting still is the encounter of the first veiled woman heading a little cavalcade from the south. all the mystery that awaits us looks out through the eye-slits in the grave-clothes muffling her. where have they come from, where are they going, all these slow wayfarers out of the unknown? probably only from one thatched _douar_[a] to another; but interminable distances unroll behind them, they breathe of timbuctoo and the farthest desert. just such figures must swarm in the saharan cities, in the soudan and senegal. there is no break in the links: these wanderers have looked on at the building of cities that were dust when the romans pushed their outposts across the atlas. [footnote a: village of tents. the village of mud-huts is called a _nourwal_.] iii el-ksar to rabat a town at last--its nearness announced by the multiplied ruts of the trail, the cactus hedges, the fig-trees weighed down by dust leaning over ruinous earthen walls. and here are the first houses of the european el-ksar--neat white spanish houses on the slope outside the old arab settlement. of the arab town itself, above reed stockades and brown walls, only a minaret and a few flat roofs are visible. under the walls drowse the usual gregarious lazaruses; others, temporarily resuscitated, trail their grave-clothes after a line of camels and donkeys toward the olive-gardens outside the town. the way to rabat is long and difficult, and there is no time to visit el-ksar, though its minaret beckons so alluringly above the fruit-orchards; so we stop for luncheon outside the walls, at a canteen with a corrugated iron roof where skinny spaniards are serving thick purple wine and eggs fried in oil to a party of french soldiers. the heat has suddenly become intolerable, and a flaming wind straight from the south brings in at the door, with a cloud of blue flies, the smell of camels and trampled herbs and the strong spices of the bazaars. luncheon over, we hurry on between the cactus hedges, and then plunge back into the waste. beyond el-ksar the last hills of the rif die away, and there is a stretch of wilderness without an outline till the lesser atlas begins to rise in the east. once in the french protectorate the trail improves, but there are still difficult bits; and finally, on a high plateau, the chauffeur stops in a web of criss-cross trails, throws up his hands, and confesses that he has lost his way. the heat is mortal at the moment. for the last hour the red breath of the sirocco has risen from every hollow into which we dipped, now it hangs about us in the open, as if we had caught it in our wheels and it had to pause above us when we paused. all around is the featureless wild land, palmetto scrub stretching away into eternity. a few yards off rises the inevitable ruined _koubba_[a] with its fig-tree: in the shade under its crumbling wall the buzz of the flies is like the sound of frying. farther off, we discern a cluster of huts, and presently some arab boys and a tall pensive shepherd come hurrying across the scrub. they are full of good-will, and no doubt of information; but our chauffeur speaks no arabic and the talk dies down into shrugs and head-shakings. the arabs retire to the shade of the wall, and we decide to start--for anywhere.... [footnote a: saint's tomb. the saint himself is called a _marabout_.] the chauffeur turns the crank, but there is no responding quiver. something has gone wrong; we can't move, and it is not much comfort to remember that, if we could, we should not know where to go. at least we should be cooler in motion than sitting still under the blinding sky. such an adventure initiates one at the outset into the stern facts of desert motoring. every detail of our trip from tangier to rabat had been carefully planned to keep us in unbroken contact with civilization. we were to "tub" in one european hotel, and to dine in another, with just enough picnicking between to give a touch of local colour. but let one little cog slip and the whole plan falls to bits, and we are alone in the old untamed moghreb, as remote from europe as any mediaeval adventurer. if one lose one's way in morocco, civilization vanishes as though it were a magic carpet rolled up by a djinn. it is a good thing to begin with such a mishap, not only because it develops the fatalism necessary to the enjoyment of africa, but because it lets one at once into the mysterious heart of the country, a country so deeply conditioned by its miles and miles of uncitied wilderness that until one has known the wilderness one cannot begin to understand the cities. we came to one at length, after sunset on that first endless day. the motor, cleverly patched up, had found its way to a real road, and speeding along between the stunted cork-trees of the forest of mamora brought us to a last rise from which we beheld in the dusk a line of yellow walls backed by the misty blue of the atlantic. salé, the fierce old pirate town, where robinson crusoe was so long a slave, lay before us, snow-white in its cheese-coloured ramparts skirted by fig and olive gardens. below its gates a stretch of waste land, endlessly trailed over by mules and camels, sloped down to the mouth of the bou-regreg, the blue-brown river dividing it from rabat. the motor stopped at the landing-stage of the steam-ferry; crowding about it were droves of donkeys, knots of camels, plump-faced merchants on crimson-saddled mules, with negro servants at their bridles, bare-legged water-carriers with hairy goat-skins slung over their shoulders, and arab women in a heap of veils, cloaks, mufflings, all of the same ashy white, the caftans of clutched children peeping through in patches of old rose and lilac and pale green. across the river the native town of rabat lay piled up on an orange-red cliff beaten by the atlantic. its walls, red too, plunged into the darkening breakers at the mouth of the river, and behind it, stretching up to the mighty tower of hassan, and the ruins of the great mosque, the scattered houses of the european city showed their many lights across the plain. iv the kasbah of the oudayas salé the white and rabat the red frown at each other over the foaming bar of the bou-regreg, each walled, terraced, minareted, and presenting a singularly complete picture of the two types of moroccan town, the snowy and the tawny. to the gates of both the atlantic breakers roll in with the boom of northern seas, and under a misty northern sky. it is one of the surprises of morocco to find the familiar african pictures bathed in this unfamiliar haze. even the fierce midday sun does not wholly dispel it--the air remains thick, opalescent, like water slightly clouded by milk. one is tempted to say that morocco is tunisia seen by moonlight. the european town of rabat, a rapidly developing community, lies almost wholly outside the walls of the old arab city. the latter, founded in the twelfth century by the great almohad conqueror of spain, yacoub-el-mansour, stretches its mighty walls to the river's mouth. thence they climb the cliff to enclose the kasbah[a] of the oudayas, a troublesome tribe whom one of the almohad sultans, mistrusting their good faith, packed up one day, flocks, tents and camels, and carried across the _bled_ to stow them into these stout walls under his imperial eye. great crenellated ramparts, cyclopean, superb, follow the curve of the cliff. on the landward side they are interrupted by a gate-tower resting on one of the most nobly decorated of the horseshoe arches that break the mighty walls of moroccan cities. underneath the tower the vaulted entrance turns, arab fashion, at right angles, profiling its red arch against darkness and mystery. this bending of passages, so characteristic a device of the moroccan builder, is like an architectural expression of the tortuous secret soul of the land. [footnote a: citadel.] [illustration: _from a photograph from the service des beaux-arts au maroc_ rabat--general view from the kasbah of the oudayas] outside the kasbah a narrow foot-path is squeezed between the walls and the edge of the cliff. toward sunset it looks down on a strange scene. to the south of the citadel the cliff descends to a long dune sloping to a sand-beach; and dune and beach are covered with the slanting headstones of the immense arab cemetery of el alou. acres and acres of graves fall away from the red ramparts to the grey sea; and breakers rolling straight from america send their spray across the lowest stones. there are always things going on toward evening in an arab cemetery. in this one, travellers from the _bled_ are camping in one corner, donkeys grazing (on heaven knows what), a camel dozing under its pack; in another, about a new-made grave, there are ritual movements of muffled figures and wailings of a funeral hymn half drowned by the waves. near us, on a fallen headstone, a man with a thoughtful face sits chatting with two friends and hugging to his breast a tiny boy who looks like a grasshopper in his green caftan; a little way off, a solitary philosopher, his eye fixed on the sunset, lies on another grave, smoking his long pipe of kif. there is infinite sadness in this scene under the fading sky, beside the cold welter of the atlantic. one seems to be not in africa itself, but in the africa that northern crusaders may have dreamed of in snow-bound castles by colder shores of the same ocean. this is what moghreb must have looked like to the confused imagination of the middle ages, to norman knights burning to ransom the holy places, or hansa merchants devising, in steep-roofed towns, of barbary and the long caravans bringing apes and gold-powder from the south. inside the gate of the kasbah one comes on more waste land and on other walls--for all moroccan towns are enclosed in circuit within circuit of battlemented masonry. then, unexpectedly, a gate in one of the inner walls lets one into a tiled court enclosed in a traceried cloister and overlooking an orange-grove that rises out of a carpet of roses. this peaceful and well-ordered place is the interior of the medersa (the college) of the oudayas. morocco is full of these colleges, or rather lodging-houses of the students frequenting the mosques, for all mahometan education is given in the mosque itself, only the preparatory work being done in the colleges. the most beautiful of the medersas date from the earlier years of the long merinid dynasty ( - ), the period at which moroccan art, freed from too distinctively spanish and arab influences, began to develop a delicate grace of its own as far removed from the extravagance of spanish ornament as from the inheritance of roman-byzantine motives that the first moslem invasion had brought with it from syria and mesopotamia. these exquisite collegiate buildings, though still in use whenever they are near a well-known mosque, have all fallen into a state of sordid disrepair. the moroccan arab, though he continues to build--and fortunately to build in the old tradition, which has never been lost--has, like all orientals, an invincible repugnance to repairing and restoring, and one after another the frail exposed arab structures, with their open courts and badly constructed terrace-roofs, are crumbling into ruin. happily the french government has at last been asked to intervene, and all over morocco the medersas are being repaired with skill and discretion. that of the oudayas is already completely restored, and as it had long fallen into disuse it has been transformed by the ministry of fine arts into a museum of moroccan art. the plan of the medersas is always much the same: the eternal plan of the arab house, built about one or more arcaded courts, with long narrow rooms enclosing them on the ground floor, and several stories above, reached by narrow stairs, and often opening on finely carved cedar galleries. the chief difference between the medersa and the private house, or even the _fondak_,[a] lies in the use to which the rooms are put. in the medersas, one of the ground-floor apartments is always fitted up as a chapel, and shut off from the court by carved cedar doors still often touched with old gilding and vermilion. there are always a few students praying in the chapel, while others sit in the doors of the upper rooms, their books on their knees, or lean over the carved galleries chatting with their companions who are washing their feet at the marble fountain in the court, preparatory to entering the chapel. [footnote a: the moroccan inn or caravanserai.] [illustration: _from a photograph by schmitt, rabat_ rabat--interior court of the medersa of the oudayas] in the medersa of the oudayas, these native activities have been replaced by the lifeless hush of a museum. the rooms are furnished with old rugs, pottery, brasses, the curious embroidered hangings which line the tents of the chiefs, and other specimens of arab art. one room reproduces a barber's shop in the bazaar, its benches covered with fine matting, the hanging mirror inlaid with mother-of-pearl, the razor-handles of silver _niello_. the horseshoe arches of the outer gallery look out on orange-blossoms, roses and the sea. it is all beautiful, calm and harmonious; and if one is tempted to mourn the absence of life and local colour, one has only to visit an abandoned medersa to see that, but for french intervention, the charming colonnades and cedar chambers of the college of the oudayas would by this time be a heap of undistinguished rubbish--for plaster and rubble do not "die in beauty" like the firm stones of rome. v robinson crusoe's "sallee" before morocco passed under the rule of the great governor who now administers it, the european colonists made short work of the beauty and privacy of the old arab towns in which they established themselves. on the west coast, especially, where the mediterranean peoples, from the phenicians to the portuguese, have had trading-posts for over two thousand years, the harm done to such seaboard towns as tangier, rabat and casablanca is hard to estimate. the modern european colonist apparently imagined that to plant his warehouses, _cafés_ and cinema-palaces within the walls which for so long had fiercely excluded him was the most impressive way of proclaiming his domination. under general lyautey such views are no longer tolerated. respect for native habits, native beliefs and native architecture is the first principle inculcated in the civil servants attached to his administration. not only does he require that the native towns shall be kept intact, and no european building erected within them; a sense of beauty not often vouchsafed to colonial governors causes him to place the administration buildings so far beyond the walls that the modern colony grouped around them remains entirely distinct from the old town, instead of growing out of it like an ugly excrescence. the arab quarter of rabat was already irreparably disfigured when general lyautey came to morocco; but ferocious old salé, phenician counting-house and breeder of barbary pirates, had been saved from profanation by its moslem fanaticism. few christian feet had entered its walls except those of the prisoners who, like robinson crusoe, slaved for the wealthy merchants in its mysterious terraced houses. not till two or three years ago was it completely pacified; and when it opened its gates to the infidel it was still, as it is to-day, the type of the untouched moroccan city--so untouched that, with the sunlight irradiating its cream-coloured walls and the blue-white domes above them, it rests on its carpet of rich fruit-gardens like some rare specimen of arab art on a strip of old oriental velvet. within the walls, the magic persists: which does not always happen when one penetrates into the mirage-like cities of arabian africa. salé has the charm of extreme compactness. crowded between the river-mouth and the sea, its white and pale-blue houses almost touch across the narrow streets, and the reed-thatched bazaars seem like miniature reductions of the great trading labyrinths of tunis or fez. everything that the reader of the arabian nights expects to find is here: the whitewashed niches wherein pale youths sit weaving the fine mattings for which the town is still famous; the tunnelled passages where indolent merchants with bare feet crouch in their little kennels hung with richly ornamented saddlery and arms, or with slippers of pale citron leather and bright embroidered _babouches_, the stalls with fruit, olives, tunny-fish, vague syrupy sweets, candles for saints' tombs, mantegnesque garlands of red and green peppers, griddle-cakes sizzling on red-hot pans, and all the varied wares and cakes and condiments that the lady in the tale of the three calanders went out to buy, that memorable morning in the market of bagdad. [illustration: _from a photograph from the service des beaux-arts au maroc_ salé--entrance of the medersa] only at salé all is on a small scale: there is not much of any one thing, except of the exquisite matting. the tide of commerce has ebbed from the intractable old city, and one feels, as one watches the listless purchasers in her little languishing bazaars, that her long animosity against the intruder has ended by destroying her own life. the feeling increases when one leaves the bazaar for the streets adjoining it. an even deeper hush than that which hangs over the well-to-do quarters of all arab towns broods over these silent thoroughfares, with heavy-nailed doors barring half-ruined houses. in a steep deserted square one of these doors opens its panels of weather-silvered cedar on the court of the frailest, ghostliest of medersas--mere carved and painted shell of a dead house of learning. mystic interweavings of endless lines, patient patterns interminably repeated in wood and stone and clay, all are here, from the tessellated paving of the court to the honeycombing of the cedar roof through which a patch of sky shows here and there like an inset of turquoise tiling. this lovely ruin is in the safe hands of the french fine arts administration, and soon the wood-carvers and stucco-workers of fez will have revived its old perfection; but it will never again be more than a show-medersa, standing empty and unused beside the mosque behind whose guarded doors and high walls one guesses that the old religious fanaticism of salé is dying also, as her learning and her commerce have died. in truth the only life in her is centred in the market-place outside the walls, where big expanding rabat goes on certain days to provision herself. the market of salé, though typical of all moroccan markets, has an animation and picturesqueness of its own. its rows of white tents pitched on a dusty square between the outer walls and the fruit-gardens make it look as though a hostile tribe had sat down to lay siege to the town, but the army is an army of hucksters, of farmers from the rich black lands along the river, of swarthy nomads and leather-gaitered peasant women from the hills, of slaves and servants and tradesmen from rabat and salé; a draped, veiled, turbaned mob shrieking, bargaining, fist-shaking, call on allah to witness the monstrous villanies of the misbegotten miscreants they are trading with, and then, struck with the mysterious eastern apathy, sinking down in languid heaps of muslin among the black figs, purple onions and rosy melons, the fluttering hens, the tethered goats, the whinnying foals, that are all enclosed in an outer circle of folded-up camels and of mules dozing under faded crimson saddles. [illustration: _from a photograph by schmitt, rabat_ salé--market-place outside the town] vi chella and the great mosque the merinid sultans of rabat had a terribly troublesome neighbour across the bou-regreg, and they built chella to keep an eye on the pirates of salé. but chella has fallen like a babylonian city triumphed over by the prophets; while salé, sly, fierce and irrepressible, continued till well on in the nineteenth century to breed pirates and fanatics. the ruins of chella lie on the farther side of the plateau above the native town of rabat. the mighty wall enclosing them faces the city wall of rabat, looking at it across one of those great red powdery wastes which seem, in this strange land, like death and the desert forever creeping up to overwhelm the puny works of man. the red waste is scored by countless trains of donkeys carrying water from the springs of chella, by long caravans of mules and camels, and by the busy motors of the french administration; yet there emanates from it an impression of solitude and decay which even the prosaic tinkle of the trams jogging out from the european town to the exhibition grounds above the sea cannot long dispel. perpetually, even in the new thriving french morocco, the outline of a ruin or the look in a pair of eyes shifts the scene, rends the thin veil of the european illusion, and confronts one with the old grey moslem reality. passing under the gate of chella, with its richly carved corbels and lofty crenellated towers, one feels one's self thus completely reabsorbed into the past. below the gate the ground slopes away, bare and blazing, to a hollow where a little blue-green minaret gleams through fig-trees, and fragments of arch and vaulting reveal the outline of a ruined mosque. was ever shade so blue-black and delicious as that of the cork-tree near the spring where the donkey's water-cans are being filled? under its branches a black man in a blue shirt lies immovably sleeping in the dust. close by women and children splash and chatter about the spring, and the dome of a saint's tomb shines through lustreless leaves. the black man, the donkeys, the women and children, the saint's dome, are all part of the inimitable eastern scene in which inertia and agitation are so curiously combined, and a surface of shrill noise flickers over depths of such unfathomable silence. the ruins of chella belong to the purest period of moroccan art. the tracery of the broken arches is all carved in stone or in glazed turquoise tiling, and the fragments of wall and vaulting have the firm elegance of a classic ruin. but what would even their beauty be without the leafy setting of the place? the "unimaginable touch of time" gives chella its peculiar charm: the aged fig-tree clamped in uptorn tiles and thrusting gouty arms between the arches; the garlanding of vines flung from column to column; the secret pool to which childless women are brought to bathe, and where the tree springing from a cleft of the steps is always hung with the bright bits of stuff which are the votive offerings of africa. the shade, the sound of springs, the terraced orange-garden with irises blooming along channels of running water, all this greenery and coolness in the hollow of a fierce red hill make chella seem, to the traveller new to africa, the very type and embodiment of its old contrasts of heat and freshness, of fire and languor. it is like a desert traveller's dream in his last fever. yacoub-el-mansour was the fourth of the great almohad sultans who, in the twelfth century, drove out the effete almoravids, and swept their victorious armies from marrakech to tunis and from tangier to madrid. his grandfather, abd-el-moumen, had been occupied with conquest and civic administration. it was said of his rule that "he seized northern africa to make order prevail there"; and in fact, out of a welter of wild tribes confusedly fighting and robbing he drew an empire firmly seated and securely governed, wherein caravans travelled from the atlas to the straits without fear of attack, and "a soldier wandering through the fields would not have dared to pluck an ear of wheat." [illustration: _from a photograph from the service des beaux-arts au maroc_ chella--ruins of mosque] his grandson, the great el-mansour, was a conqueror too; but where he conquered he planted the undying seed of beauty. the victor of alarcos, the soldier who subdued the north of spain, dreamed a great dream of art. his ambition was to bestow on his three capitals, seville, rabat and marrakech, the three most beautiful towers the world had ever seen; and if the tower of rabat had been completed, and that of seville had not been injured by spanish embellishments, his dream would have been realized. the "tower of hassan," as the sultan's tower is called, rises from the plateau above old rabat, overlooking the steep cliff that drops down to the last winding of the bou-regreg. truncated at half its height, it stands on the edge of the cliff, a far-off beacon to travellers by land and sea. it is one of the world's great monuments, so sufficient in strength and majesty that until one has seen its fellow, the koutoubya of marrakech, one wonders if the genius of the builder could have carried such perfect balance of massive wall-spaces and traceried openings to a triumphant completion. near the tower, the red-brown walls and huge piers of the mosque built at the same time stretch their roofless alignment beneath the sky. this mosque, before it was destroyed, must have been one of the finest monuments of almohad architecture in morocco: now, with its tumbled red masses of masonry and vast cisterns overhung by clumps of blue aloes, it still forms a ruin of roman grandeur. the mosque, the tower, the citadel of the oudayas, and the mighty walls and towers of chella, compose an architectural group as noble and complete as that of some mediaeval tuscan city. all they need to make the comparison exact is that they should have been compactly massed on a steep hill, instead of lying scattered over the wide spaces between the promontory of the oudayas and the hill-side of chella. the founder of rabat, the great yacoub-el-mansour, called it, in memory of the battle of alarcos, "the camp of victory" (_ribat-el-path_), and the monuments he bestowed on it justified the name in another sense, by giving it the beauty that lives when battles are forgotten. ii volubilis, moulay idriss and meknez i volubilis one day before sunrise we set out from rabat for the ruins of roman volubilis. from the ferry of the bou-regreg we looked backward on a last vision of orange ramparts under a night-blue sky sprinkled with stars; ahead, over gardens still deep in shadow, the walls of salé were passing from drab to peach-colour in the eastern glow. dawn is the romantic hour in africa. dirt and dilapidation disappear under a pearly haze, and a breeze from the sea blows away the memory of fetid markets and sordid heaps of humanity. at that hour the old moroccan cities look like the ivory citadels in a persian miniature, and the fat shopkeepers riding out to their vegetable-gardens like princes sallying forth to rescue captive maidens. our way led along the highroad from rabat to the modern port of kenitra, near the ruins of the phenician colony of mehedyia. just north of kenitra we struck the trail, branching off eastward to a european village on the light railway between rabat and fez, and beyond the railway-sheds and flat-roofed stores the wilderness began, stretching away into clear distances bounded by the hills of the rarb,[a] above which the sun was rising. [footnote a: the high plateau-and-hill formation between tangier and fez.] range after range these translucent hills rose before us, all around the solitude was complete. village life, and even tent life, naturally gathers about a river-bank or a spring; and the waste we were crossing was of waterless sand bound together by a loose desert growth. only an abandoned well-curb here and there cast its blue shadow on the yellow _bled_, or a saint's tomb hung like a bubble between sky and sand. the light had the preternatural purity which gives a foretaste of mirage: it was the light in which magic becomes real, and which helps to understand how, to people living in such an atmosphere, the boundary between fact and dream perpetually fluctuates. the sand was scored with tracks and ruts innumerable, for the road between rabat and fez is travelled not only by french government motors but by native caravans and trains of pilgrims to and from the sacred city of moulay idriss, the founder of the idrissite dynasty, whose tomb is in the zerhoun, the mountain ridge above volubilis. to untrained eyes it was impossible to guess which of the trails one ought to follow; and without much surprise we suddenly found the motor stopping, while its wheels spun round vainly in the loose sand. the military chauffeur was not surprised either; nor was captain de m., the french staff-officer who accompanied us. "it often happens just here," they admitted philosophically. "when the general goes to meknez he is always followed by a number of motors, so that if his own is stuck he may go on in another." this was interesting to know, but not particularly helpful, as the general and his motors were not travelling our way that morning. nor was any one else, apparently. it is curious how quickly the _bled_ empties itself to the horizon if one happens to have an accident in it! but we had learned our lesson between tangier and rabat, and were able to produce a fair imitation of the fatalistic smile of the country. the officer remarked cheerfully that somebody might turn up, and we all sat down in the _bled_. a berber woman, cropping up from nowhere, came and sat beside us. she had the thin suntanned face of her kind, brilliant eyes touched with _khol_, high cheek-bones, and the exceedingly short upper lip which gives such charm to the smile of the young nomad women. her dress was the usual faded cotton shift, hooked on the shoulders with brass or silver clasps (still the antique _fibulae_), and wound about with a vague drapery in whose folds a brown baby wriggled. the coolness of dawn had vanished and the sun beat down from a fierce sky. the village on the railway was too far off to be reached on foot, and there were probably no mules there to spare. nearer at hand there was no sign of help, not a fortified farm, or even a circle of nomad tents. it was the unadulterated desert--and we waited. not in vain; for after an hour or two, from far off in the direction of the hills, there appeared an army with banners. we stared at it unbelievingly. the _mirage_, of course! we were too sophisticated to doubt it, and tales of sun-dazed travellers mocked by such visions rose in our well-stocked memories. the chauffeur thought otherwise. "good! that's a pilgrimage from the mountains. they're going to salé to pray at the tomb of the _marabout_; to-day is his feast-day." and so they were! and as we hung on their approach, and speculated as to the chances of their stopping to help, i had time to note the beauty of this long train winding toward us under parti-colored banners. there was something celestial, almost diaphanous, in the hundreds of figures turbaned and draped in white, marching slowly through the hot colorless radiance over the hot colorless sand. the most part were on foot, or bestriding tiny donkeys, but a stately caïd rode alone at the end of the line on a horse saddled with crimson velvet, and to him our officer appealed. the caïd courteously responded, and twenty or thirty pilgrims were ordered to harness themselves to the motor and haul it back to the trail, while the rest of the procession moved hieratically onward. i felt scruples at turning from their path even a fraction of this pious company; but they fell to with a saintly readiness, and before long the motor was on the trail. then rewards were dispensed; and instantly those holy men became a prey to the darkest passions. even in this land of contrasts the transition from pious serenity to rapacious rage can seldom have been more rapid. the devotees of the _marabout_ fought, screamed, tore their garments and rolled over each other with sanguinary gestures in the struggle for our pesetas; then, perceiving our indifference, they suddenly remembered their religious duties, scrambled to their feet, tucked up their flying draperies, and raced after the tail-end of the procession. through a golden heat-haze we struggled on to the hills. the country was fallow, and in great part too sandy for agriculture, but here and there we came on one of the deep-set moroccan rivers, with a reddish-yellow course channelled between perpendicular banks of red earth, and marked by a thin line of verdure that widened to fruit-gardens wherever a village had sprung up. we traversed several of these "sedentary"[a] villages, _nourwals_ of clay houses with thatched conical roofs, in gardens of fig, apricot and pomegranate that must be so many pink and white paradises after the winter rains. [footnote a: so called to distinguish them from the tent villages of the less settled groups.] one of these villages seemed to be inhabited entirely by blacks, big friendly creatures who came out to tell us by which trail to reach the bridge over the yellow _oued_. in the _oued_ their womenkind were washing the variegated family rags. they were handsome blue-bronze creatures, bare to the waist, with tight black astrakhan curls and firmly sculptured legs and ankles; and all around them, like a swarm of gnats, danced countless jolly pickaninnies, naked as lizards, with the spindle legs and globular stomachs of children fed only on cereals. half terrified but wholly interested, these infants buzzed about the motor while we stopped to photograph them; and as we watched their antics we wondered whether they were the descendants of the little soudanese boys whom the founder of meknez, the terrible sultan moulay-ismaël, used to carry off from beyond the atlas and bring up in his military camps to form the nucleus of the black guard which defended his frontiers. we were on the line of travel between meknez and the sea, and it seemed not unlikely that these _nourwals_ were all that remained of scattered outposts of moulay-ismaël's legionaries. after a time we left _oueds_ and villages behind us and were in the mountains of the rarb, toiling across a high sandy plateau. far off a fringe of vegetation showed promise of shade and water, and at last, against a pale mass of olive-trees, we saw the sight which, at whatever end of the world one comes upon it, wakes the same sense of awe: the ruin of a roman city. volubilis (called by the arabs the castle of the pharaohs) is the only considerable roman colony so far discovered in morocco. it stands on the extreme ledge of a high plateau backed by the mountains of the zerhoun. below the plateau, the land drops down precipitately to a narrow river-valley green with orchards and gardens, and in the neck of the valley, where the hills meet again, the conical white town of moulay idriss, the sacred city of morocco, rises sharply against a wooded background. so the two dominations look at each other across the valley: one, the lifeless roman ruin, representing a system, an order, a social conception that still run through all our modern ways, the other, the untouched moslem city, more dead and sucked back into an unintelligible past than any broken architrave of greece or rome. volubilis seems to have had the extent and wealth of a great military outpost, such as timgad in algeria; but in the seventeenth century it was very nearly destroyed by moulay-ismaël, the sultan of the black guard, who carried off its monuments piece-meal to build his new capital of meknez, that mequinez of contemporary travellers which was held to be one of the wonders of the age. little remains to volubilis in the way of important monuments: only the fragments of a basilica, part of an arch of triumph erected in honour of caracalla, and the fallen columns and architraves which strew the path of rome across the world. but its site is magnificent; and as the excavation of the ruins was interrupted by the war it is possible that subsequent search may bring forth other treasures comparable to the beautiful bronze _sloughi_ (the african hound) which is now its principal possession. it was delicious, after seven hours of travel under the african sun, to sit on the shady terrace where the curator of volubilis, m. louis châtelain, welcomes his visitors. the french fine arts have built a charming house with gardens and pergolas for the custodian of the ruins, and have found in m. châtelain an archaeologist so absorbed in his task that, as soon as conditions permit, every inch of soil in the circumference of the city will be made to yield up whatever secrets it hides. ii moulay idriss we lingered under the pergolas of volubilis till the heat grew less intolerable, and then our companions suggested a visit to moulay idriss. [illustration: _from a photograph from the service des beaux-arts au maroc_ volubilis--the western portico of the basilica of antonius pius] such a possibility had not occurred to us, and even captain de m. seemed to doubt whether the expedition were advisable. moulay idriss was still said to be resentful of christian intrusion: it was only a year before that the first french officers had entered it. but m. châtelain was confident that there would be no opposition to our visit, and with the piled-up terraces and towers of the sacred city growing golden in the afternoon light across the valley it was impossible to hesitate. we drove down through an olive-wood as ancient as those of mitylene and corfu, and then along the narrowing valley, between gardens luxuriant even in the parched moroccan autumn. presently the motor began to climb the steep road to the town, and at a gateway we got out and were met by the native chief of police. instantly at the high windows of mysterious houses veiled heads appeared and sidelong eyes cautiously inspected us. but the quarter was deserted, and we walked on without meeting any one to the street of the weavers, a silent narrow way between low whitewashed niches like the cubicles in a convent. in each niche sat a grave white-robed youth, forming a great amphora-shaped grain-basket out of closely plaited straw. vine-leaves and tendrils hung through the reed roofing overhead, and grape-clusters cast their classic shadow at our feet. it was like walking on the unrolled frieze of a white etruscan vase patterned with black vine garlands. the silence and emptiness of the place began to strike us: there was no sign of the oriental crowd that usually springs out of the dust at the approach of strangers. but suddenly we heard close by the lament of the _rekka_ (a kind of long fife), accompanied by a wild thrum-thrum of earthenware drums and a curious excited chanting of men's voices. i had heard such a chant before, at the other end of north africa, in kairouan, one of the other great sanctuaries of islam, where the sect of the aïssaouas celebrate their sanguinary rites in the _zaouia_[a] of their confraternity. yet it seemed incredible that if the aïssaouas of moulay idriss were performing their ceremonies that day the chief of police should be placidly leading us through the streets in the very direction from which the chant was coming. the moroccan, though he has no desire to get into trouble with the christian, prefers to be left alone on feast-days, especially in such a stronghold of the faith as moulay idriss. [footnote a: sacred college.] [illustration: _from a photograph from the service des beaux-arts au maroc_ moulay-idriss ( , inhabitants)] but "geschehen ist geschehen" is the sum of oriental philosophy. for centuries moulay idriss had held out fanatically on its holy steep; then, suddenly, in , its chiefs saw that the game was up, and surrendered without a pretense of resistance. now the whole thing was over, the new conditions were accepted, and the chief of police assured us that with the french uniform at our side we should be safe anywhere. "the aïssaouas?" he explained. "no, this is another sect, the hamadchas, who are performing their ritual dance on the feast-day of their patron, the _marabout_ hamadch, whose tomb is in the zerhoun. the feast is celebrated publicly in the market-place of moulay idriss." as he spoke we came out into the market-place, and understood why there had been no crowd at the gate. all the population was in the square and on the roofs that mount above it, tier by tier, against the wooded hillside: moulay idriss had better to do that day than to gape at a few tourists in dust-coats. short of sfax, and the other coast cities of eastern tunisia, there is surely not another town in north africa as white as moulay idriss. some are pale blue and pinky yellow, like the kasbah of tangier, or cream and blue like salé, but tangier and salé, for centuries continuously subject to european influences, have probably borrowed their colors from genoa and the italian riviera. in the interior of the country, and especially in morocco, where the whole color-scheme is much soberer than in algeria and tunisia, the color of the native houses is always a penitential shade of mud and ashes. but moulay idriss, that afternoon, was as white as if its arcaded square had been scooped out of a big cream cheese. the late sunlight lay like gold-leaf on one side of the square, the other was in pure blue shade, and above it, the crowded roofs, terraces and balconies packed with women in bright dresses looked like a flower-field on the edge of a marble quarry. the bright dresses were as unusual a sight as the white walls, for the average moroccan crowd is the color of its houses. but the occasion was a special one, for these feasts of the hamadchas occur only twice a year, in spring and autumn, and as the ritual dances take place out of doors, instead of being performed inside the building of the confraternity, the feminine population seizes the opportunity to burst into flower on the housetops. [illustration: _from a photograph from the service des beaux-arts au maroc_ moulay-idriss--the market-place] it is rare, in morocco, to see in the streets or the bazaars any women except of the humblest classes, household slaves, servants, peasants from the country or small tradesmen's wives; and even they (with the exception of the unveiled berber women) are wrapped in the prevailing grave-clothes. the _filles de joie_ and dancing-girls whose brilliant dresses enliven certain streets of the algerian and tunisian towns are invisible, or at least unnoticeable, in morocco, where life, on the whole, seems so much less gay and brightly-tinted; and the women of the richer classes, mercantile or aristocratic, never leave their harems except to be married or buried. a throng of women dressed in light colors is therefore to be seen in public only when some street festival draws them to the roofs. even then it is probable that the throng is mostly composed of slaves, household servants, and women of the lower _bourgeoisie_; but as they are all dressed in mauve and rose and pale green, with long earrings and jewelled head-bands flashing through their parted veils, the illusion, from a little distance, is as complete as though they were the ladies in waiting of the queen of sheba; and that radiant afternoon at moulay idriss, above the vine-garlanded square, and against the background of piled-up terraces, their vivid groups were in such contrast to the usual gray assemblages of the east that the scene seemed like a setting for some extravagantly staged ballet. for the same reason the spectacle unrolling itself below us took on a blessed air of unreality. any normal person who has seen a dance of the aïssaouas and watched them swallow thorns and hot coals, slash themselves with knives, and roll on the floor in epilepsy must have privately longed, after the first excitement was over, to fly from the repulsive scene. the hamadchas are much more savage than aïssaouas, and carry much farther their display of cataleptic anaesthesia, and, knowing this, i had wondered how long i should be able to stand the sight of what was going on below our terrace. but the beauty of the setting redeemed the bestial horror. in that unreal golden light the scene became merely symbolical: it was like one of those strange animal masks which the middle ages brought down from antiquity by way of the satyr-plays of greece, and of which the half-human protagonists still grin and contort themselves among the christian symbols of gothic cathedrals. [illustration: _from a photograph taken by captain henissart of the french army_ moulay-idriss--market-place on the day of the ritual dance of the hamadchas] at one end of the square the musicians stood on a stone platform above the dancers. like the musicians in a bas-relief they were flattened side by side against a wall, the fife-players with lifted arms and inflated cheeks, the drummers pounding frantically on long earthenware drums shaped like enormous hour-glasses and painted in barbaric patterns; and below, down the length of the market-place, the dance unrolled itself in a frenzied order that would have filled with envy a paris or london impresario. in its centre an inspired-looking creature whirled about on his axis, the black ringlets standing out in snaky spirals from his haggard head, his cheek-muscles convulsively twitching. around him, but a long way off, the dancers rocked and circled with long raucous cries dominated by the sobbing booming music, and in the sunlit space between dancers and holy man, two or three impish children bobbed about with fixed eyes and a grimace of comic frenzy, solemnly parodying his contortions. meanwhile a tall grave personage in a doge-like cap, the only calm figure in the tumult, moved gravely here and there, regulating the dance, stimulating the frenzy, or calming some devotee who had broken the ranks and lay tossing and foaming on the stones. there was something far more sinister in this passionless figure, holding his hand on the key that let loose such crazy forces, than in the poor central whirligig who merely set the rhythm of the convulsions. the dancers were all dressed in white caftans or in the blue shirts of the lowest classes. in the sunlight something that looked like fresh red paint glistened on their shaved black or yellow skulls and made dark blotches on their garments. at first these stripes and stains suggested only a gaudy ritual ornament like the pattern on the drums; then one saw that the paint, or whatever it was, kept dripping down from the whirling caftans and forming fresh pools among the stones, that as one of the pools dried up another formed, redder and more glistening, and that these pools were fed from great gashes which the dancers hacked in their own skulls and breasts with hatchets and sharpened stones. the dance was a blood-rite, a great sacrificial symbol, in which blood flowed so freely that all the rocking feet were splashed with it. gradually, however, it became evident that many of the dancers simply rocked and howled, without hacking themselves, and that most of the bleeding skulls and breasts belonged to negroes. every now and then the circle widened to let in another figure, black or dark yellow, the figure of some humble blue-shirted spectator suddenly "getting religion" and rushing forward to snatch a weapon and baptize himself with his own blood; and as each new recruit joined the dancers the music shrieked louder and the devotees howled more wolfishly. and still, in the centre, the mad _marabout_ spun, and the children bobbed and mimicked him and rolled their diamond eyes. such is the dance of the hamadchas, of the confraternity of the _marabout_ hamadch, a powerful saint of the seventeenth century, whose tomb is in the zerhoun above moulay idriss. hamadch, it appears, had a faithful slave, who, when his master died, killed himself in despair, and the self-inflicted wounds of the brotherhood are supposed to symbolize the slave's suicide; though no doubt the origin of the ceremony might be traced back to the depths of that ensanguined grove where mr. fraser plucked the golden bough. the more naïve interpretation, however, has its advantages, since it enables the devotees to divide their ritual duties into two classes, the devotions of the free men being addressed to the saint who died in his bed, while the slaves belong to the slave, and must therefore simulate his horrid end. and this is the reason why most of the white caftans simply rock and writhe, while the humble blue shirts drip with blood. [illustration: _from a photograph taken by captain henissart of the french army_ moulay-idriss--the market-place. procession of the confraternity of the hamadchas] the sun was setting when we came down from our terrace above the market-place. to find a lodging for the night we had to press on to meknez, where we were awaited at the french military post; therefore we were reluctantly obliged to refuse an invitation to take tea with the caïd, whose high-perched house commands the whole white amphitheatre of the town. it was disappointing to leave moulay idriss with the hamadchas howling their maddest, and so much besides to see; but as we drove away under the long shadows of the olives we counted ourselves lucky to have entered the sacred town, and luckier still to have been there on the day of the dance which, till a year ago, no foreigner had been allowed to see. a fine french road runs from moulay idriss to meknez, and we flew on through the dusk between wooded hills and open stretches on which the fires of nomad camps put orange splashes in the darkness. then the moon rose, and by its light we saw a widening valley, and gardens and orchards that stretched up to a great walled city outlined against the stars. iii meknez all that evening, from the garden of the military subdivision on the opposite height, we sat and looked across at the dark tree-clumps and moonlit walls of meknez, and listened to its fantastic history. meknez was built by the sultan moulay-ismaël, around the nucleus of a small town of which the site happened to please him, at the very moment when louis xiv was creating versailles. the coincidence of two contemporary autocrats calling cities out of the wilderness has caused persons with a taste for analogy to describe meknez as the versailles of morocco: an epithet which is about as instructive as it would be to call phidias the benvenuto cellini of greece. there is, however, a pretext for the comparison in the fact that the two sovereigns took a lively interest in each other's affairs. moulay-ismaël sent several embassies to treat with louis xiv on the eternal question of piracy and the ransom of christian captives, and the two rulers were continually exchanging gifts and compliments. the governor of tetouan, who was sent to paris in , having brought as presents to the french king a lion, a lioness, a tigress, and four ostriches, louis xiv shortly afterward despatched m. de saint-amand to morocco with two dozen watches, twelve pieces of gold brocade, a cannon six feet long and other firearms. after this the relations between the two courts remained friendly till , at which time they were strained by the refusal of france to return the moorish captives who were employed on the king's galleys, and who were probably as much needed there as the sultan's christian slaves for the building of moorish palaces. [illustration: _from a photograph from the service des beaux-arts au maroc_ meknez--gate: "bab-mansour"] six years later the sultan despatched abdallah-ben-aïssa to france to reopen negotiations. the ambassador was as brilliantly received and as eagerly run after as a modern statesman on an official mission, and his candidly expressed admiration for the personal charms of the princesse de conti, one of the french monarch's legitimatized children, is supposed to have been mistaken by the court for an offer of marriage from the emperor of barbary. but he came back without a treaty. moulay-ismaël, whose long reign ( to ) and extraordinary exploits make him already a legendary figure, conceived, early in his career, a passion for meknez; and through all his troubled rule, with its alternations of barbaric warfare and far-reaching negotiations, palace intrigue, crazy bloodshed and great administrative reforms, his heart perpetually reverted to the wooded slopes on which he dreamed of building a city more splendid than fez or marrakech. "the sultan" (writes his chronicler aboul kasim-ibn-ahmad, called "ezziani") "loved meknez, the climate of which had enchanted him, and he would have liked never to leave it." he left it, indeed, often, left it perpetually, to fight with revolted tribes in the atlas, to defeat one berber army after another, to carry his arms across the high atlas into the souss, to adorn fez with the heads of seven hundred vanquished chiefs, to put down his three rebellious brothers, to strip all the cities of his empire of their negroes and transport them to meknez ("so that not a negro, man, woman or child, slave or free, was left in any part of the country"); to fight and defeat the christians ( ), to take tangier, to conduct a campaign on the moulouya, to lead the holy war against the spanish ( ), to take larache, the spanish commercial post on the west coast (which furnished eighteen hundred captives for meknez); to lay siege to ceuta, conduct a campaign against the turks of algiers, repress the pillage in his army, subdue more tribes, and build forts for his black legionaries from oudjda to the oued noun. but almost each year's bloody record ends with the placid phrase: "then the sultan returned to meknez." in the year , ezziani writes, the indomitable old man "deprived his rebellious sons of their principalities; after which date he consecrated himself exclusively to the building of his palaces and the planting of his gardens. and in (nineteen years later in this long reign!) he ordered the destruction of the mausoleum of moulay idriss for the purpose of enlarging it. and to gain the necessary space he bought all the adjacent land, and the workmen did not leave these new labors till they were entirely completed." in this same year there was levied on fez a new tax which was so heavy that the inhabitants were obliged to abandon the city. yet it is written of this terrible old monarch, who devastated whole districts, and sacrificed uncounted thousands of lives for his ruthless pleasure, that under his administration of his chaotic and turbulent empire "the country rejoiced in the most complete security. a jew or a woman might travel alone from oudjda to the oued noun without any one's asking their business. abundance reigned throughout the land: grain, food, cattle were to be bought for the lowest prices. nowhere in the whole of morocco was a highwayman or a robber to be found." and probably both sides of the picture are true. what, then, was the marvel across the valley, what were the "lordly pleasure-houses" to whose creation and enlargement moulay-ismaël returned again and again amid the throes and violences of a nearly centenarian life? the chronicler continues: "the sultan caused all the houses near the kasbah[a] to be demolished, _and compelled the inhabitants to carry away the ruins of their dwellings_. all the eastern end of the town was also torn down, and the ramparts were rebuilt. he also built the great mosque next to the palace of nasr.... he occupied himself personally with the construction of his palaces, and before one was finished he caused another to be begun. he built the mosque of elakhdar; the walls of the new town were pierced with twenty fortified gates and surmounted with platforms for cannon. within the walls he made a great artificial lake where one might row in boats. there was also a granary with immense subterranean reservoirs of water, and a stable _three miles long_ for the sultan's horses and mules; twelve thousand horses could be stabled in it. the flooring rested on vaults in which the grain for the horses was stored.... he also built the palace of elmansour, which had twenty cupolas; from the top of each cupola one could look forth on the plain and the mountains around meknez. all about the stables the rarest trees were planted. within the walls were fifty palaces, each with its own mosque and its baths. never was such a thing known in any country, arab or foreign, pagan or moslem. the guarding of the doors of these palaces was intrusted to twelve hundred black eunuchs." [footnote a: the citadel of old meknez.] such were the wonders that seventeenth century travellers toiled across the desert to see, and from which they came back dazzled and almost incredulous, as if half-suspecting that some djinn had deluded them with the vision of a phantom city. but for the soberer european records, and the evidence of the ruins themselves (for the whole of the new meknez is a ruin), one might indeed be inclined to regard ezziani's statements as an oriental fable; but the briefest glimpse of moulay-ismaël's meknez makes it easy to believe all his chronicler tells of it, even to the three miles of stables. next morning we drove across the valley and, skirting the old town on the hill, entered, by one of the twenty gates of moulay-ismaël, a long empty street lined with half-ruined arcades. beyond was another street of beaten red earth bordered by high red walls blotched with gray and mauve. ahead of us this road stretched out interminably (meknez, before washington, was the "city of magnificent distances"), and down its empty length only one or two draped figures passed, like shadows on the way to shadowland. it was clear that the living held no further traffic with the meknez of moulay-ismaël. here it was at last. another great gateway let us, under a resplendently bejewelled arch of turquoise-blue and green, into another walled emptiness of red clay, a third gate opened into still vaster vacancies, and at their farther end rose a colossal red ruin, something like the lower stories of a roman amphitheatre that should stretch out indefinitely instead of forming a circle, or like a series of roman aqueducts built side by side and joined into one structure. below this indescribable ruin the arid ground sloped down to an artificial water which was surely the lake that the sultan had made for his boating-parties; and beyond it more red earth stretched away to more walls and gates, with glimpses of abandoned palaces and huge crumbling angle-towers. the vastness, the silence, the catastrophic desolation of the place, were all the more impressive because of the relatively recent date of the buildings. as moulay-ismaël had dealt with volubilis, so time had dealt with his own meknez; and the destruction which it had taken thousands of lash-driven slaves to inflict on the stout walls of the roman city, neglect and abandonment had here rapidly accomplished. but though the sun-baked clay of which the impatient sultan built his pleasure-houses will not suffer comparison with the firm stones of rome, "the high roman fashion" is visible in the shape and outline of these ruins. what they are no one knows. in spite of ezziani's text (written when the place was already partly destroyed) archaeologists disagree as to the uses of the crypt of rose-flushed clay whose twenty rows of gigantic arches are so like an alignment of roman aqueducts. were these the vaulted granaries, or the subterranean reservoirs under the three miles of stabling which housed the twelve thousand horses? the stables, at any rate, were certainly near this spot, for the lake adjoins the ruins as in the chronicler's description; and between it and old meknez, behind walls within walls, lie all that remains of the fifty palaces with their cupolas, gardens, mosques and baths. this inner region is less ruined than the mysterious vaulted structure, and one of the palaces, being still reserved for the present sultan's use, cannot be visited; but we wandered unchallenged through desert courts, gardens of cypress and olive where dried fountains and painted summer-houses are falling into dust, and barren spaces enclosed in long empty façades. it was all the work of an eager and imperious old man, who, to realize his dream quickly, built in perishable materials, but the design, the dimensions, the whole conception, show that he had not only heard of versailles but had looked with his own eyes on volubilis. [illustration: _from a photograph from the service des beaux-arts au maroc_ meknez--the ruins of the palace of moulay-ismaël] to build on such a scale, and finish the work in a single lifetime, even if the materials be malleable and the life a long one, implies a command of human labor that the other sultan at versailles must have envied. the imposition of the _corvée_ was of course even simpler in morocco than in france, since the material to draw on was unlimited, provided one could assert one's power over it; and for that purpose ismaël had his black army, the hundred and fifty thousand disciplined legionaries who enabled him to enforce his rule over all the wild country from algiers to agadir. the methods by which this army were raised and increased are worth recounting in ezziani's words: "a _taleb_[a] of marrakech having shown the sultan a register containing the names of the negroes who had formed part of the army of el-mansour, moulay-ismaël ordered his agents to collect all that remained of these negroes and their children.... he also sent to the tribes of the beni-hasen, and into the mountains, to purchase all the negroes to be found there. thus all that were in the whole of moghreb were assembled, from the cities and the countryside, till not one was left, slave or free. [footnote a: learned man.] "these negroes were armed and clothed, and sent to mechra erremel (north of meknez) where they were ordered to build themselves houses, plant gardens and remain till their children were ten years old. then the sultan caused all the children to be brought to him, both boys and girls. the boys were apprenticed to masons, carpenters, and other tradesmen; others were employed to make mortar. the next year they were taught to drive the mules, the third to make _adobe_ for building; the fourth year they learned to ride horses bareback, the fifth they were taught to ride in the saddle while using firearms. at the age of sixteen these boys became soldiers. they were then married to the young negresses who had meanwhile been taught cooking and washing in the sultan's palaces--except those who were pretty, and these were given a musical education, after which each one received a wedding-dress and a marriage settlement, and was handed over to her husband. "all the children of these couples were in due time destined for the black army, or for domestic service in the palaces. every year the sultan went to the camp at mechra erremel and brought back the children. the black army numbered one hundred and fifty thousand men, of whom part were at erremel, part at meknez, and the rest in the seventy-six forts which the sultan built for them throughout his domain. may the lord be merciful to his memory!" such was the army by means of which ismaël enforced the _corvée_ on his undisciplined tribes. many thousands of lives went to the building of imperial meknez; but his subjects would scarcely have sufficed if he had not been able to add to them twenty-five thousand christian captives. m. augustin bernard, in his admirable book on morocco, says that the seventeenth century was "the golden age of piracy" in morocco; and the great ismaël was no doubt one of its chief promoters. one understands his unwillingness to come to an agreement with his great friend and competitor, louis xiv, on the difficult subject of the ransom of christian captives when one reads in the admiring ezziani that it took fifty-five thousand prisoners and captives to execute his architectural conceptions. "these prisoners, by day, were occupied on various tasks; at night they were locked into subterranean dungeons. any prisoner who died at his task was _built into the wall he was building_." (this statement is confirmed by john windus, the english traveller who visited the court of moulay-ismaël in the sultan's old age.) many europeans must have succumbed quickly to the heat and the lash, for the wall-builders were obliged to make each stroke in time with their neighbors, and were bastinadoed mercilessly if they broke the rhythm; and there is little doubt that the expert artisans of france, italy and spain were even dearer to the old architectural madman than the friendship of the palace-building despot across the sea. ezziani's chronicle dates from the first part of the nineteenth century, and is an arab's colorless panegyric of a great arab ruler; but john windus, the englishman who accompanied commodore stewart's embassy to meknez in , saw the imperial palaces and their builder with his own eyes, and described them with the vivacity of a foreigner struck by every contrast. moulay-ismaël was then about eighty-seven years old, "a middle-sized man, who has the remains of a good face, with nothing of a negro's features, though his mother was a black. he has a high nose, which is pretty long from the eyebrows downward, and thin. he has lost all his teeth, and breathes short, as if his lungs were bad, coughs and spits pretty often, which never falls to the ground, men being always ready with handkerchiefs to receive it. his beard is thin and very white, his eyes seem to have been sparkling, but their vigor decayed through age, and his cheeks very much sunk in." such was the appearance of this extraordinary man, who deceived, tortured, betrayed, assassinated, terrorized and mocked his slaves, his subjects, his women and children and his ministers like any other half-savage arab despot, but who yet managed through his long reign to maintain a barbarous empire, to police the wilderness, and give at least an appearance of prosperity and security where all had before been chaos. the english emissaries appear to have been much struck by the magnificence of his palaces, then in all the splendor of novelty, and gleaming with marbles brought from volubilis and salé. windus extols in particular the sunken gardens of cypress, pomegranate and orange trees, some of them laid out seventy feet below the level of the palace-courts; the exquisite plaster fretwork; the miles of tessellated walls and pavement made in the finely patterned mosaic work of fez; and the long terrace walk trellised with "vines and other greens" leading from the palace to the famous stables, and over which it was the sultan's custom to drive in a chariot drawn by women and eunuchs. moulay-ismaël received the english ambassador with every show of pomp and friendship, and immediately "made him a present" of a handful of young english captives; but just as the negotiations were about to be concluded commodore stewart was privately advised that the sultan had no intention of allowing the rest of the english to be ransomed. luckily a diplomatically composed letter, addressed by the english envoy to one of the favorite wives, resulted in ismaël's changing his mind, and the captives were finally given up, and departed with their rescuers. as one stands in the fiery sun, among the monstrous ruins of those tragic walls, one pictures the other christian captives pausing for a second, at the risk of death, in the rhythmic beat of their labor, to watch the little train of their companions winding away across the desert to freedom. on the way back through the long streets that lead to the ruins we noticed, lying by the roadside, the shafts of fluted columns, blocks of marble, roman capitals: fragments of the long loot of salé and volubilis. we asked how they came there, and were told that, according to a tradition still believed in the country, when the prisoners and captives who were dragging the building materials toward the palace under the blistering sun heard of the old sultan's death, they dropped their loads with one accord and fled. at the same moment every worker on the walls flung down his trowel or hod, every slave of the palaces stopped grinding or scouring or drawing water or carrying faggots or polishing the miles of tessellated floors, so that, when the tyrant's heart stopped beating, at that very instant life ceased to circulate in the huge house he had built, and in all its members it became a carcass for his carcass. iii fez i the first vision many-walled fez rose up before us out of the plain toward the end of the day. the walls and towers we saw were those of the upper town, fez eldjid (the new), which lies on the edge of the plateau and hides from view old fez tumbling down below it into the ravine of the oued fez. thus approached, the city presents to view only a long line of ramparts and fortresses, merging into the wide, tawny plain and framed in barren mountains. not a house is visible outside the walls, except, at a respectful distance, the few unobtrusive buildings of the european colony, and not a village breaks the desolation of the landscape. as we drew nearer, the walls towered close over us, and skirting them we came to a bare space outside a great horseshoe gate, and found ourselves suddenly in the foreground of a picture by carpaccio or bellini. where else had one seen just those rows of white-turbaned majestic figures, squatting in the dust under lofty walls, all the pale faces ringed in curling beards turned to the story-teller in the centre of the group? transform the story-teller into a rapt young venetian, and you have the audience and the foreground of carpaccio's "preaching of st. stephen," even to the camels craning inquisitive necks above the turbans. every step of the way in north africa corroborates the close observation of the early travellers, whether painters or narrators, and shows the unchanged character of the oriental life that the venetians pictured, and leo africanus and windus and charles cochelet described. there was time, before sunset, to go up to the hill from which the ruined tombs of the merinid sultans look down over the city they made glorious. after the savage massacre of foreign residents in the french encircled the heights commanding fez with one of their admirably engineered military roads, and in a few minutes our motor had climbed to the point from which the great dynasty of artist-sultans dreamed of looking down forever on their capital. nothing endures in islam, except what human inertia has left standing and its own solidity has preserved from the elements. or rather, nothing remains intact, and nothing wholly perishes, but the architecture, like all else, lingers on half-ruined and half-unchanged. the merinid tombs, however, are only hollow shells and broken walls, grown part of the brown cliff they cling to. no one thinks of them save as an added touch of picturesqueness where all is picturesque: they survive as the best point from which to look down at fez. there it lies, outspread in golden light, roofs, terraces, and towers sliding over the plain's edge in a rush dammed here and there by barriers of cypress and ilex, but growing more precipitous as the ravine of the fez narrows downward with the fall of the river. it is as though some powerful enchanter, after decreeing that the city should be hurled into the depths, had been moved by its beauty, and with a wave of his wand held it suspended above destruction. at first the eye takes in only this impression of a great city over a green abyss, then the complex scene begins to define itself. all around are the outer lines of ramparts, walls beyond walls, their crenellations climbing the heights, their angle fortresses dominating the precipices. almost on a level with us lies the upper city, the aristocratic fez eldjid of painted palaces and gardens, then, as the houses close in and descend more abruptly, terraces, minarets, domes, and long reed-thatched roofs of the bazaars, all gather around the green-tiled tomb of moulay idriss and the tower of the almohad mosque of el kairouiyin, which adjoin each other in the depths of fez, and form its central sanctuary. from the merinid hill we had noticed a long façade among the cypresses and fruit-trees of eldjid. this was bou-jeloud, the old summer-palace of the sultan's harem, now the house of the resident-general, where lodgings had been prepared for us. the road descended again, crossing the oued fez by one of the fine old single-arch bridges that mark the architectural link between morocco and spain. we skirted high walls, wayside pools, and dripping mill-wheels; then one of the city gates engulfed us, and we were in the waste spaces of intramural fez, formerly the lines of defense of a rich and perpetually menaced city, now chiefly used for refuse-heaps, open-air fondaks, and dreaming-places for rows of lazaruses rolled in their cerements in the dust. through another gate and more walls we came to an arch in the inner line of defense. beyond that, the motor paused before a green door, where a cadi in a silken caftan received us. across squares of orange-trees divided by running water we were led to an arcaded apartment hung with moroccan embroideries and lined with wide divans; the hall of reception of the resident-general. through its arches were other tiled distances, fountains, arcades, beyond, in greener depths, the bright blossoms of a flower-garden. such was our first sight of bou-jeloud, once the summer-palace of the wives of moulay hafid. upstairs, from a room walled and ceiled with cedar, and decorated with the bold rose-pink embroideries of salé and the intricate old needlework of fez, i looked out over the upper city toward the mauve and tawny mountains. just below the window the flat roofs of a group of little houses descended like the steps of an irregular staircase. between them rose a few cypresses and a green minaret, out of the court of one house an ancient fig-tree thrust its twisted arms. the sun had set, and one after another bright figures appeared on the roofs. the children came first, hung with silver amulets and amber beads, and pursued by negresses in striped turbans, who bustled up with rugs and matting, then the mothers followed more indolently, released from their ashy mufflings and showing, under their light veils, long earrings from the _mellah_[a] and caftans of pale green or peach color. [footnote a: the ghetto in african towns. all the jewellers in morocco are jews.] the houses were humble ones, such as grow up in the cracks of a wealthy quarter, and their inhabitants doubtless small folk, but in the enchanted african twilight the terraces blossomed like gardens, and when the moon rose and the muezzin called from the minaret, the domestic squabbles and the shrill cries from roof to roof became part of a story in bagdad, overheard a thousand years ago by that arch-detective haroun-al-raschid. ii fez eldjid it is usual to speak of fez as very old, and the term seems justified when one remembers that the palace of bou-jeloud stands on the site of an almoravid kasbah of the eleventh century, that when that kasbah was erected fez elbali had already existed for three hundred years, that el kairouiyin is the contemporary of sant' ambrogio of milan, and that the original mosque of moulay idriss ii was built over his grave in the eighth century. fez is, in fact, the oldest city in morocco without a phenician or a roman past, and has preserved more traces than any other of its architectural flowering-time, yet it would be truer to say of it, as of all moroccan cities, that it has no age, since its seemingly immutable shape is forever crumbling and being renewed on the old lines. when we rode forth the next day to visit some of the palaces of eldjid our pink-saddled mules carried us at once out of the bounds of time. how associate anything so precise and occidental as years or centuries with these visions of frail splendor seen through cypresses and roses? the cadis in their multiple muslins, who received us in secret doorways and led us by many passages into the sudden wonder of gardens and fountains; the bright-earringed negresses peering down from painted balconies, the pilgrims and clients dozing in the sun against hot walls, the deserted halls with plaster lace-work and gold pendentives in tiled niches; the venetian chandeliers and tawdry rococo beds, the terraces from which pigeons whirled up in a white cloud while we walked on a carpet of their feathers--were all these the ghosts of vanished state, or the actual setting of the life of some rich merchant with "business connections" in liverpool and lyons, or some government official at that very moment speeding to meknez or casablanca in his sixty h.p. motor? we visited old palaces and new, inhabited and abandoned, and over all lay the same fine dust of oblivion, like the silvery mould on an overripe fruit. overripeness is indeed the characteristic of this rich and stagnant civilization. buildings, people, customs, seem all about to crumble and fall of their own weight: the present is a perpetually prolonged past. to touch the past with one's hands is realized only in dreams, and in morocco the dream-feeling envelopes one at every step. one trembles continually lest the "person from porlock" should step in. [illustration: _from a photograph from the service des beaux-arts au maroc_ fez eldjid (the upper city)] he is undoubtedly on the way, but fez had not heard of him when we rode out that morning. fez eldjid, the "new fez" of palaces and government buildings, was founded in the fourteenth century by the merinid princes, and probably looks much as it did then. the palaces in their overgrown gardens, with pale-green trellises dividing the rose-beds from the blue-and-white tiled paths, and fountains in fluted basins of italian marble, all had the same drowsy charm, yet the oldest were built not more than a century or two ago, others within the last fifty years; and at marrakech, later in our journey, we were to visit a sumptuous dwelling where plaster-cutters and ceramists from fez were actually repeating with wonderful skill and spontaneity, the old ornamentation of which the threads run back to rome and damascus. of really old private dwellings, palaces or rich men's houses, there are surprisingly few in morocco. it is hard to guess the age of some of the featureless houses propping each other's flanks in old fez or old salé, but people rich enough to rebuild have always done so, and the passion for building seems allied, in this country of inconsequences, to the supine indifference that lets existing constructions crumble back to clay. "dust to dust" should have been the motto of the moroccan palace-builders. fez possesses one old secular building, a fine fondak of the fifteenth century, but in morocco, as a rule, only mosques and the tombs of saints are preserved--none too carefully--and even the strong stone buildings of the almohads have been allowed to fall to ruin, as at chella and rabat. this indifference to the completed object--which is like a kind of collective exaggeration of the artist's indifference to his completed work--has resulted in the total disappearance of the furniture and works of art which must have filled the beautiful buildings of the merinid period. neither pottery nor brasswork nor enamels nor fine hangings survive; there is no parallel in morocco to the textiles of syria, the potteries of persia, the byzantine ivories or enamels. it has been said that the moroccan is always a nomad, who lives in his house as if it were a tent; but this is not a conclusive answer to any one who knows the passion of the modern moroccan for european furniture. when one reads the list of the treasures contained in the palaces of the mediaeval sultans of egypt one feels sure that, if artists were lacking in morocco, the princes and merchants who brought skilled craftsmen across the desert to build their cities must also have imported treasures to adorn them. yet, as far as is known, the famous fourteenth-century bronze chandelier of tetuan, and the fine old ritual furniture reported to be contained in certain mosques, are the only important works of art in morocco later in date than the roman _sloughi_ of volubilis. iii fez elbali the distances in fez are so great and the streets so narrow, and in some quarters so crowded, that all but saints or humble folk go about on mule-back. in the afternoon, accordingly, the pink mules came again, and we set out for the long tunnel-like street that leads down the hill to the fez elbali. "look out--'ware heads!" our leader would call back at every turn, as our way shrank to a black passage under a house bestriding the street, or a caravan of donkeys laden with obstructive reeds or branches of dates made the passers-by flatten themselves against the walls. on each side of the street the houses hung over us like fortresses, leaning across the narrow strip of blue and throwing out great beams and buttresses to prop each other's bulging sides. windows there were none on the lower floors; only here and there an iron-barred slit stuffed with rags and immemorial filth, from which a lean cat would suddenly spring out, and scuttle off under an archway like a witch's familiar. [illustration: _from a photograph from the service des beaux-arts au maroc_ fez--a reed-roofed street] some of these descending lanes were packed with people, others as deserted as a cemetery; and it was strange to pass from the thronged streets leading to the bazaars to the profound and secretive silence of a quarter of well-to-do dwelling-houses, where only a few veiled women attended by negro slaves moved noiselessly over the clean cobblestones, and the sound of fountains and runnels came from hidden courtyards and over garden-walls. this noise of water is as characteristic of fez as of damascus. the oued fez rushes through the heart of the town, bridged, canalized, built over, and ever and again bursting out into tumultuous falls and pools shadowed with foliage. the central artery of the city is not a street but a waterfall, and tales are told of the dark uses to which, even now, the underground currents are put by some of the dwellers behind the blank walls and scented gardens of those highly respectable streets. the crowd in oriental cities is made up of many elements, and in morocco turks, jews and infidels, berbers of the mountains, fanatics of the confraternities, soudanese blacks and haggard blue men of the souss, jostle the merchants and government officials with that democratic familiarity which goes side by side with abject servility in this land of perpetual contradictions. but fez is above all the city of wealth and learning, of universities and counting-houses, and the merchant and the _oulama_[a]--the sedentary and luxurious types--prevail. [footnote a: learned man, doctor of the university.] the slippered fazi merchant, wrapped in white muslins and securely mounted on a broad velvet saddle-cloth anchored to the back of a broad mule, is as unlike the arab horseman of the desert as mr. tracy tupman was unlike the musketeers of dumas. ease, music, money-making, the affairs of his harem and the bringing-up of his children, are his chief interests, and his plump pale face with long-lashed hazel eyes, his curling beard and fat womanish hands, recall the portly potentates of hindu miniatures, dreaming among houris beside lotus-tanks. these personages, when they ride abroad, are preceded by a swarthy footman, who keeps his hand on the embroidered bridle; and the government officers and dignitaries of the _makhzen_[a] are usually escorted by several mounted officers of their household, with a servant to each mule. the cry of the runners scatters the crowd, and even the panniered donkeys and perpetually astonished camels somehow contrive to become two-dimensional while the white procession goes by. [footnote a: the sultan's government.] then the populace closes in again, so quickly and densely that it seems impossible it could ever have been parted, and negro water-carriers, muffled women, beggars streaming with sores, sinewy and greasy "saints," soudanese sorcerers hung with amulets made of sardine-boxes and hares'-feet, long-lashed boys of the chleuh in clean embroidered caftans, jews in black robes and skull-caps, university students carrying their prayer-carpets, bangled and spangled black women, scrofulous children with gazelle eyes and mangy skulls, and blind men tapping along with linked arms and howling out verses of the koran, surge together in a mass drawn by irresistible suction to the point where the bazaars converge about the mosques of moulay idriss and el kairouiyin. seen from a terrace of the upper town, the long thatched roofing of el attarine, the central bazaar of fez, promises fantastic revelations of native life; but the dun-colored crowds moving through its checkered twilight, the lack of carved shop-fronts and gaily adorned coffee-houses, and the absence of the painted coffers and vivid embroideries of tunis, remind one that morocco is a melancholy country, and fez a profoundly melancholy city. _dust and ashes, dust and ashes_, echoes from the gray walls, the mouldering thatch of the _souks_, the long lamentable song of the blind beggars sitting in rows under the feet of the camels and asses. no young men stroll through the bazaar in bright caftans, with roses and jasmine behind their ears, no pedlars offer lemonade and sweetmeats and golden-fritters, no flower-sellers pursue one with tight bunches of orange-blossom and little pink roses. the well-to-do ride by in white, and the rest of the population goes mournfully in earth-color. but gradually one falls under the spell of another influence--the influence of the atlas and the desert. unknown africa seems much nearer to morocco than to the white towns of tunis and the smiling oases of south algeria. one feels the nearness of marrakech at fez, and at marrakech that of timbuctoo. fez is sombre, and the bazaars clustered about its holiest sanctuaries form its most sombre quarter. dusk falls there early, and oil-lanterns twinkle in the merchants' niches while the clear african daylight still lies on the gardens of upper fez. this twilight adds to the mystery of the _souks_, making them, in spite of profane noise and crowding and filth, an impressive approach to the sacred places. until a year or two ago, the precincts around moulay idriss and el kairouiyin were _horm_, that is, cut off from the unbeliever. heavy beams of wood barred the end of each _souk_, shutting off the sanctuaries, and the christian could only conjecture what lay beyond. now he knows in part; for, though the beams have not been lowered, all comers may pass under them to the lanes about the mosques, and even pause a moment in their open doorways. farther one may not go, for the shrines of morocco are still closed to unbelievers; but whoever knows cordova, or has stood under the arches of the great mosque of kairouan, can reconstruct something of the hidden beauties of its namesake, the "mosque kairouan" of western africa. once under the bars, the richness of the old moorish fez presses upon one with unexpected beauty. here is the graceful tiled fountain of nedjarine, glittering with the unapproachable blues and greens of ceramic mosaics, near it, the courtyard of the fondak nedjarine, oldest and stateliest of moroccan inns, with triple galleries of sculptured cedar rising above arcades of stone. a little farther on lights and incense draw one to a threshold where it is well not to linger unduly. under a deep archway, between booths where gay votive candles are sold, the glimmer of hanging lamps falls on patches of gilding and mosaic, and on veiled women prostrating themselves before an invisible shrine--for this is the vestibule of the mosque of moulay idriss, where, on certain days of the week, women are admitted to pray. moulay idriss was not built over the grave of the fatimite prophet, first of the name, whose bones lie in the zerhoun above his sacred town. the mosque of fez grew up around the tomb of his posthumous son, moulay idriss ii, who, descending from the hills, fell upon a camp of berbers on an affluent of the sebou, and there laid the foundations of fez, and of the moroccan empire. [illustration: _from a photograph from the service des beaux-arts au maroc_ fez--the nedjarine fountain] of the original monument it is said that little remains. the _zaouia_[a] which encloses it dates from the reign of moulay-ismaël, the seventeenth-century sultan of meknez, and the mosque itself, and the green minaret shooting up from the very centre of old fez, were not built until . but a rich surface of age has already formed on all these disparate buildings, and the over-gorgeous details of the shrines and fountains set in their outer walls are blended into harmony by a film of incense-smoke, and the grease of countless venerating lips and hands. [footnote a: moslem monastery.] featureless walls of mean houses close in again at the next turn; but a few steps farther another archway reveals another secret scene. this time it is a corner of the jealously guarded court of ablutions in the great mosque el kairouiyin, with the twin green-roofed pavilions that are so like those of the alhambra. those who have walked around the outer walls of the mosque of the other kairouan, and recall the successive doors opening into the forecourt and into the mosque itself, will be able to guess at the plan of the church of fez. the great almohad sanctuary of tunisia is singularly free from parasitic buildings, and may be approached as easily as that of cordova, but the approaches of el kairouiyin are so built up that one never knows at which turn of the labyrinth one may catch sight of its court of fountains, or peep down the endless colonnades of which the arabs say: "the man who should try to count the columns of kairouiyin would go mad." marble floors, heavy whitewashed piers, prostrate figures in the penumbra, rows of yellow slippers outside in the sunlight--out of such glimpses one must reconstruct a vision of the long vistas of arches, the blues and golds of the _mirhab_,[a] the lustre of bronze chandeliers, and the ivory inlaying of the twelfth-century _minbar_[b] of ebony and sandalwood. [footnote a: niche in the sanctuary of mosques.] [footnote b: movable pulpit.] no christian footstep has yet profaned kairouiyin, but fairly definite information as to its plan has been gleaned by students of moroccan art. the number of its "countless" columns has been counted, and it is known that, to the right of the _mirhab_, carved cedar doors open into a mortuary chapel called "the mosque of the dead"--and also that in this chapel, on fridays, old books and precious manuscripts are sold by auction. this odd association of uses recalls the fact that kairouiyin is not only a church but a library, the university of fez as well as its cathedral. the beautiful medersas with which the merinids adorned the city are simply the lodging-houses of the students, the classes are all held in the courts and galleries adjoining the mosque. el kairouiyin was originally an oratory built in the ninth century by fatmah, whose father had migrated from kairouan to fez. later it was enlarged, and its cupola was surmounted by the talismans which protect sacred edifices against rats, scorpions and serpents, but in spite of these precautions all animal life was not successfully exorcised from it. in the twelfth century, when the great gate ech chemmâin was building, a well was discovered under its foundations. the mouth of the well was obstructed by an immense tortoise, but when the workmen attempted to take the tortoise out she said: "burn me rather than take me away from here." they respected her wishes and built her into the foundations; and since then women who suffer from the back-ache have only to come and sit on the bench above the well to be cured. the actual mosque, or "praying-hall," is said to be formed of a rectangle or double cube of metres by , and this vast space is equally divided by rows of horseshoe arches resting on whitewashed piers on which the lower part is swathed in finely patterned matting from salé. fifteen monumental doorways lead into the mosque. their doors are of cedar, heavily barred and ornamented with wrought iron, and one of them bears the name of the artisan, and the date of the hegira (the first half of the twelfth century). the mosque also contains the two halls of audience of the cadi, of which one has a graceful exterior façade with coupled lights under horseshoe arches; the library, whose , volumes are reported to have dwindled to about a thousand, the chapel where the masters of the koran recite the sacred text in fulfilment of pious bequests; the "museum" in the upper part of the minaret, wherein a remarkable collection of ancient astronomical instruments is said to be preserved; and the _mestonda_, or raised hall above the court, where women come to pray. but the crown of el kairouiyin is the merinid court of ablutions. this inaccessible wonder lies close under the medersa attarine, one of the oldest and most beautiful collegiate buildings of fez, and through the kindness of the director of fine arts, who was with us, we were taken up to the roof of the medersa and allowed to look down into the enclosure. it is so closely guarded from below that from our secret coign of vantage we seemed to be looking down into the heart of forbidden things. spacious and serene the great tiled cloister lay beneath us, water spilling over from a central basin of marble with a cool sound to which lesser fountains made answer from under the pyramidal green roofs of the twin pavilions. it was near the prayer-hour, and worshippers were flocking in, laying off their shoes and burnouses, washing their faces at the fountains and their feet in the central tank, or stretching themselves out in the shadow of the enclosing arcade. this, then, was the famous court "so cool in the great heats that seated by thy beautiful jet of water i feel the perfection of bliss"--as the learned doctor abou abd allah el maghili sang of it, the court in which the students gather from the adjoining halls after having committed to memory the principles of grammar in prose and verse, the "science of the reading of the koran," the invention, exposition and ornaments of style, law, medicine, theology, metaphysics and astronomy, as well as the talismanic numbers, and the art of ascertaining by calculation the influences of the angels, the spirits and the heavenly bodies, "the names of the victor and the vanquished, and of the desired object and the person who desires it." such is the twentieth-century curriculum of the university of fez. repetition is the rule of arab education as it is of arab ornament. the teaching of the university is based entirely on the mediaeval principle of mnemonics, and as there are no examinations, no degrees, no limits to the duration of any given course, nor is any disgrace attached to slowness in learning, it is not surprising that many students, coming as youths, linger by the fountain of kairouiyin till their hair is gray. one well-known _oulama_ has lately finished his studies after twenty-seven years at the university, and is justly proud of the length of his stay. the life of the scholar is easy, the way of knowledge is long, the contrast exquisite between the foul lanes and noisy bazaars outside and this cool heaven of learning. no wonder the students of kairouiyin say with the tortoise, "burn me rather than take me away." iv el andalous and the potters' field outside the sacred precincts of moulay idriss and kairouiyin, on the other side of the oued fez, lies el andalous, the mosque which the andalusian moors built when they settled in fez in the ninth century. it stands apart from the bazaars, on higher ground, and though it is not _horm_ we found it less easy to see than the more famous mosques, since the christian loiterer in its doorways is more quickly noticed. the fazi are not yet used to seeing unbelievers near their sacred places. it is only in the tumult and confusion of the _souks_ that one can linger on the edge of the inner mysteries without becoming aware of attracting sullen looks, and my only impression of el andalous is of a magnificent almohad door and the rich blur of an interior in which there was no time to single out the details. turning from its forbidden and forbidding threshold we rode on through a poor quarter which leads to the great gate of bab f'touh. beyond the gate rises a dusty rocky slope extending to the outer walls--one of those grim intramural deserts that girdle fez with desolation. this one is strewn with gravestones, not enclosed, but, as in most moroccan cemeteries, simply cropping up like nettles between the rocks and out of the flaming dust. here and there among the slabs rises a well-curb or a crumbling _koubba_. a solitary palm shoots up beside one of the shrines. and between the crowded graves the caravan trail crosses from the outer to the inner gate, and perpetual lines of camels and donkeys trample the dead a little deeper into the dusty earth. this bab f'touh cemetery is also a kind of fondak. poor caravans camp there under the walls in a mire of offal and chicken-feathers and stripped date-branches prowled through by wolfish dogs and buzzed over by fat blue flies. camel-drivers squat beside iron kettles over heaps of embers, sorcerers from the sahara offer their amulets to negro women, peddlers with portable wooden booths sell greasy cakes that look as if they had been made out of the garbage of the caravans, and in and out among the unknown dead and sleeping saints circulates the squalid indifferent life of the living poor. a walled lane leads down from bab f'touh to a lower slope, where the fazi potters have their baking-kilns. under a series of grassy terraces overgrown with olives we saw the archaic ovens and dripping wheels which produce the earthenware sold in the _souks_. it is a primitive and homely ware, still fine in shape, though dull in color and monotonous in pattern; and stacked on the red earth under the olives, the rows of jars and cups, in their unglazed and unpainted state, showed their classical descent more plainly than after they have been decorated. this green quiet hollow, where turbaned figures were moving attentively among the primitive ovens, so near to the region of flies and offal we had just left, woke an old phrase in our memories, and as our mules stumbled back over the graves of bab f'touh we understood the grim meaning of the words: "they carried him out and buried him in the potters' field." v medersas, bazaars and an oasis fez, for two centuries and more, was in a double sense the capital of morocco: the centre of its trade as well as of its culture. culture, in fact, came to northwest africa chiefly through the merinid princes. the almohads had erected great monuments from rabat to marrakech, and had fortified fez, but their "mighty wasteful empire" fell apart like those that had preceded it. stability had to come from the west; it was not till the arabs had learned it through the moors that morocco produced a dynasty strong and enlightened enough to carry out the dream of its founders. whichever way the discussion sways as to the priority of eastern or western influences on moroccan art--whether it came to her from syria, and was thence passed on to spain, or was first formed in spain, and afterward modified by the moroccan imagination--there can at least be no doubt that fazi art and culture, in their prime, are partly the reflection of european civilization. fugitives from spain came to the new city when moulay idriss founded it. one part of the town was given to them, and the river divided the elbali of the almohads into the two quarters of kairouiyin and andalous, which still retain their old names. but the full intellectual and artistic flowering of fez was delayed till the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries. it seems as though the seeds of the new springtime of art, blown across the sea from reawakening europe, had at last given the weltering tribes of the desert the force to create their own type of beauty. nine medersas sprang up in fez, six of them built by the princes who were also creating the exquisite collegiate buildings of salé, rabat and old meknez, and the enchanting mosque and minaret of chella. the power of these rulers also was in perpetual flux, they were always at war with the sultans of tlemcen, the christians of spain, the princes of northern algeria and tunis. but during the fourteenth century they established a rule wide and firm enough to permit of the great outburst of art and learning which produced the medersas of fez. until a year or two ago these collegiate buildings were as inaccessible as the mosques, but now that the french government has undertaken their restoration strangers may visit them under the guidance of the fine arts department. all are built on the same plan, the plan of salé and rabat, which (as m. tranchant de lunel[a] has pointed out) became, with slight modifications, that of the rich private houses of morocco. but interesting as they are in plan and the application of ornament, their main beauty lies in their details, in the union of chiselled plaster with the delicate mosaic work of niches and revêtements, the web-like arabesques of the upper walls and the bold, almost gothic sculpture of the cedar architraves and corbels supporting them. and when all these details are enumerated, and also the fretted panels of cedar, the bronze doors with their great shield-like bosses, and the honeycombings and rufflings of the gilded ceilings, there still remains the general tinge of dry disintegration, as though all were perishing of a desert fever--that, and the final wonder of seeing before one, in such a setting, the continuance of the very life that went on there when the tiles were set and the gold was new on the ceilings. [footnote a: in _france-maroc, no._ .] for these tottering medersas, already in the hands of the restorers, are still inhabited. as long as the stairway holds and the balcony has not rotted from its corbels, the students of the university see no reason for abandoning their lodgings above the cool fountain and the house of prayer. the strange men giving incomprehensible orders for unnecessary repairs need not disturb their meditations, and when the hammering grows too loud the _oulamas_ have only to pass through the silk market or the _souk_ of the embroiderers to the mosque of kairouiyin, and go on weaving the pattern of their dreams by the fountain of perfect bliss. one reads of the bazaars of fez that they have been for centuries the central market of the country. here are to be found not only the silks and pottery, the jewish goldsmiths' work, the arms and embroidered saddlery which the city itself produces, but "morocco" from marrakech, rugs, tent-hangings and matting from rabat and salé, grain baskets from moulay idriss, daggers from the souss, and whatever european wares the native markets consume. one looks, on the plan of fez, at the space covered by the bazaars, one breasts the swarms that pour through them from dawn to dusk--and one remains perplexed, disappointed. they are less "oriental" than one had expected, if "oriental" means color and gaiety. sometimes, on occasion, it does mean that: as, for instance, when a procession passes bearing the gifts for a jewish wedding. the gray crowd makes way for a group of musicians in brilliant caftans, and following them comes a long file of women with uncovered faces and bejewelled necks, balancing on their heads the dishes the guests have sent to the feast--_kouskous_, sweet creams and syrups, "gazelles' horns" of sugar and almonds--in delicately woven baskets, each covered with several squares of bright gauze edged with gold. then one remembers the marketing of the lady of "the three calendars," and fez again becomes the bagdad of al raschid. [illustration: _from a photograph from the service des beaux-arts au maroc_ fez--the bazaars. a view of the souk el attarine and the quaisarya (silk market)] but when no exceptional events, processions, ceremonies and the like brighten the underworld of the _souks_, their look is uniformly melancholy. the gay bazaars, the gaily-painted houses, the flowers and flute-playing of north africa, are found in her mediterranean ports, in contact with european influences. the farther west she extends, the more she becomes self-contained, sombre, uninfluenced, a gloomy fanatic with her back to the walls of the atlantic and the atlas. color and laughter lie mostly along the trade-routes, where the peoples of the world come and go in curiosity and rivalry. this ashen crowd swarming gloomily through the dark tunnels represents the real moghreb that is close to the wild tribes of the "hinterland" and the grim feudal fortresses of the atlas. how close, one has only to go out to sefrou on a market-day to see. sefrou is a military outpost in an oasis under the atlas, about forty miles south of fez. to most people the word "oasis" evokes palms and sand; but though morocco possesses many oases it has no pure sand and few palms. i remember it as a considerable event when i discovered one from my lofty window at bou-jeloud. the _bled_ is made of very different stuff from the sand-ocean of the sahara. the light plays few tricks with it. its monotony is wearisome rather than impressive, and the fact that it is seldom without some form of dwarfish vegetation makes the transition less startling when the alluvial green is finally reached. one had always half expected it, and it does not spring at a djinn's wave out of sterile gold. but the fact brings its own compensations. moroccan oases differ one from another far more than those of south algeria and tunisia. some have no palms, others but a few, others are real palm-oases, though even in the south (at least on the hither side of the great atlas) none spreads out a dense uniform roofing of metal-blue fronds like the date-oases of biskra or tozeur. as for sefrou, which foucauld called the most beautiful oasis of morocco, it is simply an extremely fertile valley with vineyards and orchards stretching up to a fine background of mountains. but the fact that it lies just below the atlas makes it an important market-place and centre of caravans. though so near fez it is still almost on the disputed border between the loyal and the "unsubmissive" tribes, those that are _blad-makhzen_ (of the sultan's government) and those that are against it. until recently, therefore, it has been inaccessible to visitors, and even now a strongly fortified french post dominates the height above the town. looking down from the fort, one distinguishes, through masses of many-tinted green, a suburb of arab houses in gardens, and below, on the river, sefrou itself, a stout little walled town with angle-towers defiantly thrust forth toward the atlas. it is just outside these walls that the market is held. it was swarming with hill-people the day we were there, and strange was the contrast between the crowd inside the circle of picketed horses and the white-robed cockneys from rabat who fill the market-place of salé. here at last we were in touch with un-arab morocco, with berbers of the _bled_ and the hills, whose women know no veils and no seclusion, and who, under a thin surface of mahometanism, preserve their old stone and animal worship, and all the gross fetichistic beliefs from which mahomet dreamed of freeing africa. the men were lean and weather-bitten, some with negroid lips, others with beaked noses and gaunt cheek-bones, all muscular and fierce-looking. some were wrapped in the black cloaks worn by the blue men of the sahara,[a] with a great orange sun embroidered on the back, some tunicked like the egyptian fellah, under a rough striped outer garment trimmed with bright tufts and tassels of wool. the men of the rif had a braided lock on the shoulder, those of the atlas a ringlet over each ear, and brown woollen scarfs wound round their temples, leaving the shaven crown bare. [footnote a: so called because of the indigo dye of their tunics, which leaves a permanent stain on their bodies.] the women, squatting among their kids and poultry and cheeses, glanced at us with brilliant hennaed eyes and smiles that lifted their short upper lips maliciously. their thin faces were painted in stripes and patterns of indigo. silver necklets covered their throats, long earrings dangled under the wool-embroidered kerchiefs bound about their temples with a twist of camel's hair, and below the cotton shifts fastened on their shoulders with silver clasps their legs were bare to the knee, or covered with leather leggings to protect them from the thorny _bled_. they seemed abler bargainers than the men, and the play of expression on their dramatic and intensely feminine faces as they wheedled the price of a calf out of a fierce hillsman, or haggled over a heap of dates that a jew with greasy ringlets was trying to secure for his secret distillery, showed that they knew their superiority and enjoyed it. jews abounded in the market-place and also in the town. sefrou contains a large israelite colony, and after we had wandered through the steep streets, over gushing waterfalls spanned by "ass-backed" spanish bridges, and through a thatched _souk_ smelling strong of camels and the desert, the french commissioner (the only european in sefrou) suggested that it might interest us to visit the _mellah_. it was our first sight of a typical jewish quarter in africa. the _mellah_ of fez was almost entirely destroyed during the massacres of (which incidentally included a _pogrom_), and its distinctive character, happily for the inhabitants, has disappeared in the rebuilding. north african jews are still compelled to live in ghettos, into which they are locked at night, as in france and germany in the middle ages, and until lately the men have been compelled to go unarmed, to wear black gabardines and black slippers, to take off their shoes when they passed near a mosque or a saint's tomb, and in various other ways to manifest their subjection to the ruling race. nowhere else do they live in conditions of such demoralizing promiscuity as in some of the cities of morocco. they have so long been subject to unrestricted extortion on the part of the moslems that even the wealthy jews (who are numerous) have sunk to the habits and appearance of the poorest; and sefrou, which has come so recently under french control, offers a good specimen of a _mellah_ before foreign sanitation has lighted up its dark places. dark indeed they were. after wandering through narrow and malodorous lanes, and slipping about in the offal of the _souks_, we were suddenly led under an arch over which should have been written "all light abandon--" and which made all we had seen before seem clean and bright and airy. the beneficent african sun dries up and purifies the immemorial filth of africa, where that sun enters there is none of the foulness of damp. but into the _mellah_ of sefrou it never comes, for the streets form a sort of subterranean rabbit-warren under the upper stories of a solid agglomeration of tall houses--a buried city lit even at midday by oil-lamps hanging in the goldsmiths' shops and under the archways of the black and reeking staircases. it was a jewish feast-day. the hebrew stalls in the _souks_ were closed, and the whole population of the _mellah_ thronged its tunnels in holiday dress. hurrying past us were young women with plump white faces and lovely eyes, turbaned in brilliant gauzes, with draperies of dirty curtain muslin over tawdry brocaded caftans. their paler children swarmed about them, little long-earringed girls like wax dolls dressed in scraps of old finery, little boys in tattered caftans with long-lashed eyes and wily smiles, and, waddling in the rear, their unwieldy grandmothers, huge lumps of tallowy flesh who were probably still in the thirties. with them were the men of the family, in black gabardines and skull-caps, sallow striplings, incalculably aged ancestors, round-bellied husbands and fathers bumping along like black balloons, all hastening to the low doorways dressed with lamps and paper garlands behind which the feast was spread. one is told that in cities like fez and marrakech the hebrew quarter conceals flowery patios and gilded rooms with the heavy european furniture that rich jews delight in. perhaps even in the _mellah_ of sefrou, among the ragged figures shuffling past us, there were some few with bags of gold in their walls and rich stuffs hid away in painted coffers, but for patios and flowers and daylight there seemed no room in the dark _bolgia_ they inhabit. no wonder the babies of the moroccan ghettos are nursed on date-brandy, and their elders doze away to death under its consoling spell. vi the last glimpse it is well to bid good-by to fez at night--a moonlight night for choice. then, after dining at the arab inn of fez eldjid--where it might be inconvenient to lodge, but where it is extremely pleasant to eat _kouskous_ under a grape-trellis in a tiled and fountained patio--this pleasure over, one may set out on foot and stray down the lanes toward fez elbali. not long ago the gates between the different quarters of the city used to be locked every night at nine o'clock, and the merchant who went out to dine in another part of the town had to lodge with his host. now this custom has been given up, and one may roam about untroubled through the old quarters, grown as silent as the grave after the intense life of the bazaars has ceased at nightfall. nobody is in the streets wandering from ghostly passage to passage, one hears no step but that of the watchman with staff and lantern. presently there appears, far off, a light like a low-flying firefly, as it comes nearer, it is seen to proceed from the _mellah_ lamp of open-work brass that a servant carries ahead of two merchants on their way home from elbali. the merchants are grave men, they move softly and slowly on their fat slippered feet, pausing from time to time in confidential talk. at last they stop before a house wall with a low blue door barred by heavy hasps of iron. the servant lifts the lamp and knocks. there is a long delay, then, with infinite caution, the door is opened a few inches, and another lifted light shines faintly on lustrous tiled walls, and on the face of a woman slave who quickly veils herself. evidently the master is a man of standing, and the house well guarded. the two merchants touch each other on the right shoulder, one of them passes in, and his friend goes on through the moonlight, his servant's lantern dancing ahead. but here we are in an open space looking down one of the descents to el attarine. a misty radiance washes the tall houses, the garden-walls, the archways, even the moonlight does not whiten fez, but only turns its gray to tarnished silver. overhead in a tower window a single light twinkles: women's voices rise and fall on the roofs. in a rich man's doorway slaves are sleeping, huddled on the tiles. a cock crows from somebody's dunghill, a skeleton dog prowls by for garbage. everywhere is the loud rush or the low crooning of water, and over every wall comes the scent of jasmine and rose. far off, from the red purgatory between the walls, sounds the savage thrum-thrum of a negro orgy, here all is peace and perfume. a minaret springs up between the roofs like a palm, and from its balcony the little white figure bends over and drops a blessing on all the loveliness and all the squalor. iv marrakech i the way there there are countless arab tales of evil djinns who take the form of sandstorms and hot winds to overwhelm exhausted travellers. in spite of the new french road between rabat and marrakech the memory of such tales rises up insistently from every mile of the level red earth and the desolate stony stretches of the _bled_. as long as the road runs in sight of the atlantic breakers they give the scene freshness and life, but when it bends inland and stretches away across the wilderness the sense of the immensity and immobility of africa descends on one with an intolerable oppression. the road traverses no villages, and not even a ring of nomad tents is visible in the distance on the wide stretches of arable land. at infrequent intervals our motor passed a train of laden mules, or a group of peasants about a well, and sometimes, far off, a fortified farm profiled its thick-set angle-towers against the sky, or a white _koubba_ floated like a mirage above the brush, but these rare signs of life intensified the solitude of the long miles between. at midday we were refreshed by the sight of the little oasis around the military-post of settat. we lunched there with the commanding officer, in a cool arab house about a flowery patio, but that brief interval over, the fiery plain began again. after settat the road runs on for miles across the waste to the gorge of the oued ouem, and beyond the river it climbs to another plain so desperate in its calcined aridity that the prickly scrub of the wilderness we had left seemed like the vegetation of an oasis. for fifty kilometres the earth under our wheels was made up of a kind of glistening red slag covered with pebbles and stones. not the scantest and toughest of rock-growths thrust a leaf through its brassy surface, not a well-head or a darker depression of the rock gave sign of a trickle of water. everything around us glittered with the same unmerciful dryness. a long way ahead loomed the line of the djebilets, the djinn-haunted mountains guarding marrakech on the north. when at last we reached them the wicked glister of their purple flanks seemed like a volcanic upheaval of the plain. for some time we had watched the clouds gathering over them, and as we got to the top of the defile rain was falling from a fringe of thunder to the south. then the vapours lifted, and we saw below us another red plain with an island of palms in its centre. mysteriously, from the heart of the palms, a tower shot up, as if alone in the wilderness, behind it stood the sun-streaked cliffs of the atlas, with snow summits appearing and vanishing through the storm. as we drove downward the rock gradually began to turn to red earth fissured by yellow streams, and stray knots of palms sprang up, lean and dishevelled, about well-heads where people were watering camels and donkeys. to the east, dominating the oasis, the twin peaked hills of the ghilis, fortified to the crest, mounted guard over invisible marrakech; but still, above the palms, we saw only that lonely and triumphant tower. presently we crossed the oued tensif on an old bridge built by moroccan engineers. beyond the river were more palms, then olive-orchards, then the vague sketch of the new european settlement, with a few shops and cafés on avenues ending suddenly in clay pits, and at last marrakech itself appeared to us, in the form of a red wall across a red wilderness. we passed through a gate and were confronted by other ramparts. then we entered an outskirt of dusty red lanes bordered by clay hovels with draped figures slinking by like ghosts. after that more walls, more gates, more endlessly winding lanes, more gates again, more turns, a dusty open space with donkeys and camels and negroes; a final wall with a great door under a lofty arch--and suddenly we were in the palace of the bahia, among flowers and shadows and falling water. ii the bahia whoever would understand marrakech must begin by mounting at sunset to the roof of the bahia. outspread below lies the oasis-city of the south, flat and vast as the great nomad camp it really is, its low roofs extending on all sides to a belt of blue palms ringed with desert. only two or three minarets and a few noblemen's houses among gardens break the general flatness; but they are hardly noticeable, so irresistibly is the eye drawn toward two dominant objects--the white wall of the atlas and the red tower of the koutoubya. foursquare, untapering, the great tower lifts its flanks of ruddy stone. its large spaces of unornamented wall, its triple tier of clustered openings, lightening as they rise from the severe rectangular lights of the first stage to the graceful arcade below the parapet, have the stern harmony of the noblest architecture. the koutoubya would be magnificent anywhere; in this flat desert it is grand enough to face the atlas. the almohad conquerors who built the koutoubya and embellished marrakech dreamed a dream of beauty that extended from the guadalquivir to the sahara; and at its two extremes they placed their watch-towers. the giralda watched over civilized enemies in a land of ancient roman culture, the koutoubya stood at the edge of the world, facing the hordes of the desert. the almoravid princes who founded marrakech came from the black desert of senegal, themselves were leaders of wild hordes. in the history of north africa the same cycle has perpetually repeated itself. generation after generation of chiefs have flowed in from the desert or the mountains, overthrown their predecessors, massacred, plundered, grown rich, built sudden palaces, encouraged their great servants to do the same, then fallen on them, and taken their wealth and their palaces. usually some religious fury, some ascetic wrath against the self-indulgence of the cities, has been the motive of these attacks, but invariably the same results followed, as they followed when the germanic barbarians descended on italy. the conquerors, infected with luxury and mad with power, built vaster palaces, planned grander cities, but sultans and viziers camped in their golden houses as if on the march, and the mud huts of the tribesmen within their walls were but one degree removed from the mud-walled tents of the _bled_. [illustration: _from a photograph from the service des beaux-arts au maroc_ marrakech--the "little garden" (with painted doors) in background, palace of the bahia] this was more especially the case with marrakech, a city of berbers and blacks, and the last outpost against the fierce black world beyond the atlas from which its founders came. when one looks at its site, and considers its history, one can only marvel at the height of civilization it attained. the bahia itself, now the palace of the resident general, though built less than a hundred years ago, is typical of the architectural megalomania of the great southern chiefs. it was built by ba-ahmed, the all-powerful black vizier of the sultan moulay-el-hassan.[a] ba-ahmed was evidently an artist and an archaeologist. his ambition was to re-create a palace of beauty such as the moors had built in the prime of arab art, and he brought to marrakech skilled artificers of fez, the last surviving masters of the mystery of chiselled plaster and ceramic mosaics and honeycombing of gilded cedar. they came, they built the bahia, and it remains the loveliest and most fantastic of moroccan palaces. [footnote a: moulay-el-hassan reigned from to .] court within court, garden beyond garden, reception halls, private apartments, slaves' quarters, sunny prophets' chambers on the roofs and baths in vaulted crypts, the labyrinth of passages and rooms stretches away over several acres of ground. a long court enclosed in pale-green trellis-work, where pigeons plume themselves about a great tank and the dripping tiles glitter with refracted sunlight, leads to the fresh gloom of a cypress garden, or under jasmine tunnels bordered with running water; and these again open on arcaded apartments faced with tiles and stucco-work, where, in a languid twilight, the hours drift by to the ceaseless music of the fountains. the beauty of moroccan palaces is made up of details of ornament and refinements of sensuous delight too numerous to record, but to get an idea of their general character it is worth while to cross the court of cypresses at the bahia and follow a series of low-studded passages that turn on themselves till they reach the centre of the labyrinth. here, passing by a low padlocked door leading to a crypt, and known as the "door of the vizier's treasure-house," one comes on a painted portal that opens into a still more secret sanctuary: the apartment of the grand vizier's favourite. [illustration: _from a photograph by felix, marrakech_ marrakech--the great court, palace of the bahia] this lovely prison, from which all sight and sound of the outer world are excluded, is built about an atrium paved with disks of turquoise and black and white. water trickles from a central _vasca_ of alabaster into an hexagonal mosaic channel in the pavement. the walls, which are at least twenty-five feet high, are roofed with painted beams resting on panels of traceried stucco in which is set a clerestory of jewelled glass. on each side of the atrium are long recessed rooms closed by vermilion doors painted with gold arabesques and vases of spring flowers, and into these shadowy inner rooms, spread with rugs and divans and soft pillows, no light comes except when their doors are opened into the atrium. in this fabulous place it was my good luck to be lodged while i was at marrakech. in a climate where, after the winter snow has melted from the atlas, every breath of air for long months is a flame of fire, these enclosed rooms in the middle of the palaces are the only places of refuge from the heat. even in october the temperature of the favourite's apartment was deliciously reviving after a morning in the bazaars or the dusty streets, and i never came back to its wet tiles and perpetual twilight without the sense of plunging into a deep sea-pool. from far off, through circuitous corridors, came the scent of citron-blossom and jasmine, with sometimes a bird's song before dawn, sometimes a flute's wail at sunset, and always the call of the muezzin in the night, but no sunlight reached the apartment except in remote rays through the clerestory, and no air except through one or two broken panes. sometimes, lying on my divan, and looking out through the vermilion doors, i used to surprise a pair of swallows dropping down from their nest in the cedar-beams to preen themselves on the fountain's edge or in the channels of the pavement, for the roof was full of birds who came and went through the broken panes of the clerestory. usually they were my only visitors, but one morning just at daylight i was waked by a soft tramp of bare feet, and saw, silhouetted against the cream-coloured walls, a procession of eight tall negroes in linen tunics, who filed noiselessly across the atrium like a moving frieze of bronze. in that fantastic setting, and the hush of that twilight hour, the vision was so like the picture of a "seraglio tragedy," some fragment of a delacroix or decamps floating up into the drowsy brain, that i almost fancied i had seen the ghosts of ba-ahmed's executioners revisiting with dagger and bowstring the scene of an unavenged crime. [illustration: _from a photograph taken by mme. la marquis de segonzac_ marrakech--apartment of the grand vizier's favorite, palace of the bahia] a cock crew, and they vanished ... and when i made the mistake of asking what they had been doing in my room at that hour i was told (as though it were the most natural thing in the world) that they were the municipal lamp-lighters of marrakech, whose duty it is to refill every morning the two hundred acetylene lamps lighting the palace of the resident general. such unforeseen aspects, in this mysterious city, do the most ordinary domestic functions wear. iii the bazaars passing out of the enchanted circle of the bahia it is startling to plunge into the native life about its gates. marrakech is the great market of the south, and the south means not only the atlas with its feudal chiefs and their wild clansmen, but all that lies beyond of heat and savagery, the sahara of the veiled touaregs, dakka, timbuctoo, senegal and the soudan. here come the camel caravans from demnat and tameslout, from the moulouya and the souss, and those from the atlantic ports and the confines of algeria. the population of this old city of the southern march has always been even more mixed than that of the northerly moroccan towns. it is made up of the descendants of all the peoples conquered by a long line of sultans who brought their trains of captives across the sea from moorish spain and across the sahara from timbuctoo. even in the highly cultivated region on the lower slopes of the atlas there are groups of varied ethnic origin, the descendants of tribes transplanted by long-gone rulers and still preserving many of their original characteristics. in the bazaars all these peoples meet and mingle: cattle-dealers, olive-growers, peasants from the atlas, the souss and the draa, blue men of the sahara, blacks from senegal and the soudan, coming in to trade with the wool-merchants, tanners, leather-merchants, silk-weavers, armourers, and makers of agricultural implements. dark, fierce and fanatical are these narrow _souks_ of marrakech. they are mere mud lanes roofed with rushes, as in south tunisia and timbuctoo, and the crowds swarming in them are so dense that it is hardly possible, at certain hours, to approach the tiny raised kennels where the merchants sit like idols among their wares. one feels at once that something more than the thought of bargaining--dear as this is to the african heart--animates these incessantly moving throngs. the souks of marrakech seem, more than any others, the central organ of a native life that extends far beyond the city walls into secret clefts of the mountains and far-off oases where plots are hatched and holy wars fomented--farther still, to yellow deserts whence negroes are secretly brought across the atlas to that inmost recess of the bazaar where the ancient traffic in flesh and blood still surreptitiously goes on. all these many threads of the native life, woven of greed and lust, of fetichism and fear and blind hate of the stranger, form, in the _souks_, a thick network in which at times one's feet seem literally to stumble. fanatics in sheepskins glowering from the guarded thresholds of the mosques, fierce tribesmen with inlaid arms in their belts and the fighters' tufts of wiry hair escaping from camel's-hair turbans, mad negroes standing stark naked in niches of the walls and pouring down soudanese incantations upon the fascinated crowd, consumptive jews with pathos and cunning in their large eyes and smiling lips, lusty slave-girls with earthen oil-jars resting against swaying hips, almond-eyed boys leading fat merchants by the hand, and bare-legged berber women, tattooed and insolently gay, trading their striped blankets, or bags of dried roses and irises, for sugar, tea or manchester cottons--from all these hundreds of unknown and unknowable people, bound together by secret affinities, or intriguing against each other with secret hate, there emanates an atmosphere of mystery and menace more stifling than the smell of camels and spices and black bodies and smoking fry which hangs like a fog under the close roofing of the _souks_. and suddenly one leaves the crowd and the turbid air for one of those quiet corners that are like the back-waters of the bazaars, a small square where a vine stretches across a shop-front and hangs ripe clusters of grapes through the reeds. in the patterning of grape-shadows a very old donkey, tethered to a stone-post, dozes under a pack-saddle that is never taken off; and near by, in a matted niche, sits a very old man in white. this is the chief of the guild of "morocco" workers of marrakech, the most accomplished craftsman in morocco in the preparing and using of the skins to which the city gives its name. of these sleek moroccos, cream-white or dyed with cochineal or pomegranate skins, are made the rich bags of the chleuh dancing-boys, the embroidered slippers for the harem, the belts and harnesses that figure so largely in moroccan trade--and of the finest, in old days, were made the pomegranate-red morocco bindings of european bibliophiles. from this peaceful corner one passes into the barbaric splendor of a _souk_ hung with innumerable plumy bunches of floss silk--skeins of citron yellow, crimson, grasshopper green and pure purple. this is the silk-spinners' quarter, and next to it comes that of the dyers, with great seething vats into which the raw silk is plunged, and ropes overhead where the rainbow masses are hung out to dry. another turn leads into the street of the metal-workers and armourers, where the sunlight through the thatch flames on round flanks of beaten copper or picks out the silver bosses of ornate powder-flasks and pistols, and near by is the _souk_ of the plough-shares, crowded with peasants in rough chleuh cloaks who are waiting to have their archaic ploughs repaired, and that of the smiths, in an outer lane of mud huts where negroes squat in the dust and sinewy naked figures in tattered loincloths bend over blazing coals. and here ends the maze of the bazaars. iv the agdal one of the almohad sultans who, during their hundred years of empire, scattered such great monuments from seville to the atlas, felt the need of coolness about his southern capital, and laid out the olive-yards of the agdal. to the south of marrakech the agdal extends for many acres between the outer walls of the city and the edge of the palm-oasis--a continuous belt of silver foliage traversed by deep red lanes, and enclosing a wide-spreading summer palace and two immense reservoirs walled with masonry, and the vision of these serene sheets of water, in which the olives and palms are motionlessly reflected, is one of the most poetic impressions in that city of inveterate poetry. on the edge of one of the reservoirs a sentimental sultan built in the last century a little pleasure-house called the menara. it is composed of a few rooms with a two-storied loggia looking across the water to the palm-groves, and surrounded by a garden of cypresses and orange-trees. the menara, long since abandoned, is usually uninhabited, but on the day when we drove through the agdal we noticed, at the gate, a group of well-dressed servants holding mules with embroidered saddle-clothes. the french officer who was with us asked the porter what was going on, and he replied that the chief of the guild of wool-merchants had hired the pavilion for a week and invited a few friends to visit him. they were now, the porter added, taking tea in the loggia above the lake, and the host, being informed of our presence, begged that we should do him and his friends the honour of visiting the pavilion. in reply to this amiable invitation we crossed an empty saloon surrounded with divans and passed out onto the loggia where the wool-merchant and his guests were seated. they were evidently persons of consequence: large bulky men wrapped in fresh muslins and reclining side by side on muslin-covered divans and cushions. black slaves had placed before them brass trays with pots of mint-tea, glasses in filigree stands, and dishes of gazelles' horns and sugar-plums, and they sat serenely absorbing these refreshments and gazing with large calm eyes upon the motionless water and the reflected trees. so, we were told, they would probably spend the greater part of their holiday. the merchant's cooks had taken possession of the kitchens, and toward sunset a sumptuous repast of many courses would be carried into the saloon on covered trays, and the guests would squat about it on rugs of rabat, tearing with their fingers the tender chicken wings and small artichokes cooked in oil, plunging their fat white hands to the wrist into huge mounds of saffron and rice, and washing off the traces of each course in the brass basin of perfumed water carried about by a young black slave-girl with hoop-earrings and a green-and-gold scarf about her hips. then the singing-girls would come out from marrakech, squat round-faced young women heavily hennaed and bejewelled, accompanied by gaunt musicians in bright caftans; and for hours they would sing sentimental or obscene ballads to the persistent maddening twang of violin and flute and drum. meanwhile fiery brandy or sweet champagne would probably be passed around between the steaming glasses of mint-tea which the slaves perpetually refilled; or perhaps the sultry air, the heavy meal, the scent of the garden and the vertiginous repetition of the music would suffice to plunge these sedentary worthies into the delicious coma in which every festive evening in morocco ends. the next day would be spent in the same manner, except that probably the chleuh boys with sidelong eyes and clean caftans would come instead of the singing-girls, and weave the arabesque of their dance in place of the runic pattern of the singing. but the result would always be the same: a prolonged state of obese ecstasy culminating in the collapse of huge heaps of snoring muslin on the divans against the wall. finally at the week's end the wool-merchant and his friends would all ride back with dignity to the bazaar. v on the roofs "should you like to see the chleuh boys dance?" some one asked. "there they are," another of our companions added, pointing to a dense ring of spectators on one side of the immense dusty square at the entrance of the _souks_--the "square of the dead" as it is called, in memory of the executions that used to take place under one of its grim red gates. it is the square of the living now, the centre of all the life, amusement and gossip of marrakech, and the spectators are so thickly packed about the story-tellers, snake-charmers and dancers who frequent it that one can guess what is going on within each circle only by the wailing monologue or the persistent drum-beat that proceeds from it. ah, yes--we should indeed like to see the chleuh boys dance, we who, since we had been in morocco, had seen no dancing, heard no singing, caught no single glimpse of merry-making! but how were we to get within sight of them? on one side of the "square of the dead" stands a large house, of european build, but modelled on oriental lines: the office of the french municipal administration. the french government no longer allows its offices to be built within the walls of moroccan towns, and this house goes back to the epic days of the caïd sir harry maclean, to whom it was presented by the fantastic abd-el-aziz when the caïd was his favourite companion as well as his military adviser. at the suggestion of the municipal officials we mounted the stairs and looked down on the packed square. there can be no more oriental sight this side of the atlas and the sahara. the square is surrounded by low mud-houses, fondaks, cafés, and the like. in one corner, near the archway leading into the _souks_, is the fruit-market, where the red-gold branches of unripe dates[a] for animal fodder are piled up in great stacks, and dozens of donkeys are coming and going, their panniers laden with fruits and vegetables which are being heaped on the ground in gorgeous pyramids: purple egg-plants, melons, cucumbers, bright orange pumpkins, mauve and pink and violet onions, rusty crimson pomegranates and the gold grapes of sefrou and salé, all mingled with fresh green sheaves of mint and wormwood. [footnote a: dates do not ripen in morocco.] [illustration: _from a photograph from "france-maroc"_ marrakech--a fondak] in the middle of the square sit the story-tellers' turbaned audiences. beyond these are the humbler crowds about the wild-ringleted snake-charmers with their epileptic gestures and hissing incantations, and farther off, in the densest circle of all, we could just discern the shaved heads and waving surpliced arms of the dancing-boys. under an archway near by an important personage in white muslin, mounted on a handsome mule and surrounded by his attendants, sat with motionless face and narrowed eyes gravely following the movements of the dancers. suddenly, as we stood watching the extraordinary animation of the scene, a reddish light overspread it, and one of our companions exclaimed: "ah--a dust-storm!" in that very moment it was upon us: a red cloud rushing across the square out of nowhere, whirling the date-branches over the heads of the squatting throngs, tumbling down the stacks of fruits and vegetables, rooting up the canvas awnings over the lemonade-sellers' stalls and before the café doors, huddling the blinded donkeys under the walls of the fondak, and stripping to the hips the black slave-girls scudding home from the _souks_. such a blast would instantly have scattered any western crowd, but "the patient east" remained undisturbed, rounding its shoulders before the storm and continuing to follow attentively the motions of the dancers and the turns of the story-tellers. by and bye, however, the gale grew too furious, and the spectators were so involved in collapsing tents, eddying date-branches and stampeding mules that the square began to clear, save for the listeners about the most popular story-teller, who continued to sit on unmoved. and then, at the height of the storm, they too were abruptly scattered by the rush of a cavalcade across the square. first came a handsomely dressed man, carrying before him on his peaked saddle a tiny boy in a gold-embroidered orange caftan, in front of whom he held an open book, and behind them a train of white-draped men on showily harnessed mules, followed by musicians in bright dresses. it was only a circumcision procession on its way to the mosque; but the dust-enveloped rider in his rich dress, clutching the bewildered child to his breast, looked like some oriental prince trying to escape with his son from the fiery embraces of desert erl-maidens. as swiftly as it rose the storm subsided, leaving the fruit-market in ruins under a sky as clear and innocent as an infant's eye. the chleuh boys had vanished with the rest, like marionettes swept into a drawer by an impatient child, but presently, toward sunset, we were told that we were to see them after all, and our hosts led us up to the roof of the caïd's house. the city lay stretched before us like one immense terrace circumscribed by palms. the sky was pure blue, verging to turquoise green where the atlas floated above mist; and facing the celestial snows stood the koutoubya, red in the sunset. people were beginning to come out on the roofs: it was the hour of peace, of ablutions, of family life on the house-tops. groups of women in pale tints and floating veils spoke to each other from terrace to terrace, through the chatter of children and the guttural calls of bedizened negresses. and presently, on the roof adjoining ours, appeared the slim dancing-boys with white caftans and hennaed feet. the three swarthy musicians who accompanied them crossed their lean legs on the tiles and set up their throb-throb and thrum-thrum, and on a narrow strip of terrace the youths began their measured steps. it was a grave static dance, such as david may have performed before the ark; untouched by mirth or folly, as beseemed a dance in that sombre land, and borrowing its magic from its gravity. even when the pace quickened with the stress of the music the gestures still continued to be restrained and hieratic, only when, one by one, the performers detached themselves from the round and knelt before us for the _peseta_ it is customary to press on their foreheads, did one see, by the moisture which made the coin adhere, how quick and violent their movements had been. the performance, like all things oriental, like the life, the patterns, the stories, seemed to have no beginning and no end: it just went monotonously and indefatigably on till fate snipped its thread by calling us away to dinner. and so at last we went down into the dust of the streets refreshed by that vision of white youths dancing on the house-tops against the gold of a sunset that made them look--in spite of ankle-bracelets and painted eyes--almost as guileless and happy as the round of angels on the roof of fra angelico's nativity. vi the saadian tombs on one of the last days of our stay in marrakech we were told, almost mysteriously, that permission was to be given us to visit the tombs of the saadian sultans. though marrakech has been in the hands of the french since , the very existence of these tombs was unknown to the authorities till . then the sultan's government privately informed the resident general that an unsuspected treasure of moroccan art was falling into ruin, and after some hesitation it was agreed that general lyautey and the director of fine arts should be admitted to the mosque containing the tombs, on the express condition that the french government undertook to repair them. while we were at rabat general lyautey had described his visit to us, and it was at his request that the sultan authorized us to see the mosque, to which no travellers had as yet been admitted. with a good deal of ceremony, and after the customary _pourparlers_ with the great pasha who controls native affairs at marrakech, an hour was fixed for our visit, and we drove through long lanes of mud-huts to a lost quarter near the walls. at last we came to a deserted square on one side of which stands the long low mosque of mansourah with a turquoise-green minaret embroidered with traceries of sculptured terra cotta. opposite the mosque is a gate in a crumbling wall; and at this gate the pasha's cadi was to meet us with the keys of the mausoleum. but we waited in vain. oriental dilatoriness, or a last secret reluctance to admit unbelievers to a holy place, had caused the cadi to forget his appointment, and we drove away disappointed. the delay drove us to wondering about these mysterious saadian sultans, who, though coming so late in the annals of morocco, had left at least one monument said to be worthy of the merinid tradition. and the tale of the saadians is worth telling. they came from arabia to the draa (the fruitful country south of the great atlas) early in the fifteenth century, when the merinid empire was already near disintegration. like all previous invaders they preached the doctrine of a pure islamism to the polytheistic and indifferent berbers, and found a ready hearing because they denounced the evils of a divided empire, and also because the whole of morocco was in revolt against the christian colonies of spain and portugal, which had encircled the coast from ceuta to agadir with a chain of fortified counting-houses. to _bouter dehors_ the money-making unbeliever was an object that found adherents from the rif to the sahara, and the saadian cherifs soon rallied a mighty following to their standard. islam, though it never really gave a creed to the berbers, supplied them with a war-cry as potent to-day as when it first rang across barbary. the history of the saadians is a foreshortened record of that of all their predecessors. they overthrew the artistic and luxurious merinids, and in their turn became artistic and luxurious. their greatest sultan, abou-el-abbas, surnamed "the golden," after defeating the merinids and putting an end to christian rule in morocco by the crushing victory of el-ksar ( ), bethought him in his turn of enriching himself and beautifying his capital, and with this object in view turned his attention to the black kingdoms of the south. senegal and the soudan, which had been mohammedan since the eleventh century, had attained in the sixteenth century a high degree of commercial wealth and artistic civilization. the sultanate of timbuctoo seems in reality to have been a thriving empire, and if timbuctoo was not the claude-like vision of carthaginian palaces which it became in the tales of imaginative travellers, it apparently had something of the magnificence of fez and marrakech. the saadian army, after a march of four and a half months across the sahara, conquered the whole black south. senegal, the soudan and bornou submitted to abou-el-abbas, the sultan of timbuctoo was dethroned, and the celebrated negro jurist ahmed-baba was brought a prisoner to marrakech, where his chief sorrow appears to have been for the loss of his library of , volumes--though he declared that, of all the numerous members of his family, it was he who possessed the smallest number of books. besides this learned bibliophile, the sultan abou-el-abbas brought back with him an immense booty, principally of ingots of gold, from which he took his surname of "the golden"; and as the result of the expedition marrakech was embellished with mosques and palaces for which the sultan brought marble from carrara, paying for it with loaves of sugar from the sugar-cane that the saadians grew in the souss. in spite of these brilliant beginnings the rule of the dynasty was short and without subsequent interest. based on a fanatical antagonism against the foreigner, and fed by the ever-wakeful hatred of the moors for their spanish conquerors, it raised ever higher the chinese walls of exclusiveness which the more enlightened almohads and merinids had sought to overthrow. henceforward less and less daylight and fresh air were to penetrate into the _souks_ of morocco. the day after our unsuccessful attempt to see the tombs of these ephemeral rulers we received another message, naming an hour for our visit; and this time the pasha's representative was waiting in the archway. we followed his lead, under the openly mistrustful glances of the arabs who hung about the square, and after picking our way through a twisting land between walls, we came out into a filthy nettle-grown space against the ramparts. at intervals of about thirty feet splendid square towers rose from the walls, and facing one of them lay a group of crumbling buildings masked behind other ruins. we were led first into a narrow mosque or praying-chapel, like those of the medersas, with a coffered cedar ceiling resting on four marble columns, and traceried walls of unusually beautiful design. from this chapel we passed into the hall of the tombs, a cube about forty feet square. fourteen columns of colored marble sustain a domed ceiling of gilded cedar, with an exterior deambulatory under a tunnel-vaulting also roofed with cedar. the walls are, as usual, of chiselled stucco, above revêtements of ceramic mosaic, and between the columns lie the white marble cenotaphs of the saadian sultans, covered with arabic inscriptions in the most delicate low-relief. beyond this central mausoleum, and balancing the praying-chapel, lies another long narrow chamber, gold-ceilinged also, and containing a few tombs. it is difficult, in describing the architecture of morocco, to avoid producing an impression of monotony. the ground-plan of mosques and medersas is always practically the same, and the same elements, few in number and endlessly repeated, make up the materials and the form of the ornament. the effect upon the eye is not monotonous, for a patient art has infinitely varied the combinations of pattern and the juxtapositions of color; while the depth of undercutting of the stucco, and the treatment of the bronze doors and of the carved cedar corbels, necessarily varies with the periods which produced them. but in the saadian mausoleum a new element has been introduced which makes this little monument a thing apart. the marble columns supporting the roof appear to be unique in moroccan architecture, and they lend themselves to a new roof-plan which relates the building rather to the tradition of venice or byzantine by way of kairouan and cordova. the late date of the monument precludes any idea of a direct artistic tradition. the most probable explanation seems to be that the architect of the mausoleum was familiar with european renaissance architecture, and saw the beauty to be derived from using precious marbles not merely as ornament, but in the roman and italian way, as a structural element. panels and fountain-basins are ornament, and ornament changes nothing essential in architecture; but when, for instance, heavy square piers are replaced by detached columns, a new style results. it is not only the novelty of its plan that makes the saadian mausoleum singular among moroccan monuments. the details of its ornament are of the most intricate refinement: it seems as though the last graces of the expiring merinid art had been gathered up into this rare blossom. and the slant of sunlight on lustrous columns, the depths of fretted gold, the dusky ivory of the walls and the pure white of the cenotaphs, so classic in spareness of ornament and simplicity of design--this subtle harmony of form and color gives to the dim rich chapel an air of dream-like unreality. [illustration: _from a photograph by m. andré chevrillon_ marrakech--mausoleum of the saadian sultans (sixteenth century) showing the tombs] and how can it seem other than a dream? who can have conceived, in the heart of a savage saharan camp, the serenity and balance of this hidden place? and how came such fragile loveliness to survive, preserving, behind a screen of tumbling walls, of nettles and offal and dead beasts, every curve of its traceries and every cell of its honeycombing? such questions inevitably bring one back to the central riddle of the mysterious north african civilization: the perpetual flux and the immovable stability, the barbarous customs and sensuous refinements, the absence of artistic originality and the gift for regrouping borrowed motives, the patient and exquisite workmanship and the immediate neglect and degradation of the thing once made. revering the dead and camping on their graves, elaborating exquisite monuments only to abandon and defile them, venerating scholarship and wisdom and living in ignorance and grossness, these gifted races, perpetually struggling to reach some higher level of culture from which they have always been swept down by a fresh wave of barbarism, are still only a people in the making. it may be that the political stability which france is helping them to acquire will at last give their higher qualities time for fruition; and when one looks at the mausoleum of marrakech and the medersas of fez one feels that, were the experiment made on artistic grounds alone, it would yet be well worth making. v harems and ceremonies i the crowd in the street to occidental travellers the most vivid impression produced by a first contact with the near east is the surprise of being in a country where the human element increases instead of diminishing the delight of the eye. after all, then, the intimate harmony between nature and architecture and the human body that is revealed in greek art was not an artist's counsel of perfection but an honest rendering of reality: there were, there still are, privileged scenes where the fall of a green-grocer's draperies or a milkman's cloak or a beggar's rags are part of the composition, distinctly related to it in line and colour, and where the natural unstudied attitudes of the human body are correspondingly harmonious, however humdrum the acts it is engaged in. the discovery, to the traveller returning from the east, robs the most romantic scenes of western europe of half their charm: in the piazza of san marco, in the market-place of siena, where at least the robes of the procurators or the gay tights of pinturicchio's striplings once justified man's presence among his works, one can see, at first, only the outrage inflicted on beauty by the "plentiful strutting manikins" of the modern world. moroccan crowds are always a feast to the eye. the instinct of skilful drapery, the sense of colour (subdued by custom, but breaking out in subtle glimpses under the universal ashy tints) make the humblest assemblage of donkey-men and water-carriers an ever-renewed delight. but it is only on rare occasions, and in the court ceremonies to which so few foreigners have had access, that the hidden sumptuousness of the native life is revealed. even then, the term sumptuousness may seem ill-chosen, since the nomadic nature of african life persists in spite of palaces and chamberlains and all the elaborate ritual of the makhzen, and the most pompous rites are likely to end in a dusty gallop of wild tribesmen, and the most princely processions to tail off in a string of half-naked urchins riding bareback on donkeys. as in all oriental countries, the contact between prince and beggar, vizier and serf is disconcertingly free and familiar, and one must see the highest court officials kissing the hem of the sultan's robe, and hear authentic tales of slaves given by one merchant to another at the end of a convivial evening, to be reminded that nothing is as democratic in appearance as a society of which the whole structure hangs on the whim of one man. ii aÏd-el-kebir in the verandah of the residence of rabat i stood looking out between posts festooned with gentian-blue ipomeas at the first shimmer of light on black cypresses and white tobacco-flowers, on the scattered roofs of the new town, and the plain stretching away to the sultan's palace above the sea. we had been told, late the night before, that the sultan would allow madame lyautey, with the three ladies of her party, to be present at the great religious rite of the aïd-el-kebir (the sacrifice of the sheep). the honour was an unprecedented one, a favour probably conceded only at the last moment: for as a rule no women are admitted to these ceremonies. it was an opportunity not to be missed, and all through the short stifling night i had lain awake wondering if i should be ready early enough. presently the motors assembled, and we set out with the french officers in attendance on the governor's wife. the sultan's palace, a large modern building on the familiar arab lines, lies in a treeless and gardenless waste enclosed by high walls and close above the blue atlantic. we motored past the gates, where the sultan's black guard was drawn up, and out to the _msalla_,[a] a sort of common adjacent to all the sultan's residences where public ceremonies are usually performed. the sun was already beating down on the great plain thronged with horsemen and with the native population of rabat on mule-back and foot. within an open space in the centre of the crowd a canvas palissade dyed with a bold black pattern surrounded the sultan's tents. the black guard, in scarlet tunics and white and green turbans, were drawn up on the edge of the open space, keeping the spectators at a distance; but under the guidance of our companions we penetrated to the edge of the crowd. [footnote a: the _msalla_ is used for the performance of religious ceremonies when the crowd is too great to be contained in the court of the mosque.] the palissade was open on one side, and within it we could see moving about among the snowy-robed officials a group of men in straight narrow gowns of almond-green, peach-blossom, lilac and pink; they were the sultan's musicians, whose coloured dresses always flower out conspicuously among the white draperies of all the other court attendants. in the tent nearest the opening, against a background of embroidered hangings, a circle of majestic turbaned old men squatted placidly on rabat rugs. presently the circle broke up, there was an agitated coming and going, and some one said: "the sultan has gone to the tent at the back of the enclosure to kill the sheep." a sense of the impending solemnity ran through the crowd. the mysterious rumour which is the voice of the bazaar rose about us like the wind in a palm-oasis; the black guard fired a salute from an adjoining hillock; the clouds of red dust flung up by wheeling horsemen thickened and then parted, and a white-robed rider sprang out from the tent of the sacrifice with something red and dripping across his saddle-bow, and galloped away toward rabat through the shouting. a little shiver ran over the group of occidental spectators, who knew that the dripping red thing was a sheep with its throat so skilfully slit that, if the omen were favourable, it would live on through the long race to rabat and gasp out its agonized life on the tiles of the mosque. the sacrifice of the sheep, one of the four great moslem rites, is simply the annual propitiatory offering made by every mahometan head of a family, and by the sultan as such. it is based not on a koranic injunction, but on the "souna" or record of the prophet's "custom" or usages, which forms an authoritative precedent in moslem ritual. so far goes the moslem exegesis. in reality, of course, the moslem blood-sacrifice comes, by way of the semitic ritual, from far beyond and behind it, and the belief that the sultan's prosperity for the coming year depends on the animal's protracted agony seems to relate the ceremony to the dark magic so deeply rooted in the mysterious tribes peopling north africa long ages before the first phoenician prows had rounded its coast. between the black guard and the tents, five or six horses were being led up and down by muscular grooms in snowy tunics. they were handsome animals, as moroccan horses go, and each of a different colour, and on the bay horse was a red saddle embroidered in gold, on the piebald a saddle of peach-colour and silver, on the chestnut, grass-green encrusted with seed-pearls, on the white mare purple housings, and orange velvet on the grey. the sultan's band had struck up a shrill hammering and twanging, the salute of the black guard continued at intervals, and the caparisoned steeds began to rear and snort and drag back from the cruel arab bits with their exquisite _niello_ incrustations. some one whispered that these were his majesty's horses--and that it was never known till he appeared which one he would mount. presently the crowd about the tents thickened, and when it divided again there emerged from it a grey horse bearing a motionless figure swathed in blinding white. marching at the horse's bridle, lean brown grooms in white tunics rhythmically waved long strips of white linen to keep off the flies from the imperial presence, and beside the motionless rider, in a line with his horse's flank, rode the imperial parasol-bearer, who held above the sovereign's head a great sunshade of bright green velvet. slowly the grey horse advanced a few yards before the tent; behind rode the court dignitaries, followed by the musicians, who looked, in their bright scant caftans, like the slender music-making angels of a florentine fresco. the sultan, pausing beneath his velvet dome, waited to receive the homage of the assembled tribes. an official, riding forward, drew bridle and called out a name. instantly there came storming across the plain a wild cavalcade of tribesmen, with rifles slung across their shoulders, pistols and cutlasses in their belts, and twists of camel's-hair bound about their turbans. within a few feet of the sultan they drew in, their leader uttered a cry and sprang forward, bending to the saddle-bow, and with a great shout the tribe galloped by, each man bowed over his horse's neck as he flew past the hieratic figure on the grey horse. [illustration: _from a photograph from "france-maroc"_ the sultan of morocco under the green umbrella (at meknez, )] again and again this ceremony was repeated, the sultan advancing a few feet as each new group thundered toward him. there were more than ten thousand horsemen and chieftains from the atlas and the wilderness, and as the ceremony continued the dust-clouds grew denser and more fiery-golden, till at last the forward-surging lines showed through them like blurred images in a tarnished mirror. as the sultan advanced we followed, abreast of him and facing the oncoming squadrons. the contrast between his motionless figure and the wild waves of cavalry beating against it typified the strange soul of islam, with its impetuosity forever culminating in impassiveness. the sun hung high, a brazen ball in a white sky, darting down metallic shafts on the dust-enveloped plain and the serene white figure under its umbrella. the fat man with a soft round beard-fringed face, wrapped in spirals of pure white, one plump hand on his embroidered bridle, his yellow-slippered feet thrust heel-down in big velvet-lined stirrups, became, through sheer immobility, a symbol, a mystery, a god. the human flux beat against him, dissolved, ebbed away, another spear-crested wave swept up behind it and dissolved in turn; and he sat on, hour after hour, under the white-hot sky, unconscious of the heat, the dust, the tumult, embodying to the wild factious precipitate hordes a long tradition of serene aloofness. iii the imperial mirador as the last riders galloped up to do homage we were summoned to our motors and driven rapidly to the palace. the sultan had sent word to mme. lyautey that the ladies of the imperial harem would entertain her and her guests while his majesty received the resident general, and we had to hasten back in order not to miss the next act of the spectacle. we walked across a long court lined with the black guard, passed under a gateway, and were met by a shabbily dressed negress. traversing a hot dazzle of polychrome tiles we reached another archway guarded by the chief eunuch, a towering black with the enamelled eyes of a basalt bust. the eunuch delivered us to other negresses, and we entered a labyrinth of inner passages and patios, all murmuring and dripping with water. passing down long corridors where slaves in dim greyish garments flattened themselves against the walls, we caught glimpses of great dark rooms, laundries, pantries, bakeries, kitchens, where savoury things were brewing and stewing, and where more negresses, abandoning their pots and pans, came to peep at us from the threshold. in one corner, on a bench against a wall hung with matting, grey parrots in tall cages were being fed by a slave. [illustration: _from a photograph from "france-maroc"_ a clan of mountaineers and their caïd] a narrow staircase mounted to a landing where a princess out of an arab fairy-tale awaited us. stepping softly on her embroidered slippers she led us to the next landing, where another golden-slippered being smiled out on us, a little girl this one, blushing and dimpling under a jewelled diadem and pearl-woven braids. on a third landing a third damsel appeared, and encircled by the three graces we mounted to the tall _mirador_ in the central tower from which we were to look down at the coming ceremony. one by one, our little guides, kicking off their golden shoes, which a slave laid neatly outside the door, led us on soft bare feet into the upper chamber of the harem. it was a large room, enclosed on all sides by a balcony glazed with panes of brightly-coloured glass. on a gaudy modern rabat carpet stood gilt armchairs of florid design and a table bearing a commercial bronze of the "art goods" variety. divans with muslin-covered cushions were ranged against the walls and down an adjoining gallery-like apartment which was otherwise furnished only with clocks. the passion for clocks and other mechanical contrivances is common to all unmechanical races, and every chief's palace in north africa contains a collection of time-pieces which might be called striking if so many had not ceased to go. but those in the sultan's harem of rabat are remarkable for the fact that, while designed on current european models, they are proportioned in size to the imperial dignity, so that a dutch "grandfather" becomes a wardrobe, and the box-clock of the european mantelpiece a cupboard that has to be set on the floor. at the end of this avenue of time-pieces a european double-bed with a bright silk quilt covered with nottingham lace stood majestically on a carpeted platform. but for the enchanting glimpses of sea and plain through the lattices of the gallery, the apartment of the sultan's ladies falls far short of occidental ideas of elegance. but there was hardly time to think of this, for the door of the _mirador_ was always opening to let in another fairy-tale figure, till at last we were surrounded by a dozen houris, laughing, babbling, taking us by the hand, and putting shy questions while they looked at us with caressing eyes. they were all (our interpretess whispered) the sultan's "favourites," round-faced apricot-tinted girls in their teens, with high cheek-bones, full red lips, surprised brown eyes between curved-up asiatic lids, and little brown hands fluttering out like birds from their brocaded sleeves. in honour of the ceremony, and of mme. lyautey's visit, they had put on their finest clothes, and their freedom of movement was somewhat hampered by their narrow sumptuous gowns, with over-draperies of gold and silver brocade and pale rosy gauze held in by corset-like sashes of gold tissue of fez, and the heavy silken cords that looped their voluminous sleeves. above their foreheads the hair was shaven like that of an italian fourteenth-century beauty, and only a black line as narrow as a pencilled eyebrow showed through the twist of gauze fastened by a jewelled clasp above the real eye-brows. over the forehead-jewel rose the complicated structure of the headdress. ropes of black wool were plaited through the hair, forming, at the back, a double loop that stood out above the nape like the twin handles of a vase, the upper veiled in airy shot gauzes and fastened with jewelled bands and ornaments. on each side of the red cheeks other braids were looped over the ears hung with broad earrings of filigree set with rough pearls and emeralds, or gold loops and pendants of coral, and an unexpected tulle ruff, like that of a watteau shepherdess, framed the round chin above a torrent of necklaces, necklaces of amber, coral, baroque pearls, hung with mysterious barbaric amulets and fetiches. as the young things moved about us on soft hennaed feet the light played on shifting gleams of gold and silver, blue and violet and apple-green, all harmonized and bemisted by clouds of pink and sky-blue, and through the changing group capered a little black picaninny in a caftan of silver-shot purple with a sash of raspberry red. but presently there was a flutter in the aviary. a fresh pair of _babouches_ clicked on the landing, and a young girl, less brilliantly dressed and less brilliant of face than the others, came in on bare painted feet. her movements were shy and hesitating, her large lips pale, her eye-brows less vividly dark, her head less jewelled. but all the little humming-birds gathered about her with respectful rustlings as she advanced toward us leaning on one of the young girls, and holding out her ringed hand to mme. lyautey's curtsey. it was the young princess, the sultan's legitimate daughter. she examined us with sad eyes, spoke a few compliments through the interpretess, and seated herself in silence, letting the others sparkle and chatter. conversation with the shy princess was flagging when one of the favourites beckoned us to the balcony. we were told we might push open the painted panes a few inches, but as we did so the butterfly group drew back lest they should be seen looking out on the forbidden world. salutes were crashing out again from the direction of the _msalla_: puffs of smoke floated over the slopes like thistle-down. farther off, a pall of red vapour veiled the gallop of the last horsemen wheeling away toward rabat. the vapour subsided, and moving out of it we discerned a slow procession. first rode a detachment of the black guard, mounted on black horses, and, comically fierce in their british scarlet and meccan green, a uniform invented at the beginning of the nineteenth century by a retired english army officer. after the guard came the standard-bearers and the great dignitaries, then the sultan, still aloof, immovable, as if rapt in the contemplation of his mystic office. more court officials followed, then the bright-gowned musicians on foot, then a confused irrepressible crowd of pilgrims, beggars, saints, mountebanks, and the other small folk of the bazaar, ending in a line of boys jamming their naked heels into the ribs of world-weary donkeys. the sultan rode into the court below us, and vizier and chamberlains, snowy-white against the scarlet line of the guards, hurried forward to kiss his draperies, his shoes, his stirrup. descending from his velvet saddle, still entranced, he paced across the tiles between a double line of white servitors bowing to the ground. white pigeons circled over him like petals loosed from a great orchard, and he disappeared with his retinue under the shadowy arcade of the audience chamber at the back of the court. [illustration: _from a photograph from "france-maroc"_ the sultan entering marrakech in state] at this point one of the favourites called us in from the _mirador_. the door had just opened to admit an elderly woman preceded by a respectful group of girls. from the newcomer's round ruddy face, her short round body, the round hands emerging from her round wrists, an inexplicable majesty emanated; and though she too was less richly arrayed than the favourites she carried her headdress of striped gauze like a crown. this impressive old lady was the sultan's mother. as she held out her plump wrinkled hand to mme. lyautey and spoke a few words through the interpretess one felt that at last a painted window of the _mirador_ had been broken, and a thought let into the vacuum of the harem. what thought, it would have taken deep insight into the processes of the arab mind to discover; but its honesty was manifest in the old empress's voice and smile. here at last was a woman beyond the trivial dissimulations, the childish cunning, the idle cruelties of the harem. it was not a surprise to be told that she was her son's most trusted adviser, and the chief authority in the palace. if such a woman deceived and intrigued it would be for great purposes and for ends she believed in; the depth of her soul had air and daylight in it, and she would never willingly shut them out. the empress mother chatted for a while with mme. lyautey, asking about the resident general's health, enquiring for news of the war, and saying, with an emotion perceptible even through the unintelligible words: "all is well with morocco as long as all is well with france." then she withdrew, and we were summoned again to the _mirador_. this time it was to see a company of officers in brilliant uniforms advancing at a trot across the plain from rabat. at sight of the figure that headed them, so slim, erect and young on his splendid chestnut, with a pale blue tunic barred by the wide orange ribbon of the cherifian order, salutes pealed forth again from the slope above the palace and the black guard presented arms. a moment later general lyautey and his staff were riding in at the gates below us. on the threshold of the inner court they dismounted, and moving to the other side of our balcony we followed the next stage of the ceremony. the sultan was still seated in the audience chamber. the court officials still stood drawn up in a snow-white line against the snow-white walls. the great dignitaries advanced across the tiles to greet the general, then they fell aside, and he went forward alone, followed at a little distance by his staff. a third of the way across the court he paused, in accordance with the moroccan court ceremonial, and bowed in the direction of the arcaded room; a few steps farther he bowed again, and a third time on the threshold of the room. then french uniforms and moroccan draperies closed in about him, and all vanished into the shadows of the audience hall. our audience too seemed to be over. we had exhausted the limited small talk of the harem, had learned from the young beauties that, though they were forbidden to look on at the ceremony, the dancers and singers would come to entertain them presently, and had begun to take leave when a negress hurried in to say that his majesty begged mme. lyautey and her friends to await his arrival. this was the crowning incident of our visit, and i wondered with what byzantine ritual the anointed one fresh from the exercise of his priestly functions would be received among his women. the door opened, and without any announcement or other preliminary flourish a fat man with a pleasant face, his djellabah stretched over a portly front, walked in holding a little boy by the hand. such was his majesty the sultan moulay youssef, despoiled of sacramental burnouses and turban, and shuffling along on bare yellow-slippered feet with the gait of a stout elderly gentleman who has taken off his boots in the passage preparatory to a domestic evening. the little prince, one of his two legitimate sons, was dressed with equal simplicity, for silken garments are worn in morocco only by musicians, boy-dancers and other hermaphrodite fry. with his ceremonial raiment the sultan had put off his air of superhuman majesty, and the expression of his round pale face corresponded with the plainness of his dress. the favourites fluttered about him, respectful but by no means awestruck, and the youngest began to play with the little prince. we could well believe the report that his was the happiest harem in morocco, as well as the only one into which a breath of the outer world ever came. moulay youssef greeted mme. lyautey with friendly simplicity, made the proper speeches to her companions, and then, with the air of the business-man who has forgotten to give an order before leaving his office, he walked up to a corner of the room, and while the flower-maidens ruffled about him, and through the windows we saw the last participants in the mystic rites galloping away toward the crenellated walls of rabat, his majesty the priest and emperor of the faithful unhooked a small instrument from the wall and applied his sacred lips to the telephone. iv in old rabat before general lyautey came to morocco rabat had been subjected to the indignity of european "improvements," and one must traverse boulevards scored with tram-lines, and pass between hotel-terraces and cafés and cinema-palaces, to reach the surviving nucleus of the once beautiful native town. then, at the turn of a commonplace street, one comes upon it suddenly. the shops and cafés cease, the jingle of trams and the trumpeting of motor-horns die out, and here, all at once, are silence and solitude, and the dignified reticence of the windowless arab house-fronts. we were bound for the house of a high government official, a moroccan dignitary of the old school, who had invited us to tea, and added a message to the effect that the ladies of his household would be happy to receive me. the house we sought was some distance down the quietest of white-walled streets. our companion knocked at a low green door, and we were admitted to a passage into which a wooden stairway descended. a brother-in-law of our host was waiting for us; in his wake we mounted the ladder-like stairs and entered a long room with a florid french carpet and a set of gilt furniture to match. there were no fretted walls, no painted cedar doors, no fountains rustling in unseen courts: the house was squeezed in between others, and such traces of old ornament as it may have possessed had vanished. but presently we saw why its inhabitants were indifferent to such details. our host, a handsome white-bearded old man, welcomed us in the doorway, then he led us to a raised oriel window at one end of the room, and seated us in the gilt armchairs face to face with one of the most beautiful views in morocco. below us lay the white and blue terrace-roofs of the native town, with palms and minarets shooting up between them, or the shadows of a vine-trellis patterning a quiet lane. beyond, the atlantic sparkled, breaking into foam at the mouth of the bou-regreg and under the towering ramparts of the kasbah of the oudayas. to the right, the ruins of the great mosque rose from their plateau over the river; and, on the farther side of the troubled flood, old salé, white and wicked, lay like a jewel in its gardens. with such a scene beneath their eyes, the inhabitants of the house could hardly feel its lack of architectural interest. after exchanging the usual compliments, and giving us time to enjoy the view, our host withdrew, taking with him the men of our party. a moment later he reappeared with a rosy fair-haired girl, dressed in arab costume, but evidently of european birth. the brother-in-law explained that this young woman, who had "studied in algeria," and whose mother was french, was the intimate friend of the ladies of the household, and would act as interpreter. our host then again left us, joining the men visitors in another room, and the door opened to admit his wife and daughters-in-law. the mistress of the house was a handsome algerian with sad expressive eyes, the younger women were pale, fat and amiable. they all wore sober dresses, in keeping with the simplicity of the house, and but for the vacuity of their faces the group might have been that of a professor's family in an english or american university town, decently costumed for an arabian nights' pageant in the college grounds. i was never more vividly reminded of the fact that human nature, from one pole to the other, falls naturally into certain categories, and that respectability wears the same face in an oriental harem as in england or america. my hostesses received me with the utmost amiability, we seated ourselves in the oriel facing the view, and the interchange of questions and compliments began. had i any children? (they asked it all at once.) alas, no. "in islam" (one of the ladies ventured) "a woman without children is considered the most unhappy being in the world." i replied that in the western world also childless women were pitied. (the brother-in-law smiled incredulously.) knowing that european fashions are of absorbing interest to the harem i next enquired: "what do these ladies think of our stiff tailor-dresses? don't they find them excessively ugly?" "yes, they do;" (it was again the brother-in-law who replied.) "but they suppose that in your own homes you dress less badly." "and have they never any desire to travel, or to visit the bazaars, as the turkish ladies do?" "no, indeed. they are too busy to give such matters a thought. in _our country_ women of the highest class occupy themselves with their household and their children, and the rest of their time is devoted to needlework." (at this statement i gave the brother-in-law a smile as incredulous as his own.) all this time the fair-haired interpretess had not been allowed by the vigilant guardian of the harem to utter a word. i turned to her with a question. "so your mother is french, _mademoiselle_?" "_oui, madame_." "from what part of france did she come?" a bewildered pause. finally, "i don't know . . . from switzerland, i think," brought out this shining example of the higher education. in spite of algerian "advantages" the poor girl could speak only a few words of her mother's tongue. she had kept the european features and complexion, but her soul was the soul of islam. the harem had placed its powerful imprint upon her, and she looked at me with the same remote and passive eyes as the daughters of the house. after struggling for a while longer with a conversation which the watchful brother-in-law continued to direct as he pleased, i felt my own lips stiffening into the resigned smile of the harem, and it was a relief when at last their guardian drove the pale flock away, and the handsome old gentleman who owned them reappeared on the scene, bringing back my friends, and followed by slaves and tea. v in fez what thoughts, what speculations, one wonders, go on under the narrow veiled brows of the little creatures destined to the high honour of marriage or concubinage in moroccan palaces? some are brought down from mountains and cedar forests, from the free life of the tents where the nomad women go unveiled. others come from harems in the turreted cities beyond the atlas, where blue palm-groves beat all night against the stars and date-caravans journey across the desert from timbuctoo. some, born and bred in an airy palace among pomegranate gardens and white terraces, pass thence to one of the feudal fortresses near the snows, where for half the year the great chiefs of the south live in their clan, among fighting men and falconers and packs of _sloughis_. and still others grow up in a stifling mellah, trip unveiled on its blue terraces overlooking the gardens of the great, and, seen one day at sunset by a fat vizier or his pale young master, are acquired for a handsome sum and transferred to the painted sepulchre of the harem. worst of all must be the fate of those who go from tents and cedar forests, or from some sea-blown garden above rabat, into one of the houses of old fez. they are well-nigh impenetrable, these palaces of elbali; the fazi dignitaries do not welcome the visits of strange women. on the rare occasions when they are received, a member of the family (one of the sons, or a brother-in-law who has "studied in algeria") usually acts as interpreter; and perhaps it is as well that no one from the outer world should come to remind these listless creatures that somewhere the gulls dance on the atlantic and the wind murmurs through olive-yards and clatters the metallic fronds of palm-groves. we had been invited, one day, to visit the harem of one of the chief dignitaries of the makhzen at fez, and these thoughts came to me as i sat among the pale women in their mouldering prison. the descent through the steep tunnelled streets gave one the sense of being lowered into the shaft of a mine. at each step the strip of sky grew narrower, and was more often obscured by the low vaulted passages into which we plunged. the noises of the bazaar had died out, and only the sound of fountains behind garden walls and the clatter of our mules' hoofs on the stones went with us. then fountains and gardens ceased also, the towering masonry closed in, and we entered an almost subterranean labyrinth which sun and air never reach. at length our mules turned into a _cul-de-sac_ blocked by a high building. on the right was another building, one of those blind mysterious house-fronts of fez that seem like a fragment of its ancient fortifications. clients and servants lounged on the stone benches built into the wall; it was evidently the house of an important person. a charming youth with intelligent eyes waited on the threshold to receive us; he was one of the sons of the house, the one who had "studied in algeria" and knew how to talk to visitors. we followed him into a small arcaded _patio_ hemmed in by the high walls of the house. on the right was the usual long room with archways giving on the court. our host, a patriarchal personage, draped in fat as in a toga, came toward us, a mountain of majestic muslins, his eyes sparkling in a swarthy silver-bearded face. he seated us on divans and lowered his voluminous person to a heap of cushions on the step leading into the court, and the son who had studied in algeria instructed a negress to prepare the tea. across the _patio_ was another arcade closely hung with unbleached cotton. from behind it came the sound of chatter, and now and then a bare brown child in a scant shirt would escape, and be hurriedly pulled back with soft explosions of laughter, while a black woman came out to readjust the curtains. there were three of these negresses, splendid bronze creatures, wearing white djellabahs over bright-coloured caftans, striped scarves knotted about their large hips, and gauze turbans on their crinkled hair. their wrists clinked with heavy silver bracelets, and big circular earrings danced in their purple ear-lobes. a languor lay on all the other inmates of the household, on the servants and hangers-on squatting in the shade under the arcade, on our monumental host and his smiling son; but the three negresses, vibrating with activity, rushed continually from the curtained chamber to the kitchen, and from the kitchen to the master's reception-room, bearing on their pinky-blue palms trays of britannia metal with tall glasses and fresh bunches of mint, shouting orders to dozing menials, and calling to each other from opposite ends of the court; and finally the stoutest of the three, disappearing from view, reappeared suddenly on a pale green balcony overhead, where, profiled against a square of blue sky, she leaned over in a veronese attitude and screamed down to the others like an excited parrot. in spite of their febrile activity and tropical bird-shrieks, we waited in vain for tea; and after a while our host suggested to his son that i might like to visit the ladies of the household. as i had expected, the young man led me across the _patio_, lifted the cotton hanging and introduced me into an apartment exactly like the one we had just left. divans covered with striped mattress-ticking stood against the white walls, and on them sat seven or eight passive-looking women over whom a number of pale children scrambled. the eldest of the group, and evidently the mistress of the house, was an algerian lady, probably of about fifty, with a sad and delicately-modelled face; the others were daughters, daughters-in-law and concubines. the latter word evokes to occidental ears images of sensual seduction which the moroccan harem seldom realizes. all the ladies of this dignified official household wore the same look of somewhat melancholy respectability. in their stuffy curtained apartment they were like cellar-grown flowers, pale, heavy, fuller but frailer than the garden sort. their dresses, rich but sober, the veils and diadems put on in honour of my visit, had a dignified dowdiness in odd contrast to the frivolity of the imperial harem. but what chiefly struck me was the apathy of the younger women. i asked them if they had a garden, and they shook their heads wistfully, saying that there were no gardens in old fez. the roof was therefore their only escape: a roof overlooking acres and acres of other roofs, and closed in by the naked fortified mountains which stand about fez like prison-walls. after a brief exchange of compliments silence fell. conversing through interpreters is a benumbing process, and there are few points of contact between the open-air occidental mind and beings imprisoned in a conception of sexual and domestic life based on slave-service and incessant espionage. these languid women on their muslin cushions toil not, neither do they spin. the moroccan lady knows little of cooking, needlework or any household arts. when her child is ill she can only hang it with amulets and wail over it, the great lady of the fazi palace is as ignorant of hygiene as the peasant-woman of the _bled_. and all these colourless eventless lives depend on the favour of one fat tyrannical man, bloated with good living and authority, himself almost as inert and sedentary as his women, and accustomed to impose his whims on them ever since he ran about the same _patio_ as a little short-smocked boy. the redeeming point in this stagnant domesticity is the tenderness of the parents for their children, and western writers have laid so much stress on this that one would suppose children could be loved only by inert and ignorant parents. it is in fact charming to see the heavy eyes of the moroccan father light up when a brown grass-hopper baby jumps on his knee, and the unfeigned tenderness with which the childless women of the harem caress the babies of their happier rivals. but the sentimentalist moved by this display of family feeling would do well to consider the lives of these much-petted children. ignorance, unhealthiness and a precocious sexual initiation prevail in all classes. education consists in learning by heart endless passages of the koran, and amusement in assisting at spectacles that would be unintelligible to western children, but that the pleasantries of the harem make perfectly comprehensible to moroccan infancy. at eight or nine the little girls are married, at twelve the son of the house is "given his first negress"; and thereafter, in the rich and leisured class, both sexes live till old age in an atmosphere of sensuality without seduction. [illustration: _from a photograph from "france-maroc"_ women watching a procession from a roof] the young son of the house led me back across the court, where the negresses were still shrieking and scurrying, and passing to and fro like a stage-procession with the vain paraphernalia of a tea that never came. our host still smiled from his cushions, resigned to oriental delays. to distract the impatient westerners, a servant unhooked from the wall the cage of a gently-cooing dove. it was brought to us, still cooing, and looked at me with the same resigned and vacant eyes as the ladies i had just left. as it was being restored to its hook the slaves lolling about the entrance scattered respectfully at the approach of a handsome man of about thirty, with delicate features and a black beard. crossing the court, he stooped to kiss the shoulder of our host, who introduced him as his eldest son, the husband of one or two of the little pale wives with whom i had been exchanging platitudes. from the increasing agitation of the negresses it became evident that the ceremony of tea-making had been postponed till his arrival. a metal tray bearing a britannia samovar and tea-pot was placed on the tiles of the court, and squatting beside it the newcomer gravely proceeded to infuse the mint. suddenly the cotton hangings fluttered again, and a tiny child in the scantest of smocks rushed out and scampered across the court. our venerable host, stretching out rapturous arms, caught the fugitive to his bosom, where the little boy lay like a squirrel, watching us with great sidelong eyes. he was the last-born of the patriarch, and the youngest brother of the majestic bearded gentleman engaged in tea-making. while he was still in his father's arms two more sons appeared: charming almond-eyed schoolboys returning from their koran-class, escorted by their slaves. all the sons greeted each other affectionately, and caressed with almost feminine tenderness the dancing baby so lately added to their ranks; and finally, to crown this scene of domestic intimacy, the three negresses, their gigantic effort at last accomplished, passed about glasses of steaming mint and trays of gazelles' horns and white sugar-cakes. vi in marrakech the farther one travels from the mediterranean and europe the closer the curtains of the women's quarters are drawn. the only harem in which we were allowed an interpreter was that of the sultan himself, in the private harems of fez and rabat a french-speaking relative transmitted (or professed to transmit) our remarks; in marrakech, the great nobleman and dignitary who kindly invited me to visit his household was deaf to our hint that the presence of a lady from one of the french government schools might facilitate our intercourse. when we drove up to his palace, one of the stateliest in marrakech, the street was thronged with clansmen and clients. dignified merchants in white muslin, whose grooms held white mules saddled with rose-coloured velvet, warriors from the atlas wearing the corkscrew ringlets which are a sign of military prowess, jewish traders in black gabardines, leather-gaitered peasant-women with chickens and cheese, and beggars rolling their blind eyes or exposing their fly-plastered sores, were gathered in oriental promiscuity about the great man's door; while under the archway stood a group of youths and warlike-looking older men who were evidently of his own clan. the caïd's chamberlain, a middle-aged man of dignified appearance, advanced to meet us between bowing clients and tradesmen. he led us through cool passages lined with the intricate mosaic-work of fez, past beggars who sat on stone benches whining out their blessings, and pale fazi craftsmen laying a floor of delicate tiles. the caïd is a lover of old arab architecture. his splendid house, which is not yet finished, has been planned and decorated on the lines of the old imperial palaces, and when a few years of sun and rain and oriental neglect have worked their way on its cedar-wood and gilding and ivory stucco it will have the same faded loveliness as the fairy palaces of fez. in a garden where fountains splashed and roses climbed among cypresses, the caïd himself awaited us. this great fighter and loyal friend of france is a magnificent eagle-beaked man, brown, lean and sinewy, with vigilant eyes looking out under his carefully draped muslin turban, and negroid lips half-hidden by a close black beard. tea was prepared in the familiar setting; a long arcaded room with painted ceiling and richly stuccoed walls. all around were ranged the usual mattresses covered with striped ticking and piled with muslin cushions. a bedstead of brass, imitating a louis xvi cane bed, and adorned with brass garlands and bows, throned on the usual platform; and the only other ornaments were a few clocks and bunches of wax flowers under glass. like all orientals, this hero of the atlas, who spends half his life with his fighting clansmen in a mediaeval stronghold among the snows, and the other half rolling in a h.p. motor over smooth french roads, seems unaware of any degrees of beauty or appropriateness in objects of european design, and places against the exquisite mosaics and traceries of his fazi craftsmen the tawdriest bric-à-brac of the cheap department-store. while tea was being served i noticed a tiny negress, not more than six or seven years old, who stood motionless in the embrasure of an archway. like most of the moroccan slaves, even in the greatest households, she was shabbily, almost raggedly, dressed. a dirty _gandourah_ of striped muslin covered her faded caftan, and a cheap kerchief was wound above her grave and precocious little face. with preternatural vigilance she watched each movement of the caïd, who never spoke to her, looked at her, or made her the slightest perceptible sign, but whose least wish she instantly divined, refilling his tea-cup, passing the plates of sweets, or removing our empty glasses, in obedience to some secret telegraphy on which her whole being hung. the caïd is a great man. he and his famous elder brother, holding the southern marches of morocco against alien enemies and internal rebellion, played a preponderant part in the defence of the french colonies in north africa during the long struggle of the war. enlightened, cultivated, a friend of the arts, a scholar and diplomatist, he seems, unlike many orientals, to have selected the best in assimilating european influences. yet when i looked at the tiny creature watching him with those anxious joyless eyes i felt once more the abyss that slavery and the seraglio put between the most europeanized mahometan and the western conception of life. the caïd's little black slaves are well-known in morocco, and behind the sad child leaning in the archway stood all the shadowy evils of the social system that hangs like a millstone about the neck of islam. presently a handsome tattered negress came across the garden to invite me to the harem. captain de s. and his wife, who had accompanied me, were old friends of the chief's, and it was owing to this that the jealously-guarded doors of the women's quarters were opened to mme. de s. and myself. we followed the negress to a marble-paved court where pigeons fluttered and strutted about the central fountain. from under a trellised arcade hung with linen curtains several ladies came forward. they greeted my companion with exclamations of delight; then they led us into the usual commonplace room with divans and whitewashed walls. even in the most sumptuous moroccan palaces little care seems to be expended on the fittings of the women's quarters: unless, indeed, the room in which visitors are received corresponds with a boarding-school "parlour," and the personal touch is reserved for the private apartments. the ladies who greeted us were more richly dressed than any i had seen except the sultan's favourites, but their faces were more distinguished, more european in outline, than those of the round-cheeked beauties of rabat. my companions had told me that the caïd's harem was recruited from georgia, and that the ladies receiving us had been brought up in the relative freedom of life in constantinople; and it was easy to read in their wistfully smiling eyes memories of a life unknown to the passive daughters of morocco. they appeared to make no secret of their regrets, for presently one of them, with a smile, called my attention to some faded photographs hanging over the divan. they represented groups of plump provincial-looking young women in dowdy european ball-dresses; and it required an effort of the imagination to believe that the lovely creatures in velvet caftans, with delicately tattooed temples under complicated head-dresses, and hennaed feet crossed on muslin cushions, were the same as the beaming frumps in the photographs. but to the sumptuously-clad exiles these faded photographs and ugly dresses represented freedom, happiness, and all they had forfeited when fate (probably in the shape of an opulent hebrew couple "travelling with their daughters") carried them from the bosphorus to the atlas. as in the other harems i had visited, perfect equality seemed to prevail between the ladies, and while they chatted with mme. de s. whose few words of arabic had loosed their tongues, i tried to guess which was the favourite, or at least the first in rank. my choice wavered between the pretty pale creature with a _ferronnière_ across her temples and a tea-rose caftan veiled in blue gauze, and the nut-brown beauty in red velvet hung with pearls whose languid attitudes and long-lidded eyes were so like the keepsake portraits of byron's haidee. or was it perhaps the third, less pretty but more vivid and animated, who sat behind the tea-tray, and mimicked so expressively a soldier shouldering his rifle, and another falling dead, in her effort to ask us "when the dreadful war would be over"? perhaps ... unless, indeed, it were the handsome octoroon, slightly older than the others, but even more richly dressed, so free and noble in her movements, and treated by the others with such friendly deference. i was struck by the fact that among them all there was not a child; it was the first harem without babies that i had seen in that prolific land. presently one of the ladies asked mme. de s. about her children, in reply, she enquired for the caïd's little boy, the son of his wife who had died. the ladies' faces lit up wistfully, a slave was given an order, and presently a large-eyed ghost of a child was brought into the room. instantly all the bracelet-laden arms were held out to the dead woman's son; and as i watched the weak little body hung with amulets and the heavy head covered with thin curls pressed against a brocaded bosom, i was reminded of one of the coral-hung child-christs of crivelli, standing livid and waxen on the knee of a splendidly dressed madonna. the poor baby on whom such hopes and ambitions hung stared at us with a solemn unamused gaze. would all his pretty mothers, his eyes seemed to ask, succeed in bringing him to maturity in spite of the parched summers of the south and the stifling existence of the harem? it was evident that no precaution had been neglected to protect him from maleficent influences and the danger that walks by night, for his frail neck and wrists were hung with innumerable charms: koranic verses, soudanese incantations, and images of forgotten idols in amber and coral and horn and ambergris. perhaps they will ward off the powers of evil, and let him grow up to shoulder the burden of the great caïds of the south. vi general lyautey's work in morocco i it is not too much to say that general lyautey has twice saved morocco from destruction: once in , when the inertia and double-dealing of abd-el-hafid abandoned the country to the rebellious tribes who had attacked him in fez, and the second time in august, , when germany declared war on france. in , in consequence of the threatening attitude of the dissident tribes and the generally disturbed condition of the country, the sultan abd-el-hafid had asked france to establish a protectorate in morocco. the agreement entered into, called the "convention of fez," stipulated that a french resident-general should be sent to morocco with authority to act as the sultan's sole representative in treating with the other powers. the convention was signed in march, , and a few days afterward an uprising more serious than any that had gone before took place in fez. this sudden outbreak was due in part to purely local and native difficulties, in part to the intrinsic weakness of the french situation. the french government had imagined that a native army commanded by french officers could be counted on to support the makhzen and maintain order, but abd-el-hafid's growing unpopularity had estranged his own people from him, and the army turned on the government and on the french. on the th of april, , the moroccan soldiers massacred their french officers after inflicting horrible tortures on them, the population of fez rose against the european civilians, and for a fortnight the oued fez ran red with the blood of harmless french colonists. it was then that france appointed general lyautey resident-general in morocco. when he reached fez it was besieged by twenty thousand berbers. rebel tribes were flocking in to their support, to the cry of the holy war, and the terrified sultan, who had already announced his intention of resigning, warned the french troops who were trying to protect him that unless they guaranteed to get him safely to rabat he would turn his influence against them. two days afterward the berbers attacked fez and broke in at two gates. the french drove them out and forced them back twenty miles. the outskirts of the city were rapidly fortified, and a few weeks later general gouraud, attacking the rebels in the valley of the sebou, completely disengaged fez. the military danger overcome. general lyautey began his great task of civilian administration. his aim was to support and strengthen the existing government, to reassure and pacify the distrustful and antagonistic elements, and to assert french authority without irritating or discouraging native ambitions. meanwhile a new mahdi (ahmed-el-hiba) had risen in the south. treacherously supported by abd-el-hafid, he was proclaimed sultan at tiznit, and acknowledged by the whole of the souss. in marrakech, native unrest had caused the europeans to fly to the coast, and in the north a new group of rebellious tribes menaced fez. el-hiba entered marrakech in august, , and the french consul and several other french residents were taken prisoner. el-hiba's forces then advanced to a point half way between marrakech and mazagan, where general mangin, at that time a colonial colonel, met and utterly routed them. the disorder in the south, and the appeals of the native population for protection against the savage depredations of the new mahdist rebels, made it necessary for the french troops to follow up their success, and in september marrakech was taken. such were the swift and brilliant results of general lyautey's intervention. the first difficulties had been quickly overcome; others, far more complicated, remained. the military occupation of morocco had to be followed up by its civil reorganization. by the franco-german treaty of germany had finally agreed to recognize the french protectorate in morocco; but in spite of an apparently explicit acknowledgment of this right, germany, as usual, managed to slip into the contract certain ambiguities of form that were likely to lead to future trouble. to obtain even this incomplete treaty france had had to sacrifice part of her colonies in equatorial africa; and in addition to the uncertain relation with germany there remained the dead weight of the spanish zone and the confused international administration of tangier. the disastrously misgoverned spanish zone has always been a centre for german intrigue and native conspiracies, as well as a permanent obstacle to the economic development of morocco. such were the problems that general lyautey found awaiting him. a long colonial experience, and an unusual combination of military and administrative talents, prepared him for the almost impossible task of dealing with them. swift and decisive when military action is required, he has above all the long views and endless patience necessary to the successful colonial governor. the policy of france in morocco had been weak and spasmodic; in his hands it became firm and consecutive. a sympathetic understanding of the native prejudices, and a real affection for the native character, made him try to build up an administration which should be, not an application of french ideas to african conditions, but a development of the best native aspirations. the difficulties were immense. the attempt to govern as far as possible through the great chiefs was a wise one, but it was hampered by the fact that these powerful leaders, however loyal to the protectorate, knew no methods of administration but those based on extortion. it was necessary at once to use them and to educate them; and one of general lyautey's greatest achievements has been the successful employment of native ability in the government of the country. ii the first thing to do was to create a strong frontier against the dissident tribes of the blad-es-siba. to do this it was necessary that the french should hold the natural defenses of the country, the foothills of the little and of the great atlas, and the valley of the moulouya, which forms the corridor between western algeria and morocco. this was nearly accomplished in when war broke out. at that moment the home government cabled the resident-general to send all his available troops to france, abandoning the whole of conquered territory except the coast towns. to do so would have been to give france's richest colonies[a] outright to germany at a moment when what they could supply--meat and wheat--was exactly what the enemy most needed. [footnote a: the loss of morocco would inevitably have been followed by that of the whole of french north africa.] general lyautey took forty-eight hours to consider. he then decided to "empty the egg without breaking the shell", and the reply he sent was that of a great patriot and a great general. in effect he said: "i will give you all the troops you ask, but instead of abandoning the interior of the country i will hold what we have already taken, and fortify and enlarge our boundaries." no other military document has so nearly that ring as marshal foch's immortal marne despatch (written only a few weeks later): "my centre is broken, my right wing is wavering, the situation is favorable and i am about to attack." general lyautey had framed his answer in a moment of patriotic exaltation, when the soul of every frenchman was strung up to a superhuman pitch. but the pledge once made, it had to be carried out, and even those who most applauded his decision wondered how he would meet the almost insuperable difficulties it involved. morocco, when he was called there, was already honeycombed by german trading interests and secret political intrigue, and the fruit seemed ready to fall when the declaration of war shook the bough. the only way to save the colony for france was to keep its industrial and agricultural life going, and give to the famous "business as usual" a really justifiable application. general lyautey completely succeeded, and the first impression of all travellers arriving in morocco two years later was that of suddenly returning to a world in normal conditions. there was even, so complete was the illusion, a first moment of almost painful surprise on entering an active prosperous community, seemingly absorbed in immediate material interests to the exclusion of all thought of the awful drama that was being played out in the mother country, and it was only on reflection that this absorption in the day's task, and this air of smiling faith in the future, were seen to be morocco's truest way of serving france. for not only was france to be supplied with provisions, but the confidence in her ultimate triumph was at all costs to be kept up in the native mind. german influence was as deep-seated as a cancer: to cut it out required the most drastic of operations. and that operation consisted precisely in letting it be seen that france was strong and prosperous enough for her colonies to thrive and expand without fear while she held at bay on her own frontier the most formidable foe the world has ever seen. such was the "policy of the smile," consistently advocated by general lyautey from the beginning of the war, and of which he and his household were the first to set the example. iii the general had said that he would not "break the egg-shell"; but he knew that this was not enough, and that he must make it appear unbreakable if he were to retain the confidence of the natives. how this was achieved, with the aid of the few covering troops left him, is still almost incomprehensible. to hold the line was virtually impossible: therefore he pushed it forward. an anonymous writer in _l'afrique française_ (january, ) has thus described the manoeuvre: "general henrys was instructed to watch for storm-signals on the front, to stop up the cracks, to strengthen weak points and to rectify doubtful lines. thanks to these operations, which kept the rebels perpetually harassed by always forestalling their own plans, the occupied territory was enlarged by a succession of strongly fortified positions." while this was going on in the north, general lamothe was extending and strengthening, by means of pacific negotiations, the influence of the great chiefs in the south, and other agents of the residency were engaged in watching and thwarting the incessant german intrigues in the spanish zone. general lyautey is quoted as having said that "a work-shop is worth a battalion." this precept he managed to put into action even during the first dark days of , and the interior development of morocco proceeded side by side with the strengthening of its defenses. germany had long foreseen what an asset northwest africa would be during the war; and general lyautey was determined to prove how right germany had been. he did so by getting the government, to whom he had given nearly all his troops, to give him in exchange an agricultural and industrial army, or at least enough specialists to form such an army out of the available material in the country. for every battle fought a road was made;[a] for every rebel fortress shelled a factory was built, a harbor developed, or more miles of fallow land ploughed and sown. [footnote a: during the first year of the war roads were built in morocco by german prisoners, and it was because germany was so thoroughly aware of the economic value of the country, and so anxious not to have her prestige diminished, that she immediately protested, on the absurd plea of the unwholesomeness of the climate, and threatened reprisals unless the prisoners were withdrawn.] but this economic development did not satisfy the resident. he wished morocco to enlarge her commercial relations with france and the other allied countries, and with this object in view he organized and carried out with brilliant success a series of exhibitions at casablanca, fez and rabat. the result of this bold policy surpassed even its creator's hopes. the moroccans of the plain are an industrious and money-loving people, and the sight of these rapidly improvised exhibitions, where the industrial and artistic products of france and other european countries were shown in picturesque buildings grouped about flower-filled gardens, fascinated their imagination and strengthened their confidence in the country that could find time for such an effort in the midst of a great war. the voice of the bazaar carried the report to the farthest confines of moghreb, and one by one the notabilities of the different tribes arrived, with delegations from algeria and tunisia. it was even said that several rebel chiefs had submitted to the makhzen in order not to miss the exhibition. at the same time as the "miracle of the marne" another, less famous but almost as vital to france, was being silently performed at the other end of her dominions. it will not seem an exaggeration to speak of general lyautey's achievement during the first year of the war as the "miracle of morocco" if one considers the immense importance of doing what he did at the moment when he did it. and to understand this it is only needful to reckon what germany could have drawn in supplies and men from a german north africa, and what would have been the situation of france during the war with a powerful german colony in control of the western mediterranean. general lyautey has always been one of the clear-sighted administrators who understand that the successful government of a foreign country depends on many little things, and not least on the administrator's genuine sympathy with the traditions, habits and tastes of the people. a keen feeling for beauty had prepared him to appreciate all that was most exquisite and venerable in the arab art of morocco, and even in the first struggle with political and military problems he found time to gather about him a group of archaeologists and artists who were charged with the inspection and preservation of the national monuments and the revival of the languishing native art-industries. the old pottery, jewelry, metal-work, rugs and embroideries of the different regions were carefully collected and classified, schools of decorative art were founded, skilled artisans sought out, and every effort was made to urge european residents to follow native models and use native artisans in building and furnishing. at the various exhibitions much space was allotted to these revived industries, and the matting of salé, the rugs of rabat, the embroideries of fez and marrakech have already found a ready market in france, besides awakening in the educated class of colonists an appreciation of the old buildings and the old arts of the country that will be its surest safeguard against the destructive effects of colonial expansion. it is only necessary to see the havoc wrought in tunisia and algeria by the heavy hand of the colonial government to know what general lyautey has achieved in saving morocco from this form of destruction also. all this has been accomplished by the resident-general during five years of unexampled and incessant difficulty; and probably the true explanation of the miracle is that which he himself gives when he says, with the quiet smile that typifies his moroccan war-policy: "it was easy to do because i loved the people." the work of the french protectorate, - ports owing to the fact that the neglected and roadless spanish zone intervened between the french possessions and tangier, which is the natural port of morocco, one of the first preoccupations of general lyautey was to make ports along the inhospitable atlantic coast, where there are no natural harbours. since , in spite of the immense cost and the difficulty of obtaining labour, the following has been done: _casablanca._ a jetty metres long has been planned: metres finished december, . small jetty begun , finished --length metres. small harbour thus created shelters small boats ( tons) in all weathers. quays metres long already finished. steam-cranes working. warehouses and depots covering , square metres completed. _rabat._ work completed december, . a quay metres long, to which boats with a draught of three metres can tie up. two groups of warehouses, steam-cranes, etc., covering , square metres. a quay metres long on the salé side of the river. _kenitra._ the port of kenitra is at the mouth of the sebou river, and is capable of becoming a good river port. the work up to december, , comprises: a channel metres long and three metres deep, cut through the bar of the sebou. jetties built on each side of the channel. quay metres long. building of sheds, depots, warehouses, steam-cranes, etc. at the ports of fedalah, mazagan, safi, mogador and agadir similar plans are in course of execution. commerce comparative tables total commerce total commerce fcs , , fcs , , exports exports fcs , , fcs , , roads built national roads , kilometres secondary roads " railways built kilometres land cultivated approximate area approximate area , hectares , , hectares justice . creation of french courts for french nationals and those under french protection. these take cognizance of civil cases where both parties, or even one, are amenable to french jurisdiction. . moroccan law is moslem, and administered by moslem magistrates. private law, including that of inheritance, is based on the koran. the sultan has maintained the principle whereby real property and administrative cases fall under native law. these courts are as far as possible supervised and controlled by the establishment of a cherifian ministry of justice to which the native judges are responsible. special care is taken to prevent the alienation of property held collectively, or any similar transactions likely to produce political and economic disturbances. . criminal jurisdiction is delegated to pashas and cadis by the sultan, except of offenses committed against, or in conjunction with, french nationals and those under french protection. such cases come before the tribunals of the french protectorate. education the object of the protectorate has been, on the one hand, to give to the children of french colonists in morocco the same education as they would have received at elementary and secondary schools in france; on the other, to provide the indigenous population with a system of education that shall give to the young moroccans an adequate commercial or manual training, or prepare them for administrative posts, but without interfering with their native customs or beliefs. before there existed in morocco only a few small schools supported by the french legation at tangier and by the alliance française, and a group of hebrew schools in the mellahs, maintained by the universal israelite alliance. . total number of schools . " " " " . total number of pupils . " " " " , . total number of teachers . " " " " in addition to the french and indigenous schools, sewing-schools have been formed for the native girls and have been exceptionally successful. moslem colleges have been founded at rabat and fez in order to supplement the native education of young mahometans of the upper classes, who intend to take up wholesale business or banking, or prepare for political, judicial or administrative posts under the sultan's government. the course lasts four years and comprises: arabic, french, mathematics, history, geography, religious (mahometan) instruction, and the law of the koran. the "ecole supérieure de la langue arabe et des dialectes berbères" at rabat receives european and moroccan students. the courses are arabic, the berber dialects, arab literature, ethnography, administrative moroccan law, moslem law, berber customary law. medical aid the protectorate has established medical centres for the native population, ranging from simple dispensaries and small native infirmaries to the important hospitals of rabat, fez, meknez, marrakech, and casablanca. mobile sanitary formations supplied with light motor ambulances travel about the country, vaccinating, making tours of sanitary inspection, investigating infected areas, and giving general hygienic education throughout the remoter regions. native patients treated in over , " " " " " , , night-shelters in towns. every town is provided with a shelter for the indigent wayfarers so numerous in morocco. these shelters are used as disinfection centres, from which suspicious cases are sent to quarantine camp at the gates of the towns. _central laboratory at rabat._ this is a kind of pasteur institute. in , , persons were vaccinated throughout the country and patients treated at the laboratory for rabies. _clinics for venereal diseases_ have been established at casablanca, fez, rabat, and marrakech. more than , cases were treated in . _ophthalmic clinics_ in the same cities gave in , , consultations. _radiotherapy._ clinics have been opened at fez and rabat for the treatment of skin diseases of the head, from which the native children habitually suffer. the french department of health distributes annually immense quantities of quinine in the malarial districts. madame lyautey's private charities comprise admirably administered child-welfare centres in the principal cities, with dispensaries for the native mothers and children. vii a sketch of moroccan history [note--in the chapters on moroccan history and art i have tried to set down a slight and superficial outline of a large and confused subject. in extenuation of this summary attempt i hasten to explain that its chief merit is its lack of originality. its facts are chiefly drawn from the books mentioned in the short bibliography at the end of the volume, in addition to which i am deeply indebted for information given on the spot to the group of remarkable specialists attached to the french administration, and to the cultivated and cordial french officials, military and civilian, who, at each stage of my rapid journey, did their best to answer my questions and open my eyes.] i the berbers in the briefest survey of the moroccan past, account must first of all be taken of the factor which, from the beginning of recorded events, has conditioned the whole history of north africa: the existence, from the sahara to the mediterranean, of a mysterious irreducible indigenous race with which every successive foreign rule, from carthage to france, has had to reckon, and which has but imperfectly and partially assimilated the language, the religion, and the culture that successive civilizations have tried to impose upon it. this race, the race of berbers, has never, modern explorers tell us, become really islamite, any more than it ever really became phenician, roman or vandal. it has imposed its habits while it appeared to adopt those of its invaders, and has perpetually represented, outside the ismalitic and hispano-arabic circle of the makhzen, the vast tormenting element of the dissident, the rebellious, the unsubdued tribes of the blad-es-siba. who were these indigenous tribes with whom the phenicians, when they founded their first counting-houses on the north and west coast of africa, exchanged stuffs and pottery and arms for ivory, ostrich-feathers and slaves? historians frankly say they do not know. all sorts of material obstacles have hitherto hampered the study of berber origins, but it seems clear that from the earliest historic times they were a mixed race, and the ethnologist who attempts to define them is faced by the same problem as the historian of modern america who should try to find the racial definition of an "american." for centuries, for ages, north africa has been what america now is: the clearing-house of the world. when at length it occurred to the explorer that the natives of north africa were not all arabs or moors, he was bewildered by the many vistas of all they were or might be: so many and tangled were the threads leading up to them, so interwoven was their pre-islamite culture with worn-out shreds of older and richer societies. m. saladin, in his "manuel d'architecture musulmane," after attempting to unravel the influences which went to the making of the mosque of kairouan, the walls of marrakech, the medersas of fez--influences that lead him back to chaldaean branch-huts, to the walls of babylon and the embroideries of coptic egypt--somewhat despairingly sums up the result: "the principal elements contributed to moslem art by the styles preceding it may be thus enumerated: from india, floral ornament; from persia, the structural principles of the acheminedes, and the sassanian vault. mesopotamia contributes a system of vaulting, incised ornament, and proportion; the copts, ornamental detail in general; egypt, mass and unbroken wall-spaces; spain, construction and romano-iberian ornament; africa, decorative detail and romano-berber traditions (with byzantine influences in persia); asia minor, a mixture of byzantine and persian characteristics." as with the art of north africa, so with its supposedly indigenous population. the berber dialects extend from the lybian desert to senegal. their language was probably related to coptic, itself related to the ancient egyptian and the non-semitic dialects of abyssinia and nubia. yet philologists have discovered what appears to be a far-off link between the berber and semitic languages, and the chleuhs of the draa and the souss, with their tall slim egyptian-looking bodies and hooked noses, may have a strain of semitic blood. m. augustin bernard, in speaking of the natives of north africa, ends, much on the same note as m. saladin in speaking of moslem art: "in their blood are the sediments of many races, phenician, punic, egyptian and arab." they were not, like the arabs, wholly nomadic; but the tent, the flock, the tribe always entered into their conception of life. m. augustin bernard has pointed out that, in north africa, the sedentary and nomadic habit do not imply a permanent difference, but rather a temporary one of situation and opportunity. the sedentary berbers are nomadic in certain conditions, and from the earliest times the invading nomad berbers tended to become sedentary when they reached the rich plains north of the atlas. but when they built cities it was as their ancestors and their neighbours pitched tents; and they destroyed or abandoned them as lightly as their desert forbears packed their camel-bags and moved to new pastures. everywhere behind the bristling walls and rock-clamped towers of old morocco lurks the shadowy spirit of instability. every new sultan builds himself a new house and lets his predecessors' palaces fall into decay, and as with the sultan so with his vassals and officials. change is the rule in this apparently unchanged civilization, where "nought may abide but mutability." ii phenicians, romans and vandals far to the south of the anti-atlas, in the yellow deserts that lead to timbuctoo, live the wild touaregs, the veiled men of the south, who ride to war with their faces covered by linen masks. these veiled men are berbers, but their alphabet is composed of lybian characters, and these are closely related to the signs engraved on certain vases of the nile valley that are probably six thousand years old. moreover, among the rock-cut images of the african desert is the likeness of theban ammon crowned with the solar disk between serpents, and the old berber religion, with its sun and animal worship, has many points of resemblance with egyptian beliefs. all this implies trade contacts far below the horizon of history, and obscure comings and goings of restless throngs across incredible distances long before the phenicians planted their first trading posts on the north african coast about b.c. five hundred years before christ, carthage sent one of her admirals on a voyage of colonization beyond the pillars of hercules. hannon set out with sixty fifty-oared galleys carrying thirty thousand people. some of them settled at mehedyia, at the mouth of the sebou, where phenician remains have been found, and apparently the exploration was pushed as far south as the coast of guinea, for the inscription recording it relates that hannon beheld elephants, hairy men and "savages called gorillas." at any rate, carthage founded stable colonies at melilla, larache, salé and casablanca. then came the romans, who carried on the business, set up one of their easy tolerant protectorates over "tingitanian mauretania,"[a] and built one important military outpost, volubilis in the zerhoun, which a series of minor defenses probably connected with salé on the west coast, thus guarding the roman province against the unconquered berbers to the south. [footnote a: east of the moulouya, the african protectorate (now west algeria and the sud oranais) was called the mauretania of caesar.] tingitanian mauretania was one of the numerous african granaries of rome. she also supplied the imperial armies with their famous african cavalry, and among minor articles of exportation were guinea-hens, snails, honey, euphorbia, wild beasts, horses and pearls. the roman dominion ceased at the line drawn between volubilis and salé. there was no interest in pushing farther south, since the ivory and slave trade with the soudan was carried on by way of tripoli. but the spirit of enterprise never slept in the race, and pliny records the journey of a roman general--suetonius paulinus--who appears to have crossed the atlas, probably by the pass of tizi-n-telremt, which is even now so beset with difficulties that access by land to the souss will remain an arduous undertaking until the way by imintanout is safe for european travel. the vandals swept away the romans in the fifth century. the lower empire restored a brief period of civilization; but its authority finally dwindled to the half-legendary rule of count julian, shut up within his walls of ceuta. then europe vanished from the shores of africa, and though christianity lingered here and there in vague donatist colonies, and in the names of roman bishoprics, its last faint hold went down in the eighth century before the irresistible cry: "there is no god but allah!" iii the arab conquest the first arab invasion of morocco is said to have reached the atlantic coast, but it left no lasting traces, and the real islamisation of barbary did not happen till near the end of the eighth century, when a descendant of ali, driven from mesopotamia by the caliphate, reached the mountains above volubilis and there founded an empire. the berbers, though indifferent in religious matters, had always, from a spirit of independence, tended to heresy and schism. under the rule of christian rome they had been donatists, as m. bernard puts it, "out of opposition to the empire"; and so, out of opposition to the caliphate, they took up the cause of one moslem schismatic after another. their great popular movements have always had a religious basis, or perhaps it would be truer to say, a religious pretext, for they have been in reality the partly moral, partly envious revolt of hungry and ascetic warrior tribes against the fatness and corruption of the "cities of the plain." idriss i became the first national saint and ruler of morocco. his rule extended throughout northern morocco, and his son, idriss ii, attacking a berber tribe on the banks of the oued fez, routed them, took possession of their oasis and founded the city of fez. thither came schismatic refugees from kairouan and moors from andalusia. the islamite empire of morocco was founded, and idriss ii has become the legendary ancestor of all its subsequent rulers. the idrissite rule is a welter of obscure struggles between rapidly melting groups of adherents. its chief features are: the founding of moulay idriss and fez, and the building of the mosques of el andalous and kairouiyin at fez for the two groups of refugees from tunisia and spain. meanwhile the caliphate of cordova had reached the height of its power, while that of the fatimites extended from the nile to western morocco, and the little idrissite empire, pulverized under the weight of these expanding powers, became once more a dust of disintegrated tribes. it was only in the eleventh century that the dust again conglomerated. two arab tribes from the desert of the hedjaz, suddenly driven westward by the fatimites, entered morocco, not with a small military expedition, as the arabs had hitherto done, but with a horde of emigrants reckoned as high as , families; and this first colonizing expedition was doubtless succeeded by others. to strengthen their hold in morocco the arab colonists embraced the dynastic feuds of the berbers. they inaugurated a period of general havoc which destroyed what little prosperity had survived the break-up of the idrissite rule, and many berber tribes took refuge in the mountains; but others remained and were merged with the invaders, reforming into new tribes of mixed berber and arab blood. this invasion was almost purely destructive, it marks one of the most desolate periods in the progress of the "wasteful empire" of moghreb. iv almoravids and almohads while the hilalian arabs were conquering and destroying northern morocco another but more fruitful invasion was upon her from the south. the almoravids, one of the tribes of veiled men of the south, driven by the usual mixture of religious zeal and lust of booty, set out to invade the rich black kingdoms north of the sahara. thence they crossed the atlas under their great chief, youssef-ben-tachfin, and founded the city of marrakech in . from marrakech they advanced on idrissite fez and the valley of the moulouya. fez rose against her conquerors, and youssef put all the male inhabitants to death. by he was master of tangier and the rif, and his rule stretched as far west as tlemcen, oran and finally algiers. his ambition drove him across the straits to spain, where he conquered one moslem prince after another and wiped out the luxurious civilization of moorish andalusia. in , at zallarca, youssef gave battle to alphonso vi of castile and leon. the almoravid army was a strange rabble of arabs, berbers, blacks, wild tribes of the sahara and christian mercenaries. they conquered the spanish forces, and youssef left to his successors an empire extending from the ebro to senegal and from the atlantic coast of africa to the borders of tunisia. but the empire fell to pieces of its own weight, leaving little record of its brief and stormy existence. while youssef was routing the forces of christianity at zallarca in spain, another schismatic tribe of his own people was detaching marrakech and the south from his rule. the leader of the new invasion was a mahdi, one of the numerous saviours of the world who have carried death and destruction throughout islam. his name was ibn-toumert, and he had travelled in egypt, syria and spain, and made the pilgrimage to mecca. preaching the doctrine of a purified monotheism, he called his followers the almohads or unitarians, to distinguish them from the polytheistic almoravids, whose heresies he denounced. he fortified the city of tinmel in the souss, and built there a mosque of which the ruins still exist. when he died, in , he designated as his successor abd-el-moumen, the son of a potter, who had been his disciple. abd-el-moumen carried on the campaign against the almoravids. he fought them not only in morocco but in spain, taking cadiz, cordova, granada as well as tlemcen and fez. in his african dominion reached from tripoli to the souss, and he had formed a disciplined army in which christian mercenaries from france and spain fought side by side with berbers and soudanese. this great captain was also a great administrator, and under his rule africa was surveyed from the souss to barka, the country was policed, agriculture was protected, and the caravans journeyed safely over the trade-routes. abd-el-moumen died in and was followed by his son, who, though he suffered reverses in spain, was also a great ruler. he died in , and his son, yacoub-el-mansour, avenged his father's ill-success in spain by the great victory of alarcos and the conquest of madrid. yacoub-el-mansour was the greatest of moroccan sultans. so far did his fame extend that the illustrious saladin sent him presents and asked the help of his fleet. he was a builder as well as a fighter, and the noblest period of arab art in morocco and spain coincides with his reign. after his death, the almohad empire followed the downward curve to which all oriental rule seems destined. in spain, the berber forces were beaten in the great christian victory of las-navas-de tolosa, and in morocco itself the first stirrings of the beni-merins (a new tribe from the sahara) were preparing the way for a new dynasty. v the merinids the beni-merins or merinids were nomads who ranged the desert between biskra and the tafilelt. it was not a religious upheaval that drove them to the conquest of morocco. the demoralized almohads called them in as mercenaries to defend their crumbling empire; and the merinids came, drove out the almohads, and replaced them. they took fez, meknez, salé, rabat and sidjilmassa in the tafilelt; and their second sultan, abou-youssef, built new fez (eldjid) on the height above the old idrissite city. the merinids renewed the struggle with the sultan of tlemcen, and carried the holy war once more into spain. the conflict with tlemcen was long and unsuccessful, and one of the merinid sultans died assassinated under its walls. in the fourteenth century the sultan abou hassan tried to piece together the scattered bits of the almohad empire. tlemcen was finally taken, and the whole of algeria annexed. but in the plain of kairouan, in tunisia, abou hassan was defeated by the arabs. meanwhile one of his brothers had headed a revolt in morocco, and the princes of tlemcen won back their ancient kingdom. constantine and bougie rebelled in turn, and the kingdom of abou hassan vanished like a mirage. his successors struggled vainly to control their vassals in morocco, and to keep their possessions beyond its borders. before the end of the fourteenth century morocco from end to end was a chaos of antagonistic tribes, owning no allegiance, abiding by no laws. the last of the merinids, divided, diminished, bound by humiliating treaties with christian spain, kept up a semblance of sovereignty at fez and marrakech, at war with one another and with their neighbours, and spain and portugal seized this moment of internal dissolution to drive them from spain, and carry the war into morocco itself. the short and stormy passage of the beni-merins seems hardly to leave room for the development of the humaner qualities; yet the flowering of moroccan art and culture coincided with those tumultuous years, and it was under the merinid sultans that fez became the centre of moroccan learning and industry, a kind of oxford with birmingham annexed. vi the saadians meanwhile, behind all the berber turmoil a secret work of religious propaganda was going on. the arab element had been crushed but not extirpated. the crude idolatrous wealth-loving berbers apparently dominated, but whenever there was a new uprising or a new invasion it was based on the religious discontent perpetually stirred up by mahometan agents. the longing for a mahdi, a saviour, the craving for purification combined with an opportunity to murder and rob, always gave the moslem apostle a ready opening; and the downfall of the merinids was the result of a long series of religious movements to which the european invasion gave an object and a war-cry. the saadians were cherifian arabs, newcomers from arabia, to whom the lax berber paganism was abhorrent. they preached a return to the creed of mahomet, and proclaimed the holy war against the hated portuguese, who had set up fortified posts all along the west coast of morocco. it is a mistake to suppose that hatred of the christian has always existed among the north african moslems. the earlier dynasties, and especially the great almohad sultans, were on friendly terms with the catholic powers of europe, and in the thirteenth century a treaty assured to christians in africa full religious liberty, excepting only the right to preach their doctrine in public places. there was a catholic diocese at fez, and afterward at marrakech under gregory ix, and there is a letter of the pope thanking the "miromilan" (the emir el moumenin) for his kindness to the bishop and the friars living in his dominions. another bishop was recommended by innocent iv to the sultan of morocco; the pope even asked that certain strongholds should be assigned to the christians in morocco as places of refuge in times of disturbance. but the best proof of the friendly relations between christians and infidels is the fact that the christian armies which helped the sultans of morocco to defeat spain and subjugate algeria and tunisia were not composed of "renegadoes" or captives, as is generally supposed, but of christian mercenaries, french and english, led by knights and nobles, and fighting for the sultan of morocco exactly as they would have fought for the duke of burgundy, the count of flanders, or any other prince who offered high pay and held out the hope of rich spoils. any one who has read villehardouin and joinville will own that there is not much to choose between the motives animating these noble freebooters and those which caused the crusaders to loot constantinople "on the way" to the holy sepulchre. war in those days was regarded as a lucrative and legitimate form of business, exactly as it was when the earlier heroes started out to take the rich robber-town of troy. the berbers have never been religious fanatics, and the vicomte de foucauld, when he made his great journey of exploration in the atlas in , remarked that antagonism to the foreigner was always due to the fear of military espionage and never to religious motives. this equally applies to the berbers of the sixteenth century, when the holy war against catholic spain and portugal was preached. the real cause of the sudden deadly hatred of the foreigner was twofold. the spaniards were detested because of the ferocious cruelty with which they had driven the moors from spain under ferdinand and isabella, and the portuguese because of the arrogance and brutality of their military colonists in the fortified trading stations of the west coast. and both were feared as possible conquerors and overlords. there was a third incentive also: the moroccans, dealing in black slaves for the european market, had discovered the value of white slaves in moslem markets. the sultan had his fleet, and each coast-town its powerful pirate vessels, and from pirate-nests like salé and tangier the raiders continued, till well on into the first half of the nineteenth century, to seize european ships and carry their passengers to the slave-markets of fez and marrakech.[a] the miseries endured by these captives, and so poignantly described in john windus's travels, and in the "naufrage du brick sophie" by charles cochelet,[b] show how savage the feeling against the foreigner had become. [footnote a: the moroccans being very poor seamen, these corsair-vessels were usually commanded and manned by christian renegadoes and turks.] [footnote b: cochelet was wrecked on the coast near agadir early in the nineteenth century and was taken with his fellow-travellers overland to el-ksar and tangier, enduring terrible hardships by the way.] with the advent of the cherifian dynasties, which coincided with this religious reform, and was in fact brought about by it, morocco became a closed country, as fiercely guarded as japan against european penetration. cut off from civilizing influences, the moslems isolated themselves in a lonely fanaticism, far more racial than religious, and the history of the country from the fall of the merinids till the french annexation is mainly a dull tale of tribal warfare. the religious movement of the sixteenth century was led and fed by zealots from the sahara. one of them took possession of rabat and azemmour, and preached the holy war; other "feudal fiefs" (as m. augustin bernard has well called them) were founded at tameslout, ilegh, tamgrout: the tombs of the _marabouts_ who led these revolts are scattered all along the west coast, and are still objects of popular veneration. the unorthodox saint worship which marks moroccan moslemism, and is commemorated by the countless white _koubbas_ throughout the country, grew up chiefly at the time of the religious revival under the saadian dynasty, and almost all the "moulays" and "sidis" venerated between tangier and the atlas were warrior monks who issued forth from their fortified _zaouias_ to drive the christians out of africa. the saadians were probably rather embarrassed by these fanatics, whom they found useful to oppose to the merinids, but troublesome where their own plans were concerned. they were ambitious and luxury-loving princes, who invaded the wealthy kingdom of the soudan, conquered the sultan of timbuctoo, and came back laden with slaves and gold to embellish marrakech and spend their treasure in the usual demoralizing orgies. their exquisite tombs at marrakech commemorate in courtly language the superhuman virtues of a series of rulers whose debaucheries and vices were usually cut short by assassination. finally another austere and fanatical mountain tribe surged down on them, wiped them out, and ruled in their stead. vii the hassanians the new rulers came from the tafilelt, which has always been a troublesome corner of morocco. the first two hassanian sultans were the usual tribal chiefs bent on taking advantage of saadian misrule to loot and conquer. but the third was the great moulay-ismaël, the tale of whose long and triumphant rule ( to ) has already been told in the chapter on meknez. this savage and enlightened old man once more drew order out of anarchy, and left, when he died, an organized and administered empire, as well as a progeny of seven hundred sons and unnumbered daughters.[a] [footnote a: moulay-ismaël was a learned theologian and often held religious discussions with the fathers of the order of mercy and the trinitarians. he was scrupulously orthodox in his religious observances, and wrote a treatise in defense of his faith which he sent to james ii of england, urging him to become a mahometan. he invented most of the most exquisite forms of torture which subsequent sultans have applied to their victims (see loti, _au maroc_), and was fond of flowers, and extremely simple and frugal in his personal habits.] the empire fell apart as usual, and no less quickly than usual, under his successors; and from his death until the strong hand of general lyautey took over the direction of affairs the hassanian rule in morocco was little more than a tumult of incoherent ambitions. the successors of moulay-ismaël inherited his blood-lust and his passion for dominion without his capacity to govern. in sidi-mohammed, one of his sons, tried to put order into his kingdom, and drove the last portuguese out of morocco; but under his successors the country remained isolated and stagnant, making spasmodic efforts to defend itself against the encroachments of european influence, while its rulers wasted their energy in a policy of double-dealing and dissimulation. early in the nineteenth century the government was compelled by the european powers to suppress piracy and the trade in christian slaves; and in the french conquest of algeria broke down the wall of isolation behind which the country was mouldering away by placing a european power on one of its frontiers. at first the conquest of algeria tended to create a link between france and morocco. the dey of algiers was a turk, and, therefore, an hereditary enemy; and morocco was disposed to favour the power which had broken turkish rule in a neighbouring country. but the sultan could not help trying to profit by the general disturbance to seize tlemcen and raise insurrections in western algeria; and presently morocco was engaged in a holy war against france. abd-el-kader, the sultan of algeria, had taken refuge in morocco, and the sultan of morocco having furnished him with supplies and munitions, france sent an official remonstrance. at the same time marshal bugeaud landed at mers-el-kebir, and invited the makhzen to discuss the situation. the offer was accepted and general bedeau and the caïd el guennaoui met in an open place. behind them their respective troops were drawn up, and almost as soon as the first salutes were exchanged the caïd declared the negotiations broken off. the french troops accordingly withdrew to the coast, but during their retreat they were attacked by the moroccans. this put an end to peaceful negotiations, and tangier was besieged and taken. the following august bugeaud brought his troops up from oudjda, through the defile that leads from west algeria, and routed the moroccans. he wished to advance on fez, but international politics interfered, and he was not allowed to carry out his plans. england looked unfavourably on the french penetration of morocco, and it became necessary to conclude peace at once to prove that france had no territorial ambitions west of oudjda. meanwhile a great sultan was once more to appear in the land. moulay-el-hassan, who ruled from to , was an able and energetic administrator. he pieced together his broken empire, asserted his authority in fez and marrakech, and fought the rebellious tribes of the west. in he asked the french government to send him a permanent military mission to assist in organizing his army. he planned an expedition to the souss, but the want of food and water in the wilderness traversed by the army caused the most cruel sufferings. moulay-el-hassan had provisions sent by sea, but the weather was too stormy to allow of a landing on the exposed atlantic coast, and the sultan, who had never seen the sea, was as surprised and indignant as canute to find that the waves would not obey him. his son abd-el-aziz was only thirteen years old when he succeeded to the throne. for six years he remained under the guardianship of ba-ahmed, the black vizier of moulay-el-hassan, who built the fairy palace of the bahia at marrakech, with its mysterious pale green padlocked door leading down to the secret vaults where his treasure was hidden. when the all-powerful ba-ahmed died the young sultan was nineteen. he was intelligent, charming, and fond of the society of europeans; but he was indifferent to religious questions and still more to military affairs, and thus doubly at the mercy of native mistrust and european intrigue. some clumsy attempts at fiscal reform, and a too great leaning toward european habits and associates, roused the animosity of the people, and of the conservative party in the upper class. the sultan's eldest brother, who had been set aside in his favour, was intriguing against him; the usual cherifian pretender was stirring up the factious tribes in the mountains; and the european powers were attempting, in the confusion of an ungoverned country, to assert their respective ascendencies. the demoralized condition of the country justified these attempts, and made european interference inevitable. but the powers were jealously watching each other, and germany, already coveting the certain agricultural resources and the conjectured mineral wealth of morocco, was above all determined that a french protectorate should not be set up. in another son of moulay-hassan, abd-el-hafid, was proclaimed sultan by the reactionary islamite faction, who accused abd-el-aziz of having sold his country to the christians. abd-el-aziz was defeated in a battle near marrakech, and retired to tangier, where he still lives in futile state. abd-el-hafid, proclaimed sultan at fez, was recognized by the whole country, but he found himself unable to cope with the factious tribes (those outside the blad-el-makhzen, or _governed country_). these rebel tribes besieged fez, and the sultan had to ask france for aid. france sent troops to his relief, but as soon as the dissidents were routed, and he himself was safe, abd-el-hafid refused to give the french army his support, and in , after the horrible massacres of fez, he abdicated in favour of another brother, moulay youssef, the actual ruler of morocco. viii note on moroccan architecture i m. h. saladin, whose "manual of moslem architecture" was published in , ends his chapter on morocco with the words: "it is especially urgent that we should know, and penetrate into, morocco as soon as possible, in order to study its monuments. it is the only country but persia where moslem art actually survives; and the tradition handed down to the present day will doubtless clear up many things." m. saladin's wish has been partly realized. much has been done since , when general lyautey was appointed resident-general, to clear up and classify the history of moroccan art; but since , though the work has never been dropped, it has necessarily been much delayed, especially as regards its published record; and as yet only a few monographs and articles have summed up some of the interesting investigations of the last five years. ii when i was in marrakech word was sent to captain de s., who was with me, that a caïd of the atlas, whose prisoner he had been several years before, had himself been taken by the pasha's troops, and was in marrakech. captain de s. was asked to identify several rifles which his old enemy had taken from him, and on receiving them found that, in the interval, they had been elaborately ornamented with the arab niello work of which the tradition goes back to damascus. this little incident is a good example of the degree to which the mediaeval tradition alluded to by m. saladin has survived in moroccan life. nowhere else in the world, except among the moribund fresco-painters of the greek monasteries, has a formula of art persisted from the seventh or eighth century to the present day; and in morocco the formula is not the mechanical expression of a petrified theology but the setting of the life of a people who have gone on wearing the same clothes, observing the same customs, believing in the same fetiches, and using the same saddles, ploughs, looms, and dye-stuffs as in the days when the foundations of the first mosque of el kairouiyin were laid. [illustration: _from a photograph from the service des beaux-arts au maroc_ marrakech--a street fountain] the origin of this tradition is confused and obscure. the arabs have never been creative artists, nor are the berbers known to have been so. as investigations proceed in syria and mesopotamia it seems more and more probable that the sources of inspiration of pre-moslem art in north africa are to be found in egypt, persia, and india. each new investigation pushes these sources farther back and farther east; but it is not of much use to retrace these ancient vestiges, since moroccan art has, so far, nothing to show of pre-islamite art, save what is purely phenician or roman. in any case, however, it is not in morocco that the clue to moroccan art is to be sought; though interesting hints and mysterious reminiscences will doubtless be found in such places as tinmel, in the gorges of the atlas, where a ruined mosque of the earliest almohad period has been photographed by m. doutté, and in the curious algerian towns of sedrata and the kalaa of the beni hammads. both of these latter towns were rich and prosperous communities in the tenth century and both were destroyed in the eleventh, so that they survive as mediaeval pompeiis of a quite exceptional interest, since their architecture appears to have been almost unaffected by classic or byzantine influences. traces of a very old indigenous art are found in the designs on the modern white and black berber pottery, but this work, specimens of which are to be seen in the oriental department of the louvre, seems to go back, by way of central america, greece (sixth century b.c.) and susa (twelfth century b.c.), to the far-off period before the streams of human invention had divided, and when the same loops and ripples and spirals formed on the flowing surface of every current. it is a disputed question whether spanish influence was foremost in developing the peculiarly moroccan art of the earliest moslem period, or whether european influences came by way of syria and palestine, and afterward met and were crossed with those of moorish spain. probably both things happened, since the almoravids were in spain; and no doubt the currents met and mingled. at any rate, byzantine, greece, and the palestine and syria of the crusaders, contributed as much as rome and greece to the formation of that peculiar moslem art which, all the way from india to the pillars of hercules, built itself, with minor variations, out of the same elements. arab conquerors always destroy as much as they can of the work of their predecessors, and nothing remains, as far as is known, of almoravid architecture in morocco. but the great almohad sultans covered spain and northwest africa with their monuments, and no later buildings in africa equal them in strength and majesty. it is no doubt because the almohads built in stone that so much of what they made survives. the merinids took to rubble and a soft tufa, and the cherifian dynasties built in clay like the spaniards in south america. and so seventeenth century meknez has perished while the almohad walls and towers of the tenth century still stand. the principal old buildings of morocco are defensive and religious--and under the latter term the beautiful collegiate houses (the medersas) of fez and salé may fairly be included, since the educational system of islam is essentially and fundamentally theological. of old secular buildings, palaces or private houses, virtually none are known to exist; but their plan and decorations may easily be reconstituted from the early chronicles, and also from the surviving palaces built in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, and even those which the wealthy nobles of modern morocco are building to this day. the whole of civilian moslem architecture from persia to morocco is based on four unchanging conditions: a hot climate, slavery, polygamy and the segregation of women. the private house in mahometan countries is in fact a fortress, a convent and a temple: a temple of which the god (as in all ancient religions) frequently descends to visit his cloistered votaresses. for where slavery and polygamy exist every house-master is necessarily a god, and the house he inhabits a shrine built about his divinity. the first thought of the moroccan chieftain was always defensive. as soon as he pitched a camp or founded a city it had to be guarded against the hungry hordes who encompassed him on every side. each little centre of culture and luxury in moghreb was an islet in a sea of perpetual storms. the wonder is that, thus incessantly threatened from without and conspired against from within--with the desert at their doors, and their slaves on the threshold--these violent men managed to create about them an atmosphere of luxury and stability that astonished not only the obsequious native chronicler but travellers and captives from western europe. [illustration: _from a photograph from the service des beaux-arts au maroc_ rabat--gate of the kasbah of the oudayas] the truth is, as has been often pointed out, that, even until the end of the seventeenth century, the refinements of civilization were in many respects no greater in france and england than in north africa. north africa had long been in more direct communication with the old empires of immemorial luxury, and was therefore farther advanced in the arts of living than the spain and france of the dark ages; and this is why, in a country that to the average modern european seems as savage as ashantee, one finds traces of a refinement of life and taste hardly to be matched by carlovingian and early capetian europe. iii the brief almoravid dynasty left no monuments behind it. fez had already been founded by the idrissites, and its first mosques (kairouiyin and les andalous) existed. of the almoravid fez and marrakech the chroniclers relate great things; but the wild hilalian invasion and the subsequent descent of the almohads from the high atlas swept away whatever the first dynasties had created. the almohads were mighty builders, and their great monuments are all of stone. the earliest known example of their architecture which has survived is the ruined mosque of tinmel, in the high atlas, discovered and photographed by m. doutté. this mosque was built by the inspired mystic, ibn-toumert, who founded the line. following him came the great palace-making sultans whose walled cities of splendid mosques and towers have romanesque qualities of mass and proportion, and, as m. raymond koechlin has pointed out, inevitably recall the "robust simplicity of the master builders who at the very same moment were beginning in france the construction of the first gothic cathedrals and the noblest feudal castles." [illustration: _from a photograph from the service des beaux-arts au maroc_ fez--medersa bouanyana] in the thirteenth century, with the coming of the merinids, moroccan architecture grew more delicate, more luxurious, and perhaps also more peculiarly itself. that interaction of spanish and arab art which produced the style known as moorish reached, on the african side of the straits, its greatest completeness in morocco. it was under the merinids that moorish art grew into full beauty in spain, and under the merinids that fez rebuilt the mosque kairouiyin and that of the andalusians, and created six of its nine _medersas_, the most perfect surviving buildings of that unique moment of sober elegance and dignity. the cherifian dynasties brought with them a decline in taste. a crude desire for immediate effect, and the tendency toward a more barbaric luxury, resulted in the piling up of frail palaces as impermanent as tents. yet a last flower grew from the deformed and dying trunk of the old empire. the saadian sultan who invaded the soudan and came back laden with gold and treasure from the great black city of timbuctoo covered marrakech with hasty monuments of which hardly a trace survives. but there, in a nettle-grown corner of a ruinous quarter, lay hidden till yesterday the chapel of the tombs: the last emanation of pure beauty of a mysterious, incomplete, forever retrogressive and yet forever forward-straining people. the merinid tombs of fez have fallen; but those of their destroyers linger on in precarious grace, like a flower on the edge of a precipice. iv moroccan architecture, then, is easily divided into four groups: the fortress, the mosque, the collegiate building and the private house. the kernel of the mosque is always the _mihrab_, or niche facing toward the kasbah of mecca, where the _imam_[a] stands to say the prayer. this arrangement, which enabled as many as possible of the faithful to kneel facing the _mihrab_, results in a ground-plan necessarily consisting of long aisles parallel with the wall of the _mihrab_, to which more and more aisles are added as the number of worshippers grows. where there was not space to increase these lateral aisles they were lengthened at each end. this typical plan is modified in the moroccan mosques by a wider transverse space, corresponding with the nave of a christian church, and extending across the mosque from the praying niche to the principal door. to the right of the _mihrab_ is the _minbar_, the carved pulpit (usually of cedar-wood incrusted with mother-of-pearl and ebony) from which the koran is read. in some algerian and egyptian mosques (and at cordova, for instance) the _mihrab_ is enclosed in a sort of screen called the _maksoura_; but in morocco this modification of the simpler plan was apparently not adopted. [footnote a: the "deacon" or elder of the moslem religion, which has no order of priests.] [illustration: _from a photograph from the service des beaux-arts au maroc_ fez--the praying-chapel in the medersa el attarine] the interior construction of the mosque was no doubt usually affected by the nearness of roman or byzantine ruins. m. saladin points out that there seem to be few instances of the use of columns made by native builders; but it does not therefore follow that all the columns used in the early mosques were taken from roman temples or christian basilicas. the arab invaders brought their architects and engineers with them; and it is very possible that some of the earlier mosques were built by prisoners or fortune-hunters from greece or italy or spain. at any rate, the column on which the arcades of the vaulting rests in the earlier mosques, as at tunis and kairouan, and the mosque el kairouiyin at fez, gives way later to the use of piers, foursquare, or with flanking engaged pilasters as at algiers and tlemcen. the exterior of the mosques, as a rule, is almost entirely hidden by a mushroom growth of buildings, lanes and covered bazaars, but where the outer walls have remained disengaged they show, as at kairouan and cordova, great masses of windowless masonry pierced at intervals with majestic gateways. beyond the mosque, and opening into it by many wide doors of beaten bronze or carved cedar-wood, lies the court of the ablutions. the openings in the façade were multiplied in order that, on great days, the faithful who were not able to enter the mosque might hear the prayers and catch a glimpse of the _mihrab_. in a corner of the courts stands the minaret. it is the structure on which moslem art has played the greatest number of variations, cutting off its angles, building it on a circular or polygonal plan, and endlessly modifying the pyramids and pendentives by which the ground-plan of one story passes into that of the next. these problems of transition, always fascinating to the architect, led in persia, mesopotamia and egypt to many different compositions and ways of treatment, but in morocco the minaret, till modern times, remained steadfastly square, and proved that no other plan is so beautiful as this simplest one of all. surrounding the court of the ablutions are the school-rooms, libraries and other dependencies, which grew as the mahometan religion prospered and arab culture developed. the medersa was a farther extension of the mosque: it was the academy where the moslem schoolman prepared his theology and the other branches of strange learning which, to the present day, make up the curriculum of the mahometan university. the medersa is an adaptation of the private house to religious and educational ends; or, if one prefers another analogy, it is a _fondak_ built above a miniature mosque. the ground-plan is always the same: in the centre an arcaded court with a fountain, on one side the long narrow praying-chapel with the _mihrab_, on the other a classroom with the same ground-plan, and on the next story a series of cell-like rooms for the students, opening on carved cedar-wood balconies. this cloistered plan, where all the effect is reserved for the interior façades about the court, lends itself to a delicacy of detail that would be inappropriate on a street-front; and the medersas of fez are endlessly varied in their fanciful but never exuberant decoration. m. tranchant de lunel has pointed out (in "france-maroc") with what a sure sense of suitability the merinid architects adapted this decoration to the uses of the buildings. on the lower floor, under the cloister, is a revêtement of marble (often alabaster) or of the almost indestructible ceramic mosaic.[a] on the floor above, massive cedar-wood corbels ending in monsters of almost gothic inspiration support the fretted balconies; and above rise stucco interfacings, placed too high up to be injured by man, and guarded from the weather by projecting eaves. [footnote a: these moroccan mosaics are called _zellijes_.] [illustration: _from a photograph from the service des beaux-arts au maroc_ salé--interior court of the medersa] the private house, whether merchant's dwelling or chieftain's palace, is laid out on the same lines, with the addition of the reserved quarters for women; and what remains in spain and sicily of moorish secular architecture shows that, in the merinid period, the play of ornament must have been--as was natural--even greater than in the medersas. the arab chroniclers paint pictures of merinid palaces, such as the house of the favourite at cordova, which the soberer modern imagination refused to accept until the medersas of fez were revealed, and the old decorative tradition was shown in the eighteenth century moroccan palaces. the descriptions given of the palaces of fez and of marrakech in the preceding articles, which make it unnecessary, in so slight a note as this, to go again into the detail of their planning and decoration, will serve to show how gracefully the art of the mosque and the medersa was lightened and domesticated to suit these cool chambers and flower-filled courts. with regard to the immense fortifications that are the most picturesque and noticeable architectural features of morocco, the first thing to strike the traveller is the difficulty of discerning any difference in the probable date of their construction until certain structural peculiarities are examined, or the ornamental details of the great gateways are noted. thus the almohad portions of the walls of fez and rabat are built of stone, while later parts are of rubble; and the touch of european influence in certain gateways of meknez and fez at once situate them in the seventeenth century. but the mediaeval outline of these great piles of masonry, and certain technicalities in their plan, such as the disposition of the towers, alternating in the inner and outer walls, continued unchanged throughout the different dynasties, and this immutability of the moroccan military architecture enables the imagination to picture, not only what was the aspect of the fortified cities which the greeks built in palestine and syria, and the crusaders brought back to europe, but even that of the far-off assyrio-chaldaean strongholds to which the whole fortified architecture of the middle ages in europe seems to lead back. [illustration: _from a photograph from the service des beaux-arts au maroc_ marrakech--the gate of the portuguese] ix books consulted afrique française (l'). bulletin mensuel du comité de l'afrique française. paris, , rue cassette. bernard, augustin. le maroc. paris, f. alcan, . budgett-meakin. the land of the moors. london, . châtelain, l. recherches archéologiques au maroc: volubilis. (published by the military command in morocco). les fouilles de volubilis (extrait du bulletin archéologique, ) chevrillon, a. crépuscule d'islam. cochelet, charles. le naufrage du brick sophie. conférences marocaines. paris, plon-nourrit. doutté, e. en tribu. paris, . foucauld, vicomte de. la reconnaissance au maroc. paris, . france-maroc. revue mensuelle, paris, , rue chauveau-lagarde. gaillard. une ville d'islam, fez. paris, . gayet, al. l'art arabe. paris, . houdas, o. le maroc de à . extrait d'une histoire du maroc intitulée "l'interprète qui s'exprime clairement sur les dynasties de l'orient et de l'occident," par ezziani. paris, e. leroux, . koechlin, raymond. une exposition d'art marocain. (gazette des beaux-arts, juillet-septembre, ). leo africanus, description of africa. loti, pierre. au maroc. migeon, gaston. manuel d'art musulman, ii, les arts plastiques et industriels. paris, a. picard et fils, . saladin, h. manuel d'art musulman, i, l'architecture. paris, a. picard et fils, . segonzac, marquis de. voyages au maroc. paris, . au coeur de l'atlas. paris, . tarde, a. de. les villes du maroc: fez, marrakech, rabat. (journal de l'université des annales, oct., nov., ). windus. a journey to mequinez. london, . index abdallah-ben-aïssa abd-el-aziz abd-el-hafid abd-el-kader abd-el-moumen abou-el abbas ("the golden") abou hassan abou-youssef agdal, olive-yards of the ahmed-baba ahmed-el-hiba aïd-el-kebir, the aïssaouas, the, of kairouan dance of algeria, french conquest of almohads, the, invasion of morocco by architecture of almoravids, the, invasion of morocco by destruction of architecture of andalusian moors, the, mosque of arabs, conquest of morocco by architecture, moroccan, four basic conditions of four groups of of the almohad dynasty of the cherifian dynasties of the merinid dynasty the saadian mausoleum the collegiate building the fortress the mosque the private house art, moroccan, sources of influence on disappearance of treasures of and moorish art ba-ahmed, builder of the bahia bab f'touh cemetery, at fez bahia, the, palace of, at marrakech apartment of grand vizier's favourite in bazaars, of fez of marrakech of salé beni-merins _see_ merinids berbers, the attack of, on fez origins of dialects of nomadic character of heresy and schisms of bernard, m. augustin black guard, the sultan's uniform of moulay-ismaël's method of raising blue men of the sahara, the bou-jeloud, palace of bugeaud, marshal carthage, african colonies of casablanca, exhibitions at port of catholics, in morocco cemetery, el alou bab f'touh châtelain, m. louis chella, ruins of cherifian dynasties, the architecture of children, moroccan, in the harem negro training of, for black guard chleuh boys, dance of christians, captive, and the building of meknez religious liberty to, in africa clocks, in sultan's harem at rabat cochelet, charles, his "naufrage du brick sophie" colleges, at fez at salé moslem architecture of moroccan colors, of north african towns commerce, moroccan conti, princesse de convention of fez, the courts of justice, moroccan crowds, moroccan street culture, in north africa dance, of chleuh boys of the hamadchas dawn, in africa djebilets, the doutté, m. dust-storm, at marrakech education, in morocco elakhdar, mosque of el alou, cemetery of el andalous, mosque of elbah (old fez) harems of eldjid (new fez) palaces of founding of el kairouiyin, mosque of the praying-hall of the court of ablutions of legend of the tortoise of el-ksar el-mansour, yacoub elmansour, palace of empress mother, the english emissaries, visit of, to meknez exhibitions, planned by general lyautey ezziani, chronicler of moulay-ismaël fatimites, the fez, the approach to unchanged character of ruins of merinid tombs of the upper or new old summer-palace at night in antiquity of palaces of the inns at streets of a city of wealth the merchant of bazaars of a melancholy city twilight in the shrines of mosque of moulay idriss at mosque of el kairouiyinat the university of medersas of mosque of el andalous at bab f'touh cemetery of the potters of art and culture of the mellah of harems of old the convention of uprising in attack of berbers on exhibitions at moslem college at founding of almoravid conquest of centre of moroccan learning catholic diocese at massacres at fez elbali fez eldjid fondak nedjanne, the fortifications, moroccan, architecture of foucauld, vicomte de franco-german treaty of french protectorate in morocco, work of french, conquests in morocco at fez furniture, disappearance of merinid ghilis, the gouraud, general hamadch, tomb of hamadchas, the, ritual dance of harem in old fez an imperial in marrakech in old rabat hassan, sultan hassan, tower of, at rabat hassanians, the, rule of holy war, the, against france against spain and portugal hospitals, in morocco houses, moroccan, architecture of color of plan of rich private ibn-toumert idriss i idriss ii idrissite empire, the inns, moroccan jews, of sefrou treatment of north african kairouan, the aïssaouas of great mosque of kairouiyin, mosque of _see_ el kairouiyin kalaa, ruins of kenitra, port of koechlin, m. raymond koutoubya, tower of the lamothe, general land, area of cultivated, in morocco louis xiv, and moulay-ismaël lunel, m. tranchant de lyautey, general at sultan's court appointed resident-general in morocco military occupation of morocco by policy of economic development of morocco achieved by summary of work of maclean, sir harry mamora, forest of mangin, general mansourah, mosque of market, of marrakech in moulay idriss of salé of sefrou marrakech, the road to founders of tower of the koutoubya at palace of the bahia at the lamp-lighters of mixed population of bazaars of the "morocco" workers of olive-yards of the menara of a holiday of merchants of the square of the dead in french administration office at fruit-market of dance of chleuh boys in saadian tombs of a harem in taken by the french catholic diocese at chapel of the tombs at medersa, the, of the oudayas attarine at fez at salé architecture of mehedyia, phenician colony of meknez, building of the kasbah of palaces of stables of entrance into ruins of sunken gardens of visit of english emissaries to mellah, of fez of sefrou menara, the, in the agdal mequinez _see_ meknez merinids, the, tombs of, at fez conquest of morocco by architecture of mirador, the imperial moorish art mosque, of elakhador of el andalous of el kairouiyin of kairouan of mansourah of rabat of tinmel of tunisia architecture of moroccan moulay hafid moulay-el-hassan moulay idriss i, rule of tomb of moulay idriss ii, tomb of rule of moulay idriss, sacred city of street of the weavers in feast of the hamadchas in market-place of whiteness of founding of moulay-ismaël, and louis xiv exploits of mausoleum of moulay idriss enlarged by meknez built by the black guard of description of palaces of and english emissaries death of rule of successors of moulay youssef nedjarine, fountain and inn of night, in fez oases, moroccan marrakech sefrou settat oudayas, the, kasbah of medersa of palaces, moroccan, the bahia bou-jeloud at fez at meknez of moulay-ismaël phenicians, the, african explorations of pilgrimage to salé, a population, moroccan, varied elements of ports, moroccan portugal, the holy war against pottery, berber potters' field, the rabat tower of hassan at ruins of mosque at called "camp of victory" sacrifice of the sheep at sultan's harem of visit to a harem in old exhibitions at port of moslem college at central laboratory at railways, moroccan, built by french protectorate rarb, the roads, moroccan, built by french protectorate romans, the, african explorations of saadian sultans, the, history of tombs of rule of sacrifice of the sheep, the saint-amand, m. de saladin, m. h., his "manual of moslem architecture" salé, first view of type of untouched moroccan city bazaar of medersas of market of colors of schools, in morocco sedrata, ruins of sefrou market-place of men and women of jewish colony of senegal settat, oasis of sheep, sacrifice of the sidi-mohammed slaves, moroccan trade in white _sloughi_, bronze, at volubilis soudan spain, the holy war against spanish zone, the, german intrigue in stables, of meknez stewart, commodore street of the weavers (moulay idriss) streets, moroccan tangier colors of taken by the french tetuan, bronze chandelier of timbuctoo, the sultanate of tingitanian mauretania tinmel, ruins of mosque at tlemcen, the conflict for touaregs, the tower, of hassan of the koutoubya tunisia, almohad sanctuary of vandals, the, african invasion by veiled men, the versailles and meknez villages, "sedentary" volubilis, ruins of bronze _sloughi_ of founded by romans wedding, jewish, procession bringing gifts for windus, john women, moroccan, dress of of sefrou of the harems in sultan's harem in harems of old fez in harem of marrakech in harem of rabat negro yacoub-el-mansour youssef-ben-tachfin by the bibliotheque nationale de france (bnf/gallica) at http://gallica.bnf.fr. travels in morocco, by the late james richardson, author of "a mission to central africa," "travels in the desert of sahara," &c. edited by his widow. [illustration] in two volumes. vol. i. introduction. having made a limited tour in the empire of morocco a few years since, i am enabled to appreciate the information imparted to us by the lamented richardson, and am desirous of adding a few observations of my own upon the present state of affairs in that part of the african continent. the following work of the indefatigable traveller demands, at the present moment, a more than ordinary share of public attention, in consequence of the momentous events now passing in the straits of gibraltar, where the presence of powerful armaments entails on the governor of our great rock-fortress, a duty of some delicacy, situated as he now is in close proximity to three belligerent powers, all of whom are at peace with great britain. but distinguished alike for common sense and professional ability, sir william codrington, it is to be hoped, will steer clear of the follies committed by sir robert wilson in , and will command respect for the british name, without provoking bitter feelings between ourselves, and our french and spanish neighbours. it is scarcely possible that either france or spain can contemplate the conquest of the entire empire of morocco, as the result of the present impending crisis, the superficial extent of the territory being , square miles, and the population nearly , , , [ ] of which a large proportion live in a state of perpetual warfare, occupying inaccessible mountain fastnesses, from whence they only descend to the plains for the sake of plunder. the inhabitants may be classified as follows: , , moors and arabs; , , berbers; , jews, and the remainder are of the negro race. the regular army consists of less than thirty thousand men, but every arab is an expert irregular horseman, and the berbers make good foot-soldiers. these indeed are, in ordinary times, rarely to be depended on by the emperor, but so powerful an incentive is religious fanaticism that, were he to raise the standard of the holy war, a large army would quickly rally around him, deficient perhaps in discipline, yet living by plunder, and marching without the encumbrance of baggage, it would prove a formidable opponent. let us, however, suppose, that the present action of france and spain should result in the subversion of the atrocious system of government practised in morocco: a guarantee from the conquerors that our existing commercial privileges should be respected, would alone be required to ensure the protection of our interests, and what an extended field would the facilities for penetrating into the interior open to us! we must also remember that napoleon iii. in heart, is a free-trader; and, should destiny ever appoint him the arbiter of morocco, the protectionist pressure of a certain deluded class in france would be impotent against his policy in western barbary, a country perhaps more hostile to the european than china. sailors and others, who have had the misfortune to be cast on the inhospitable shore of northern africa, have been sent far inland into slavery to drag out a miserable existence; and, at this moment, there are many white christian slaves in the southern and eastern provinces of the empire. should the war not result in conquest, the least we have a right to expect, is that toleration should be forced upon the moors, and that european capital and labour should be allowed a free development throughout their empire. a flourishing trade would soon spring up, nature having blessed barbary with an excellent soil and climate, besides vast mineral wealth in its mountains; lead, copper, and antimony are found in them. the plains produce corn, rice, and indigo; the forests of cedar, ilex, cork, and olive-trees are scattered over a vast extent, and contain antelopes, wild bears, and other species of game; barbary also possesses an excellent breed of horses. the principal manufactures are leather, shawls and carpets. england has, but a short time since, succeeded in emancipating her jewish brethren from their few remaining disabilities; an opportunity may now be at hand, of ameliorating the condition of those in the empire of morocco, who are forced to submit to a grinding persecution, and are merely tolerated because they are useful. they supply many wants of the moorish population; are the best, and in many handicrafts, the only artificers, and are much employed by the government in financial occupations. they are compelled to occupy a distinct quarter of the town they inhabit; are permitted only to wear black garments, are forbidden to ride, the horse being considered too noble an animal to carry a jew, and are forced to take off their shoes on passing a mosque. even the little moorish boys strike and ill-treat them in various ways, and the slightest attempt at retaliation was formerly punished with death, and would now be visited with the bastinado. they are more heavily taxed than any other class, and special contributions are often levied on them. alas! why should we respect the national existence of any community of mahometans? have we effaced from our memory their treachery and inhuman cruelty in india; their utter worthlessness in turkey; their neglect in taking advantage of the richness with which nature has blest the countries in their possession; and their conquest from christendom of one of the fairest portions of europe. civilization cries aloud for retribution on a race whose religion teaches them to regard us as "dogs." surely, far from protecting and cherishing, we should hunt them out of the fair lands they occupy, and force them back on the deserts which vomited them forth on our ancestors ten centuries ago. brief periods of glory at bagdad, cairo, and granada, should not protect those who are now slaves to the lowest vices that degrade human nature. no administrative reforms are at all practicable; their moral maladies have attacked the vital element; the sole cure is conquest, and the substitution of christian governments in northern africa, and turkey in europe and asia. russia, france, austria, greece, and spain are weary of the excesses of their savage neighbours; none can be honestly inclined to stay their avenging swords. i have, in these prefatory remarks, extracted a few particulars from the short chapter on morocco, contained in my work on the "french in africa," and in advocating a crusade against the mahometan races, i believe i am recording the sentiments of millions of europeans. it now only remains for me to give expression to that universal feeling of regret which prevails among my countrymen at the untimely fate of poor richardson, and to offer my congratulations that he has bequeathed to us so pleasing an addition to his former works as the following narrative of his "travels in morocco." l. trent cave, f.r.g.s. author of "the french in africa." army and navy club, november, . preface. the present unsettled state of affairs in morocco, in consequence of the war in which she is now engaged with her more powerful and ancient enemy--spain, must, i conceive, render any information regarding a region so little known peculiarly acceptable at the present moment. in morocco, my late husband laboured to advance the same objects which had previously taken him to central africa, viz., the amelioration of the condition of the strange and remarkable races of men who inhabit that part of the world. he aimed at the introduction of a legitimate commerce with a view, in the first instance, to destroy the horrible and revolting trade in slaves, and thus pave the way for the diffusion of christianity among a benighted people. while travelling, with these high purposes in contemplation, he neglected no opportunity of studying the geography of the country, and of obtaining an insight into the manners, customs, prejudices, and sentiments of its inhabitants, as well as any other useful information in relation to it. i accompanied him on his travels in algiers, tunis, and tripoli, in which last city he left me, it not being considered advisable that i should proceed with him into the interior of the country. we were not destined to meet again in this world. my beloved husband died at bornou, in central africa, whither he was sent by her majesty's government to enter into treaties with the chiefs of the surrounding districts. of the many difficulties and dangers which the traveller is likely to encounter in penetrating into the interior of so inhospitable a region, the reader may form some idea by a perusal of the the following extracts from my husband's writings. "i am very much of opinion that in african travel we should take especial care not to attempt too much at once; that we should proceed very slowly, feeling our way, securing ourselves against surprise, and reducing and confining our explorations to the record of matters of fact as far as possible, or consistently with a due illustration of the narrative. but, whether we attempt great tours, or short journeyings, we shall soon find, by our own sad experience, that african travel can only be successfully prosecuted piecemeal, bit by bit, here a little and there a little, now an island, now a line of coast, now an inland province, now a patch of desert, and slow and painful in all their results, whilst few explorers will ever be able to undertake more than two, at most three, inland journeys. "failures, disasters, and misadventure may attend our efforts of discovery; the intrepid explorers may perish, as they have so frequently done, or be scalped by the indian savage in the american wilderness, or stabbed by the treacherous bedouin of asiatic deserts, or be stretched stiff in the icy dreary polar circles, or, succumbing to the burning clime of africa, leave their bones to bleach upon its arid sandy wastes; yet these victims of enterprise will add more to a nation's glory than its hoarded heaps of gold, or the great gains of its commerce, or even the valour of its arms. "nevertheless, geographical discovery is not barren ardour, or wasted enthusiasm; it produces substantial fruits. the fair port of london, with its two parallel forests of masts, bears witness to the rich and untold treasures which result from the traffic of our merchant-fleets with the isles and continents discovered by the genius and enterprise of the maritime or inland explorer. and, finally, we have always in view the complete regeneration of the world, by our laws, our learning, and our religion. if every valley is to be raised, and every mountain laid low, by the spade and axe of industry, guided by science, the valley or the mountain must first be discovered. "if men are to be civilized, they must first be found; and if other, or the remaining tribes of the inhabitable earth are to acknowledge the true god, and accept his favour as known to us, they also, with ourselves, must have an opportunity of hearing his name pronounced, and his will declared." my husband would, indeed, have rejoiced had he lived to witness the active steps now taken by oxford and cambridge for sending out missionaries to central africa, to spread the light of the gospel. among his unpublished letters, i find one addressed to the christian churches, entitled "project for the establishment of a christian mission at bornou," dated october, . he writes: "the christian churches have left central africa now these twelve centuries in the hands of the mohammedans, who, in different countries, have successfully propagated the false doctrines of the impostor of mecca. if the christian churches wish to vindicate the honour of their religion--to diffuse its beneficent and heavenly doctrines--and to remove from themselves the severe censure of having abandoned central africa to the false prophet, i believe there is now an opening, _viâ_ bornou, to attempt the establishment of their faith in the heart of africa." he ends his paper by quoting the words of ignatius pallme, a bohemian, the writer of travels in kordofan, who says "it is high time for the missionary societies in europe to direct their attention to this part of africa (that is, kordofan). if they delay much longer, it will be too late; for, when the negroes have once adopted the koran, no power on earth can induce them to change their opinions. i have heard, through several authentic sources, that there are few provinces in the interior of africa where mohammedanism has not already begun to gain a footing." it would be a great solace to me should this work be received favourably, and be deemed to reflect honour on the memory of my lamented husband; and, in the hope that such may be the case, i venture to commit it into the hands of an indulgent public. j.e. richardson. london, november , . contents of the first volume introduction preface chapter i. policy of the court of morocco.--its strength.--diploplomatic intercourse with england.--distrust of europeans.--commercial relations. chapter ii. arrival at tangier.--moorish pilgrims in cordova.--address of the anti-slavery society.--mr. d. hay, british consul.--institut d'afrique.--conveyance of eunuchs in vessels under the french flag.--franco-moorish politics.--corn monopolies in morocco.--love and veneration for the english name--celebration of the ayd-kebir, or great festival.--value of money in morocco.--juvenile strolling singer.--general account of the city of tangier.--intercourse between the moorish emperor and the foreign consuls.--cockney sportsmen.--the degrading of high moorish functionaries.--how we smuggle cattle from tangier to gibraltar.--the blood-letting of plethoric placemen. chapter iii. the posada.--ingles and benoliel.--amulets for successful parturition.--visits of a moorish taleb and a berber.--three sundays during a week in barbary.--m. rey's account of the empire of morocco.--the government auctioneer gives an account of slavery and the slave trade in morocco.--benoliel as english cicerone.--departure from tangier to gibraltar.--how i lost my fine green broad-cloth.--mr. frenerry's opinion of maroquine affairs. chapter iv. departure from gibraltar to mogador.--the straits.--genoese sailors.--trade-wind hurricanes on the atlantic coast of morocco.--difficulties of entering the port of mogador.--bad provisioning of foreign merchantmen.--the present representative of the once far-famed and dreaded rovers.--disembarkation at mogador.--mr. phillips, captain of the port.--rumours amongst the people about my mission.--visit to the cemeteries.--maroquine wreckers.--health of the inhabitants of mogador.--moorish cavaliers "playing at powder" composed of the ancient numidians.--the barb.--the life guards of the moorish emperor.--martial character of the negro.--some account of the black corps of the shereefs.--orthodoxy of the shereefs, and illustrative anecdotes of the various emperors. chapter v. several visits from the moors; their ideas on soldiers and payment of public functionaries.--mr. cohen and his opinion on maroquine affairs.-- phlebotomising of governors, and ministerial responsibility.--border travels of the shedma and hhaha tribes.--how the emperor enriches himself by the quarrels of his subjects.--message from the emperor respecting the anti-slavery address.--difficulties of travelling through or residing in the interior.--use of knives, and forks, and chairs are signs of social progress.--account of the periodical visit of the mogador merchants to the emperor, in the southern capital. chapter vi. influence of french consuls.--arrival of the governor of mogador from the capital; he brings an order to imprison the late governor; his character, and mode of administering affairs.--statue of a negress at the bottom of a well.--spanish renegades.--various wedding festivals of jews.--frequent fêtes and feastings among the jewish population of morocco.--scripture illustration, "behold the bridegroom cometh!"--jewish renegades.--how far women have souls.--infrequency of suicides. chapter vii. interview with the governor of mogador, on the address of the anti-slavery society.--day and night side of the mission adventure.--phillips' application to be allowed to stand with his "shoes on" before the shereefian presence.--case of the french israelite, darmon, who was killed by the government.--order of the government against europeans smoking in the streets.--character of haj mousa, governor of mazagran.--talmudical of a sousee jew.--false weights amongst the mogador merchants.--rumours of war from the north, and levy of troops.--bragadocio of the governor.--mr. authoris's opinion on the state of of the country.--moorish opinions on english abolition.-- european slavery in southern morocco.--spanish captives and the london ironmongers company.--sentiments of barbary jews on slavery. illustrations. vol. i. interior of a moorish house city of tangier port of mogador christian burial place moorish cemetery nubian cavalry of ancient africa wadnoun vol. ii. the snake-charmer city of morocco fish found in hot springs water-snake the aoudad travels in morocco. chapter i. policy of the court of morocco.--its strength.--diplomatic intercourse with england.--distrust of europeans.--commercial relations. morocco is the china of north africa. the grand political maxim of the shereefian court is, the exclusion of strangers; to look upon all strangers with distrust and suspicion; and should they, at any time, attempt to explore the interior of morocco, or any of the adjacent counties, to thwart and circumvent their enterprise, is a veritable feat of statesmanship in the opinion of the shereefian court. the assassination of mr. davidson, some years since, is an odious and enduring stigma on the moorish court, notwithstanding the various efforts which have been made to deny the personal responsibility of the emperor in that transaction. the prince de joinville was once going to open morocco, as we opened china; but bullets and shot which his royal highness showered upon tangier and mogador, only closed faster the approaches and routes of this well-guarded empire--only more hermetically sealed the capitals of fez and morocco against the prying or morbid curiosity of the tourist, or the mappings and measurings of the political spy. the striking anecdote, illustrating the exclusive policy of the maroquine court, is familiar to all who have read the history of the moorish sultans of the mugreb. years ago, a european squadron threatened to bombard tangier, unless their demands were instantly satisfied; and the then reigning sultan sent down from fez this imperial message: "how much will the enemy give me if i myself burn to ashes my well-beloved city of tangier? tell the enemy, o governor of the mighty city of tangier, that i can reduce this self-same city to a heap of smoking ruins, at a much cheaper rate than he can, with all his ships, his warlike machines, and his fighting men." the strength of morocco lies in her internal cities, her inland population, and the natural difficulties of her territory; about her coast she cares little; but the french did not find this out till after their bombardments. the unwonted discovery led them afterwards to boast that they had at length opened morocco by the other and opposite system of a pacific mission. the parties forming the mission, pretended to have obtained from the emperor permission for europeans "to travel in morocco without let or hindrance whithersoever they will." but the opposition press justly ridiculed the pretensions of the alleged concession, as the precarious and barren result of a mission costing several million of francs. even an englishman, but much more a frenchman--and the latter is especially hated and dreaded in all the maroquine provinces, would have considerably hesitated in placing confidence in the safe conduct of this jealous court. the spirit of the christian west, which has invaded the most secret councils of the eastern world, persia, turkey, and all the countries subjected to ottoman rule, is still excluded by the haughty shereefs of the mahometan west. there is scarcely any communication between the port and the court of the shereefs, and the two grand masters of orthodox islamism, this of the west, and that of the east, are nearly strangers to each other. all that muley errahman has to do with the east, appears to be to procure eunuchs and abyssinian concubines for his harem from egypt, and send forward his most faithful, or most rebellious subjects [ ] on their pilgrimage to mecca. englishmen are surprised, that the frequent visits and uninterrupted communications between morocco and gibraltar, during so long a period, should have produced scarcely a perceptible change in the minds of the moors, and that western barbary should be a century behind tunis. this circumstance certainly does not arise from any inherent inaptitude in the moorish character to entertain friendly relations with europeans, and can only have resulted from that crouching and subservient policy which the gibraltar authorities have always judged it expedient to show towards the maroquines. our diplomatic intercourse began with morocco in the reign of queen elizabeth; and though on friendly terms more or less ever since, englishmen have not yet obtained a recognised permission to travel in the interior of the country, without first specially applying to its government. our own countrymen know little of morocco, or of its inhabitants, customs, laws, and government; and, though only five or six days sail from england, it must be regarded as an unknown and unexplored region to the mass of the english nation. nevertheless, in spite of the maroquine empire being the most conservative and unchangeable of all north african mussulman states, and whilst, happily for itself, it has been allowed to pursue its course obscurely and noiselessly, without exciting particular attention in europe, or being involved in the wars and commotions of european nations, morocco is not, therefore, beyond the reach of changes and the ravages of time, nor exempt from that mutability which is impressed upon all sublunary states. the bombardments of tangier and mogador have left behind them traces not easily to be effaced. it was no ordinary event for morocco to carry on hostilities with an european power. the battle of isly has deeply wounded the shereefians, and incited the mussulman heart to sullen and unquenchable revenge. a change has come over the maroquine mind, which, as to its immediate effects, is evidently for the worst towards us christians. the distrust of all europeans, which existed before the french hostilities, is now enlarged to hatred, a feeling from which even the english are hardly excepted. up to the last moment, the government and people of morocco believed that england would never abandon them to their unscrupulous and ambitious neighbours. the citizens and merchants of mogador could not be brought to believe, or even to entertain the idea that the british ships of war would quietly look on, whilst the french--the great rivals and enemies of the english--destroyed their towns and batteries. most manifest facts and stern realities dissipated, in an hour when they little thought of it, such a fond delusion. from that moment, the moral influence of england, once our boast, and not perhaps unreasonably so, was no longer felt in morocco; and now we have lost almost all hold on the good wishes and faith of the mussulman tribes of that immense country. as to exploring the empire of morocco, or making it the way of communication with soudan or central negroland, this is now altogether impracticable. the difficulties of europeans travelling the maroquine states, always great and perilous, are now become nearly insuperable. this suspicious distrust, or ill-feeling has communicated itself contagiously to the tribes of the south as far as the desert, and has infected other parts of barbary. the engleez, once the cherished friends of the moors, are looked upon more or less as the abettors of french aggressions in north africa, if not as the sharers with them of the spoil. in the language of the more plain-spoken moors, "we always thought all christians alike, though we often excepted the english from the number of our enemies, now we are certain we were wrong; the english are become as much our enemies as the french and the spaniards." the future alone can disclose what will be the particular result of this unfavourable feeling; both with respect to france and england, and to other european nations. however, we may look forward without misgiving. islamism will wear itself out--the crescent must wane. in these preliminary observations, the commercial system of the maroquine court deserves especial mention. the great object of muley abd errahman [ ] is--nay, the pursuit of his whole life has been--to get the whole of the trade of the empire into his own hands. in fact, he has by this time virtually succeeded, though the thing is less ostentatiously done than by the egyptian viceroy, that equally celebrated prince-merchant. in order to effect this, his shereefian majesty seeks to involve in debt all the merchants, natives, or foreigners, tempting them by the offer of profuse credit. as many of them as are needy and speculative, this imperial boon is without scruple greedily accepted. the emperor likewise provides them with commodious houses and stores; gives them at once ten or twenty thousand dollars worth of credit, and is content to receive in return monthly instalments. these instalments never are, never can be regularly paid up. the debt progressively and indefinitely increases; and whilst they live like so many merchant-princes, carrying on an immense trade, they are in reality beggars and slaves of the emperor. they are, however, styled _imperial_ merchants, and wear their golden chains with ostentatious pride. this credit costs his shereetian highness nothing; he gives no goods, advances no moneys, whilst he most effectually impoverishes and reduces to servitude the foreign merchant resident in his empire, never allowing him to visit his native country without the guarantee of leaving his wife and family behind as hostages for his return. the native merchant is, in all cases, absolutely at the mercy of his imperial lord. on the bombardment of mogador, all the native and resident traders, not excepting the english merchants, were found overwhelmed with debt, and, therefore, were not allowed to leave the country; and they were only saved from the pillage and massacre of the ferocious berber tribes by a miracle of good luck. since the bombardment of mogador, the emperor has more strongly than ever set his face against the establishment of strangers in his dominions. now his imperial highness is anxious that all commerce should be transacted by his own subjects. the emperor's jews are, in future, to be the principal medium of commerce between morocco and europe, which, indeed, is facilitated by many of the native jews having direct relations with european jews, those of london and marseilles. in this way, the maroquines will be relieved from the embarrassments occasioned by the presence of europeans, jews, or christians, under the protection of foreign consuls. the emperor, also, has a fair share of trade, and gets a good return on what he exports; the balance of commercial transactions is always in his favour. i must add a word on the way of treating politically with the court of morocco. the modes and maxims of this court, not unlike those of the chinese, are procrastination, plausible delays, and voluminous despatches and communications, which are carried on through the hands of intermediaries and subordinate agents of every rank and degree. you can never communicate directly with the emperor, as with other barbary princes and pashas. this system has admirably and invariably succeeded for the last two or three centuries; that is to say, the empire of morocco has remained intact by foreign influences, while its system of commerce has been an exclusive native monopoly. the americans, however, have endeavoured to adopt a more expeditious mode of treating with the maroquine court. they have something, in the style and spirit of lynch law, usually made their own demands and their own terms, by threatening the immediate withdrawal of their consul, or the bombardment of ports. the shereefs, thus intimidated, have yielded, though with a very bad grace. nevertheless, the americans have received no favours, nor have they obtained a nearer approach to the awful shereefian presence than other people; and it is not likely they ever will succeed beyond their neighbours. the french and english have always negotiated and corresponded, corresponded and negotiated, and been worsted once and worsted again. somehow or other, the emperor has, in most cases, had his own way. neither the american nor our own european system is the right or dignified course. and i am still of opinion, that the maroquine court is so far enlightened respecting the actual state of the barbarians or christian infidels, out of its shereefian land of marabouts, out of its central orthodox mussulman land of the mugreb, as to be accessible to ordinary notions of things, and that it would always concede a just demand if it were rightly and vigorously pressed, and if the religious fanaticism of its people were not involved in the transaction. thus far we may do justice to the government of these moorish princes. this opinion, however, does not altogether coincide with that of the late mr. hay. according to the report of mr. borrow, as found in his work, "the bible of spain," the moorish government, according to mr. hay, was "one of the vilest description, with which it was next to impossible to hold amicable relations, as it invariably acted with bad faith, and set at nought the most solemn treaties." but, if the maroquine court had acted in this most extraordinary manner, surely there would now be no moorish empire of western barbary. chapter ii. arrival at tangier.--moorish pilgrims in cordova.--address of the anti-slavery society.--mr. d. hay, british consul.--institut d'afrique.--conveyance of eunuchs in vessels under the french flag.--franco-moorish politics.--corn monopolies in morocco.--love and veneration for the english name.--celebration of the ayd-kebir, great festival. value of money in morocco.--juvenile strolling singer.--general account of the city of tangier.--intercourse between the moorish emperor and the foreign consuls.--cockney sportsmen,--the degrading of high moorish functionaries.--how we smuggle cattle from tangier to gibraltar.--the blood-letting of plethoric placemen. the communication between gibraltar and tangier is by no means easy and regular, though the places are only a few hours' distance from the other. i had waited many days at gib. (as our captain called the former place), before the wind enabled us to leave, and then, our boat being a small transport for cattle, and the government contractors wanting beef for the garrison--for an englishman or an english soldier cannot live in any part of the world without beef--we were compelled to leave with the wind in our teeth, and to make a night's voyage of this four or five hours' traverse. it might be worth while, one would think, to try a small steam-tug for the conveyance of cattle from tangier to our garrison, which, besides, would be a great convenience for passengers. on coming on deck in the morning, tangier, "the city protected of the lord," appeared in all its north african lineaments, white and bright, shining, square masses of masonry, domes of fair and modest santos, and the heaven-pointing minarets; here and there a graceful palm, a dark olive, or the black bushy kharoub, and all denned sharply and clearly in the goodly prospect. but these barbary towns had lost much of their freshness or novelty to me, and novelty is the greatest ingredient of our pleasure in foreign travel. i had also just travelled through spain, and the south of this country is still, as to its aspect, part and parcel of morocco, though it is severed by the straits. in the ancient moorish city of cordova, i had even saluted the turban. i met two moors strolling along, with halting steps and triste mien, through the streets, whom i instinctively addressed. "_wein mashe. ash tomel_. where are you going? what are you doing?" the moors (greatly pleased to hear the sound of their own mother-tongue in the land of their pilgrimage).--"_net jerrej_. we are enjoying ourselves." traveller.--"what do you think of the country (cordova)?" the moors.--"this is the land of our fathers." traveller.--"well, what then? are you going to possess it again?" the moors.--"of what country are you?" traveller.--"engleez." the moors (brightening up).--"that is good. yes, we are very glad. we thought you might be a spaniard, or a frenchman. now we'll tell you all; we don't fear. god will give us this country again, when seedna aïsa [ ] comes to deliver us from these curse-smitten dogs of spaniards." [ ] traveller.--"well, never mind the spaniards. have you seen anything you like here?" the moors.--"look at this knife; it is rusty; it should not be so." traveller.--"how!" the moors.--"we read in our books and commentators that in andalous (spain) there is no rust, and that nothing rusts here." [ ] traveller.--"nonsense; have you seen the hundred pillars of your mosque?" (now converted into a cathedral.) the moors.--"ah, we have seen them," with a deep sigh; "and the pillars will stand till to-morrow." (end of the world.) i was obliged to say farewell to these poor pilgrims, wandering in the land of their fathers, and worshipping at the threshold of the noble remains of moresco-spanish antiquity, for the _diligencia_ was starting off to seville. to return from my digression. i soon found myself at home in tangier amongst my old friends, the moors, and coming from spain, could easily recognise many things connecting the one country with the other. the success attending the various measures of the bey of tunis for the abolition of slavery in north africa, and the favourable manner in which this prince had received me, when i had charge of a memorial from the inhabitants of malta, to congratulate his highness on his great work on philanthropy, induced the committee of the anti-slavery society to confide to me an address to the emperor of morocco, praying him to enfranchise the negro race of his imperial dominions. we were fully prepared to encounter the strongest opposition from the shereefian court; but, at the same time, we thought there could be no insuperable obstacle in our way. the maroquines had the same religion and form of government as the tuniseens, and by perseverance in this, as well as any other enterprise, something might at last be effected. even the agitation of the question in the empire of morocco, amongst its various tribes, was a thing not to be neglected; for the agitation of public opinion in a despotic country like morocco, as well as in a constitutional state like england, admirably prepares the way for great measures of reform and philanthropy; and, besides the business of an abolitionnist is agitation; agitation unceasing; agitation in season and out of season. on my arrival at tangier, i called upon mr. drummond hay, the british consul-general, stating to him my object, and asking his assistance. the english government had instructed the consul to address the emperor on this interesting subject, not long before i arrived, but it was with the greatest difficulty that any sort of answer could be obtained to the communication. mr. hay, therefore, gave me but small encouragement, and was not a little surprised when i told him i expected a letter of introduction from her majesty's government. he could not understand this reiterated assault on the shereefs for the abolition of slavery, not comprehending the absolute necessity of continued agitation on such a difficult matter, as exciting from a despotic and semi-barbarous prince, fortified by the prejudices of ages and generally sanctioned in his conduct by his religion, the emancipation of a degraded and enslaved portion of the human race. [ ] however, mr. hay was polite, and set about arranging matters for proceeding with a confessedly disagreeable subject for any consul to handle under like circumstances. he made a copy of the address of the anti-slavery society, and sent it to the english government, requesting instructions. i expected an address from the institut d'afrique of paris; but, after waiting some time, the secretary, mr. hippolyte de st. anthoine, wrote me a letter, in which he stated that, on account of the ill-will manifested by the emperor to the establishment of the french in algeria, the institut had come to the painful conclusion of not addressing him for the abolition of the slave-trade in his imperial states. soon after my arrival at tangier, the english letter-boat, carreo ingles, master, matteo attalya, brought twelve eunuch slaves, african youths, from gibraltar. they are a present from the viceroy of egypt to the emperor of morocco. the correo is the weekly bearer of letters and despatches to and from morocco. the slaves were not entered upon the bill of health, thus infringing upon the maritime laws of gibraltar and tangier. the other captains of the little boats could not help remarking, "you english make so much fuss about putting down the slave-trade, and allow it to be carried on under your own flag." even the foreign consuls here reprobated the inconsistency of the british government, in aiding the slave-trade of the mediterranean by their own flag. however, government ordered a strict inquiry into this case, and took means for preventing the occurrence of a like abuse. nevertheless, since then the emperor has actually applied to the british consul to allow eunuchs to be brought down the mediterranean in english steamers, in the same way as these were brought from malta to gibraltar in the prometheus--as, forsooth, servants and passengers. and on the refusal of our consul to sanction this illicit conveyance of slaves by british vessels, the emperor applied to the french consul, who condescended to hoist the tri-coloured flag for the transport of slave-eunuchs! this is one way of mitigating the prejudices of the shereefian court against the french occupation of algeria. many slaves are carried up and down the mediterranean in french vessels. the keeper of an hotel related to me with great bitterness, that the french officer who came with me from gibraltar had left tetuan for algeria. the officer had ordered a great many things of this man, promising to pay on his return to tangier. he deposited an old hatbox as a security, which, on being opened by the hotel keeper, was found to be full of greasy paper. at tetuan, the officer gave himself out as a special envoy of the emperor of the french. my good friends, the moors, continue to speculate upon the progress of the french army in algeria. i asked a moorish officer what he thought of the rumoured french invasion of morocco. he put the backs of his hands together, and locking together his fingers to represent the back of a hedgehog, he observed emphatically; "impossible! no christians can invade us. our country is like a hedgehog, no one can touch us." tangier christians will never permit the french to invade morocco, whatever may be the pretext. this is even the opinion of the foreign consuls. as a specimen of the commercial system of this country, i may mention that the monopoly of exporting leeches was sold this week to a jew, at the rate of , dollars. now the jew refuses to buy leeches except at his own price, whilst every unfortunate trader is obliged to sell to him and to him only. in fact, the monopolist fixes the price, and everybody who brings leeches to tangier must accept it. this case of leeches may be applied to nearly all the monopolies of the country. can anything be more ruinous to commerce? all the moors of tangier, immediately on entering into conversation with me, inquire if i am engleez? even moorish children ask this question: it appears to be a charm to them. the ayd kebir (great feast) was celebrated to-day, being the first of the new year. it was ushered in yesterday by prayer in the mosques. about a.m. the governor, the commandant of the troops, and other tangier authorities, proceeded to the open space of the market, attended with flags and music, and some hundred individuals all dressed in their holiday clothes. the white flag, typical of the sanctity of religion, floated over others of scarlet and green; the music was of squeaking bagpipes, and rude tumtums, struck like minute drums. the greater part were on horseback, the governor being most conspicuous. this troop of individuals ascended a small hill of the market-place, where they remained half an hour in solemn prayer. no jew or christian was allowed to approach the magic or sacred circle which enclosed them. this being concluded, down ran a butcher with a sheep on his back; just slaughtered, and bleeding profusely. a troop of boys followed quickly at his heels pelting him with stones. the butcher ran through the town to the seashore, and thence to the house of the kady--the boys still in hot and breathless pursuit, hard after him, pelting him and the bleeding sheep. the moors believe, if the man can arrive at the house of the judge before the sheep dies, that the people of tangier will have good luck; but, if the sheep should be quite dead, and not moving a muscle, then it will bring them bad luck, and the christians are likely to come and take away their country from them. the drollest part of the ceremony is, that the boys should scamper after the butcher, pelting the sheep, and trying to kill it outright, thus endeavouring to bring ill-luck upon their city and themselves. but how many of us really and knowingly seek our misfortunes? on the occasion of this annual feast, every moor, or head of a family, kills a sheep. the rich give to the poor, but the poor usually save up their earnings to be able to purchase a sheep to kill on this day. the streets are in different parts covered with blood, making them look like so many slaughter grounds. when the bashaw of the province is in tangier, thousands of the neighbouring arabs come to pay him their respects. with the moors, the festivals of religion are bonâ fide festivals. it may also be added, as characteristic of these north african barbarians, that, whilst many a poor person in our merry christian england does not, and cannot, get his plum-pudding and roast-beef at christmas, there is not a poor man or even a slave, in morocco who does not eat his lamb on this great feast of the mussulmans. it would be a mortal sin for a rich man to refuse a poor man a mouthful of his lamb. of course there was a sensation among the native population, and even among the consular corps, about my mission; but i have nothing very particular to record. i had many moorish visitors, some of whom were officers of the imperial troops. i made the acquaintance of one, sidi ali, with whom i had the following dialogue:-- traveller.--"sidi ali, what can i do to impress muley abd errahman in my favour?" sidi ali.--"money!" traveller.--"but will the emir of the shereefs accept of money from us christians?" sidi ali.--"money!" traveller.--"what am i to give the minister ben dris, to get his favour?" sidi ali.--"money!" traveller.--"can i travel in safety in morocco?" sidi ali.--"money:" indeed "money" seems to be the all and everything in morocco, as among us, "the nation of shopkeepers." the emperor himself sets the example, for he is wholly occupied in amassing treasures in mequiney. another acquaintance of mine was a little more communicative. aged moor.--"what can i do for you, stranger? you are good to me, every time i call here you give me tea with plenty of sugar in it. what can i do for you in my country?" traveller.--"tell me how to get on in my mission? how can i see muley errahman?" aged moor.--"now i am bound to give you my best advice. first then, take plenty of money with you. all love money; therefore without money you can do nothing. muley abd errahman loves money, and money he must have. and the minister loves money, and the minister must not be forgotten. the minister is the door to the emperor. you cannot get into the house but through the door. out of the towns and cities, the emperor has no power; so that whenever you travel out of these places, remember to give the people money." i had numberless volunteers to conduct me to fez. all came begging for this honour and lucrative employment. whatever may be said of the virtues of hospitality, i found all the world alike in its determination to make the most of strangers, if not to devour them. but the emperor was not at fez; he was in the southern capital, and it was necessary for me to go via mogador, to endeavour to obtain an interview with him at that place. the dreary monotony of moorish life was one day broken in upon by a juvenile strolling singer, who attracted a crowd of silent and attentive listeners. it was a grateful sight to see old men, with long and silvery beards, reclining in mute and serious attention; young men lounging in the pride and consciousness of animal strength; little children intermixed, but without prattle or merriment--all fixed and fascinated with the charm of vocal song. the vocalist himself was a picturesque object; his face was burnt black with afric's sun, his bare head was wildly covered with long, black matted, and curly hair, but his eye was soft and serene; and, as he stretched his throat upwards to give compass to his voice, he seemed as if he would catch inspiration from the prophet in heaven. a coarse brown blanket enveloped his spare and way-worn body, his only clothing and shelter from the heat by day and the cold by night, a fold of which fell upon his naked feet. the voice of the arab vocalist was extremely plaintive, even to the tones and inflections of distress, and the burden of his song was of religion and of love--two sentiments which all pure minds delight to combine. when he stopped a moment to take breath, a murmur of applause vibrated through the still air of the evening, not indeed for the youth, but for god! [ ] for it was a prayer of the artless and enraptured bystanders, invoking allah to bless the singing lad, and also to bless them, while ascribing all praise to the deity. this devout scene raised the moors greatly in my estimation. i thought men could not be barbarians, or even a jealous or vindictive race, who were charmed with such simple melody of sounds, and with sentiments so pure and true to nature. the arab youth sang:-- oh, there's none but the one god! i'll journey over the desert far to seek my love the fairest of maidens; the camels moan loudly to carry me thither, gainly are they, and fleeter than the swift-legged ostrich. oh, there's none but the one god! what though the desert wind slay me; what of it? death is from god. and woe to me! i cannot repine. but i'll away to the abode of my love, i'll embrace her with all my strength, i'll bear her back thence, and rest her on my couch. oh, there's none but the one god! so sang in plaintive accents the youth, until the last ray of the sun lingered on the minarets' tops, when, by the louder and authoritative voice of the muezin calling the faithful to prayers, this crowd of the worshippers of song and vocal harmony was dispersed to meet again, and forthwith chant a more solemn strain. the poor lad of the streets and highways went into the mosque along with his motley group of admirers; and all blended their voices and devotion together in prayer and adoration, lowly and in profound prostration, before the great allah! it is my intention, in the course of the present narrative, to give a brief account of the principal towns and cities of north africa; and i cannot do better than begin with tangier. this city is very ancient, having probably been built by the aboriginals, berbers, and was usually called by the romans, taigo on tingis. the emperor claudius re-peopled it, and called it julia traducta. the moors call it sanjah, and relate that benhad sahab el-alem built it, also surrounded it with walls of metal, and constructed its houses of gold and silver. in this condition, it remained until destroyed by some berber kings, who carried away all its treasures. the modern tangier is a small city of the province of hasbat, picturesquely placed on the eastern slope of a hill, which terminates in the west with its port and bay, having some analogy to the site of algiers. it has almost a square form, and its ramparts are a wall, flanked here and there with towers. this place, likewise, is most advantageously situate in the narrowest part of the straits of gibraltar, at a few miles east of cape spartel, and thirty miles w.s.w. of gibraltar, and has, therefore, been coveted by all the conquerors of north africa. the phoenicians, romans, goths, and arabs successively effected its conquest; and it was long a bone of eager contention between the moors and portuguese. in , alonzo, king of portugal, took it from the moors; and in it came into the hands of the english, as a part of the dowry of catherine, queen of charles ii.; so, whilst in our possession it was a place of considerable strength; but on its evacuation in by order of the english government, who were disgusted by the expense of its occupation, and the bootless collisions with the natives, the fortifications were demolished, and only the vestiges of them now are visible. had the british government continued its occupation for half a century, and kept in check the maroquine tribes, it is probable that by this time the greater part of morocco would have been under british rule, when we might have founded a flourishing colony, from which all north africa might have received the elements of christian civilization. old tangier (tangier belia) is situate about four miles east from the present, being now a heap of ruins, near a little river called khalk or tingia, spanned over by the remains of a once finely-built roman bridge. here was likewise an artificial port, where the roman galleys retired. the whole of this part of africa was denominated by the romans, mauritania, from the name of this city; and during their administration was united to the government of spain. tangier had a population of from four to six thousand. grabert estimates the population at , , including , jews, who live intermixed with the moors; , negroes, berbers of rif, and about christians. the consuls-general of the european powers reside here; and most of them have commodious houses. the swedish consul has a splendid garden, which is thrown open to the european residents. there is but one good street in the town; and the transition from europe to barbary, at so short a distance, is striking to the stranger. tarifa, on the opposite side, along the coast of spain, has, however, a moorish affinity to this place; and the dress of the women is not very dissimilar in the two towns, once inhabited by the people of the same religion, and now, perhaps, many of them descendants of the same families. tangier, though a miserable place compared to most of the cities in europe, is something considerable in morocco, and the great mosque is rather splendid. mr. borrow justly remarks that its minarets look like the offspring of the celebrated giralda of seville. the christians have here a convent, and a church within it, to which are attached half-a-dozen monks. there is no protestant church; mr. hay reads service in the british consulate, and invites the protestant residents. tangier is the only place in the empire where the christian religion is publicly professed. the jews have three or four small synagogues. usually, the synagogues in barbary are nothing more than private houses. before the bombardment of the french, the fortifications mounted forty pieces or so of cannon, but of no strength; on the contrary, going completely to ruin and decay, being scarcely strong enough to fire a salute from. the bay of tangier is good and spacious; but, in the course of time, will be filled up with sand. the shipping is exposed to strong westerly winds. the safest anchorage, however, is on the the eastern part, about half a mile off the shore, in a line with the round tower. with a few thousand pounds, one of the finest--at least, one of the most convenient--ports of the mediterranean could be constructed here. there is a bashaw of this province, who resides at el-araish, and a lieutenant-governor, who lives at tangier. with these functionaries, the representatives of european powers have principally to transact affairs. on the north is the castle, the residence of the governor. eleven consuls take up their abode in tangier; the british, french, spanish, portuguese, american, danish, swedish, sardinian, neapolitan, austrian, and dutch. each consular house generally belongs to its particular nation, the ground to the sultan. the consuls who have the most interest to guard in morocco, are the british, french, spanish, and portuguese. up to the bombardment of tangier, the danish and swedish governments paid to the maroquine court, the former , and the latter , dollars per annum, to have the privilege of hoisting their flag at this port. the french hostilities against morocco furnished a convenient opportunity for getting this odious tribute abolished. the americans led the way in getting rid of this subservience to the shereefian court, and refused from the first all presents and annual donations. generally, however, when new consuls are appointed, they bring with them presents, and visit the emperor in person. on the occasion of _fêtes_, they sometimes make presents to the governors of districts. whenever the emperor condescends to come down to tangier, three days after his arrival, it is the required etiquette for the consuls to seek his presence, and to make their obeisance to the shereefian lord. the consuls are accustomed to decide upon and control the affairs of their own countrymen, and those placed under their protection; but when a moor and an european are concerned in a transaction, it is usually a mixed commission of the consulate and the moorish authorities. many curious anecdotes are current respecting the consuls and the moorish government. a spanish consul once took it into his head to strike his flag and leave tangier. whilst he was gone, the emperor ordered all the jews to go and take possession of his house and live in it, as a degradation. the consular house was soon crammed with dirty jews, whose vermin and filth rendered the house untenantable, until it had undergone a thorough repair and cleansing. sometimes the emperor shows a great affection for a particular consular family. the family of the portuguese consul were great favorites. during the war of succession in portugal, the portuguese consul contracted debts in tangier, not being able to get his salary amidst the strife of parties. the moors complained to the emperor of the consul's debts. muley abd errahman, though a thorough miser himself, paid the consul's debts, alleging as a reason, "the consul was a friend of my ancestors, and he shall be my friend." the portuguese government wished to remove this consul on account of his alleged miguelite propensities, but the emperor threatened, if they did, that he would not receive another. our government compelled the portuguese to gratify the personal feeling of the emperor. senhor colaso is a native of morocco, as his father was before him, and the emperor calls them his own children. the jewish servants of the consulates are free from the poll-tax and other obnoxious contributions, and their moorish servants are also exempt from government conscriptions. at times, very serious misunderstandings and disputes occur between the consuls and the emperor on the subject of his imperial highness. our consul, mr. hay, was shot at by a fanatic marabout, the ball missing him, but killing a horse of one of the party. this affair was passed over, the consul very properly taking no notice of a mad saint. but i will cite another instance, as showing the intimate perception which the moors have of the peculiar precepts of our religion, as well as exhibiting their own moral ideas, in each case representing them to us in a favourable light. one of the emperor's subjects had insulted the french consul, m. sourdeau, and muley suleiman addressed to him the following singular epistle. "in the name of god, the most merciful. there is no power or force except with the most high and great god! "consul of the french nation, sourdeau, and salutation to him who is in the right way. inasmuch as you are our guest, under our protection, and consul in our country of a great nation, so we cannot but wish you the greatest consideration and the honours. on which account, you will perceive that that which has happened to you is to us intolerable, and would still be so had it been done by one of our own children or most intimate friends. and although we cannot put any obstacle to the decrees of god, yet such an act is not grateful to us, even if it is done to the vilest of men, or even cattle, and certainly we will not fail to show an example of severe justice, god willing. if you were not christians, having a feeling heart, and bearing patiently injuries, after the example of your prophet, whom god has in glory, jesus the son of mary, who, in the book which he brought you in the name of god, commands you, that if any person strike you on one cheek turn to him the other also; and who (always blessed of god!) also did not defend himself when the jews sought to kill him, from whom god took him. and, in our book, it is said, by the mouth of our prophet, there is no people among whom there are so many disposed to good works as those who call themselves christians; and certainly among you there are many priests and holy men who are not proud; nevertheless, our prophet also says, that we cannot impute a crime to persons of three sorts, that is to say, madmen (until they return to sound sense), children, and persons who sleep. now this man who has offended you is mad, and has no knowledge; but we have decreed to give you full satisfaction. if, however, you should be pleased to pardon him, you will perform a magnanimous work, and the most merciful will abundantly recompense you. on the other hand, if you absolutely wish him to be punished, he is in your hands, for in my empire no one shall fear injustice or violence, with the assistance of god." a whimsical story is current in tangier respecting the dealings of the shereefian court with the neapolitan government, which characteristically sets forth moorish diplomacy or manoeuvring. a ship load of sulphur was sent to the emperor. the moorish authorities declared it was very coarse and mixed with dirt. with great alacrity, the neapolitan government sent another load of finer and better quality. this was delivered; and the consul asked the moorish functionaries to allow the coarse sulphur to be conveyed back. these worthies replied, "oh dear, no! it is of no consequence, the emperor says, he will keep the bad, and not offend his royal cousin, the king of naples, by sending it back." the neapolitan government had no alternative but to submit, and thank the chief of the shereefs for his extreme condescension in accepting two ship-loads of sulphur instead of one. there are occasional communications between tangier and tarifa, in spain, but they are very frequent with gibraltar. a vast quantity of european merchandize is imported here from gibraltar for fez and the north of morocco. all the postal and despatch business also comes through tangier, which has privileges that few or no other maroquine cities possess. the emperors, indeed, have been wont to call it "the city of christians." in the environs, there is at times a good deal of game, and the european residents go out to shoot, as one is wont in other countries to talk a walk. the principal game is the partridge and hare, and the grand sport, the wild boar. our officers of the gibraltar garrison come over for shooting. but quackery and humbug exist in everything. a young gentleman has just arrived from gibraltar, who had been previously six weeks on his passage from holland to that place, with his legs infixed in a pair of three-league boots. he says he has come from holland on purpose to sport and hunt in morocco. several of the consuls, when they go out sporting, metamorphose themselves into veteran numidian sportsmen. you would imagine they were going to hunt lions for months in the ravines of the atlas, whereas it is only to shoot a stray partridge or a limping hare, or perchance they may meet with a boar. and this they do for a couple of days, or twenty-four hours, sleeping during the night very snugly under tents, and fed and feasted with milk, fowls, and sheep by the arabs. morocco, like all despotic countries, furnishes some severe examples of the degrading of high functionaries. there is an old man, sidi-el-arby-es-said, living there, who is a marked victim of imperial tyranny. some years ago, the conqueror despoiled him of all his wealth, and threw him into prison, after he had been twenty years bashaw of this district. he was in prison one year with his two sons. the object of the emperor was to extort the last filse of his money; and he entirely succeeded. the oppressor, however, relented a little on the death of one of his victim's sons; released him from confinement, and gave the ex-bashaw two houses, one for himself and the other for his surviving son. the old captain of the port has been no less than a dozen times in prison, under the exhausting pressure of the emperor. after the imperial miser has copiously bled his captain, he lets him out to fill his skin again. the old gentleman is always merry and loyal, in spite of the treatment from his imperial taskmaster. very funny stories are told by the masters of the small craft, who transport the bullocks from hence to gibraltar. the government of that place are only allowed to export, at a low duty per annum, a certain number of bullocks. the contractor's agents come over; and at the moment of embarking the cattle, something like the following dialogue frequently ensues. _agent of contractor_.--"count away!" _captain of the port_.--"one, two, three, &c. thirty, forty. ah! stop! stop! too many." _agent of contractor_.--"no, you fool, there are only thirty." _captain of the port_.--"you lie! there are forty." _agent of contractor_.--"only thirty, i tell you," (putting three or four dollars into his hand). _captain of the port_.--"well, well, there are only thirty." and, in this way, the garrison of gibraltar often gets or , head of cattle more than the stipulated number, at five dollars per head duty instead of ten. who derives the benefit of peculation i am unable to state. an anecdote recurs to me of old youssef, bashaw of tripoli, illustrative of the phlebotomizing system now under consideration. colonel warrington one day seriously represented to the bashaw how his functionaries robbed him, and took the liberty of mentioning the name of one person. "yes, yes," observed the bashaw, "i know all about him; i don't want to catch him yet; he's not fat enough. when he has gorged a little more, i'll have his head off." the emperor of morocco, however, usually treats his bashaws of the coast with greater consideration than those of the interior cities, the former being more in contact with europeans, his highness not wishing his reputation to suffer in the eyes of christians. chapter iii. the posada.--ingles and benoliel.--amulets for successful parturition.--visits of a moorish taleb and a berber.--three sundays during a week in barbary.--m. rey's account of the empire of morocco.--the government auctioneer gives an account of slavery and the slave trade in morocco.--benoliel as english cicerone.--departure from tangier to gibraltar.--how i lost my fine green broadcloth.--mr. frenerry's opinion of maroquine affairs. i took up my stay at the "english hotel" (posada ingles), kept by benoliel, a morocco jew, who spoke tolerable english. a jerusalemitish rabbi came in one day to write charms for his wife, she being near her confinement. the superstition of charms and other cognate matters, are shared alike by all the native inhabitants of barbary. it often happens that a marabout shrine will be visited by moor and jew, each investing the departed saint with his own peculiar sanctity. so contagious is this species of superstition, that romish christians, long resident in barbary, assisted by the inventive monks, at last discover the moorish or jewish to be a christian saint. the jewesses brought our oriental rabbi, declaring him to know everything, and that his garments smelt of the holy city. benoliel, or ben, as the english called him, protested to me that he did not believe in charms; he only allowed the rabbi to write them to please the women. but i have found, during my travels in the mediterranean, many persons of education, who pretended they did not believe this or that superstition of their church, whilst they were at heart great cowards, having no courage to reject a popular falsehood, and quite as superstitious as those who never doubt the excrescent dogmas or traditionary fables of their religion. the paper amulets, however, operated favourably on mrs. benoliel. she was delivered of a fine child; and received the congratulations of her neighbours. the child was named sultana; [ ] and the people were all as merry as if a princess had been born in israel. i received a visit from a moorish taleb, to whom i read some portions of my journal, as also the arabic testament: _taleb_.--"the english read arabic because they are the friends of mussulmans. for this reason, god gives them wit to understand the language of the koran." _traveller_.--"we wish to study all languages, and to know all people." _taleb_.--"now, as you have become so wise in our country, and read arabic, where next are you going? why not be quiet and return home, and live a marabout? where next are you going?" in this strain the taleb continued lecturing me, until he was interrupted by a berber of rif. the rifian.--"christian, engleez, come to our mountains. i will conduct you to the emir, on whom is the blessing of god. come to the emir, come." traveller.--"no, i've nothing to do with war." the rifian.--"ah! ah! ah! i know you are a necromancer. cannot you tell me where money is buried? i want money very bad. give me a peseta." traveller.--"not i. i am going to see your emperor." the rifian.--"ah! ah! ah! that is right; give him plenty of money. muley abd errahman hoards up money always. if you give him plenty of money, you will be placed on a horse and ride by his side." the inhabitants of barbary all bury their money. the secret is confided to a single person, who often is taken ill, and dies before he can discover the hiding place to his surviving relatives. millions of dollars are lost in this way. the people, conscious of their secret practice, are always on the scent for concealed treasures. one friday, some jews asked the governor of the custom-house to grant them their clearance-papers, because they were, early on the sunday following, to depart for gibraltar. the governor said, "come to-morrow." "no," replied the jews, "we cannot, it's our feast." "well," returned the governor, "you jews have your feasts, the christians have theirs, and we mussulmen will have ours. i'll not go down to the custom-house to day, for it is my feast." these three sundays or feasts, prevalent through north africa, are very inconvenient for business, and often make men rebels to their religious persuasions. the following is a frenchman's account of morocco [ ] up to the time of its bombardments. "the question of algeria cannot be confined within the limits of the french possessions. it embraces morocco, a country possessing a vast and varied population. leo gave a marvellous description of fez, as the second city of islamism in his time. travellers who have sought to explore africa, rarely or never took the route viâ morocco. formerly, monks were stationed in the interior to purchase captives; but, since piracy has ceased, these have left the country. very few persons go into the interior, for maroquine merchants come out of their country to trade. tangier and tetuan are not fair specimens of morocco; they form a transition from europe to africa, being neither spain nor morocco. the ambassador, or merchant, who now-a-days gets an audience with the sultan, is allowed to see little of the country, arising from the jealousy of the government or native merchants. davidson was probably murdered by the jealousy of the fez merchants. "all the larger cities of morocco are situate upon the coast, excepting three capitals of the interior--fez, miknas, and morocco, to which el-kesar-kebir may be added. the other interior places are mostly large villages, where the tribes of the country collect together. the inhabitants of the cities make gain their only business, and debauchery their only pleasure. as to their learning, there is an immense difference between a turkish ulema and a moorish doctor. "from the fall of carthage and rome, until the fourteenth century, the people of north africa have had relations with europe. the independence of the kingdoms of fez and morocco fell by internal dissensions like the mussulman power in spain. after expelling the mahometans from spain, the christians (spaniards and portuguese) pursued them to morocco, and built a line of forts on its coasts. those have all now been abandoned except four, held by spain. england destroyed the fortifications and abandoned tangier, which she had obtained through portugal. to blockade tangier at the present time, would do more harm to england than morocco, by cutting off the supply of provisions for gibraltar. "the navy of morocco was never very great. it was the audacity and cruelty of its pirates which frightened christendom. during the maritime wars of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, the emperor of morocco remained neutral, which was a great benefit to the christian belligerent powers. spain must be at peace with morocco; she must either be an active friend, or an enemy. the policy of morocco, in former times, was so well managed, that it made all the christian powers pay a certain tribute to that country, to insure themselves against the piracy of its cruisers. "the history of the diplomatic relations of europe with morocco, presents only a chronicle of shameful concessions made by the european powers to the moorish princes. at the end of the eighteenth century, the sultan of morocco declared that, 'whoever was not his friend was his enemy,' or, in other words, that 'he would arm his cruisers against every flag which did not float upon a consular house at tangier.' "muley abd errahman sent his corsairs to sea in to frighten the european powers into treaties. the plan succeeded, the first squabble being with austria. from , or, better to mark the period, since the capture of algiers, the corsairs and their depredations have ceased. the progress of france in africa has produced a profound impression in morocco, but european powers have not taken their due advantage of this. many humiliating acts have been performed by different governments. england possessed herself of all the commerce of importance since she has been established at gibraltar. on the whole coast of morocco, there are only two mercantile establishments under the french flag. french consular agents have no influence with the moorish government. morocco and spain have shewn themselves neighbours. mutual assistance has often been given by morocco and spain, in cases of national distress, particularly in seasons of famine. "the sultan of morocco surveys from a distance the events of europe, and endeavours to arrest their effect on his frontier. the residence of the foreign consuls was first at rabat, then at tangier. the object has constantly been to keep the consuls, as far as possible, from his capital and the transactions of his interior, in order that they may not see the continual revolts of his tribes, and so discover the weakness and disunion of the empire. communications between tangier and morocco require at least forty days, a system shrewdly laid down by the sultan, who is anxious to be as remote as possible from the consuls and their influence. "the state of the army and navy, and particularly of the munitions of war, is very bad. all the coast of morocco is difficult of access, and the only two ports which would have served for a naval station, are those which have been abandoned, viz., the bay of santa cruz and the ancient mamora, between el-araish and rabat; the rest are only roadsteads." m. rey thus sums up his observations upon european diplomacy directed towards morocco. "voluntary humbling of european nations, always ready to pander to moorish rapacity, even without reaping any advantage for it; and who submit themselves to be uselessly ransomed. as to the english, they show suppleness and prudence, and sacrificing national dignity to the prosperity of commerce; the sultans are not backward in taking advantage adroitly of a situation so favourable and almost unique; such is the picture of the diplomatic relations we have sketched." he describes the personal character and habits of the sultan, muley abd errahman, and gives details of the court. "a jew is the master-cook of the emperor, his imperial highness always eats alone. the sultan receives european merchants in a very friendly manner, whilst he keeps ambassadors at a respectful distance. an interview with an ambassador does not last more than ten minutes. the sultan replies in a phraseology which has not been varied for three centuries. the title of the present vizier is not minister, but sahab, "friend" or "companion." the sultan has the soundest judgment of any man in his empire, and great tact in the administration of affairs. he instructs himself by continual questions. "his passion is avarice, and he has converted the whole empire into a commercial firm for the accumulation of his gains. muley tsmael left a treasury of millions of ducats, [ ] and at the death of sidi mohammed, this treasury was reduced to two millions. the constant occupation of muley abd errahmnan is to replenish the imperial treasury. commerce, which was neglected by his predecessors, has all his attention. the cruelty of the former sultans is exchanged for the avarice of the present. the history of these shereefian princes is a chain of unheard-of atrocities. the present sultan keeps not a single promise when his interests interfere." m. rey gives us this flattering tableau as a social picture of morocco. covetous governors are continually succeeding one another, they are ever eager of enjoying the advantages of their position; their thirst for plunder is so much the more intense, as they are not allowed time to satisfy it, so they prey on the people. the inhabitants of towns and of the country live in rags in miserable hovels. what raiment! what food! mortality is dreadful, the children are invalids, and the women, especially in the country, are condemned to do the work of beasts of burden; such is the picture of society. i have quoted these few passages from the "mémoire" of m. rey, because he was resident many years in tangier, and his account of the country discovers talent and intelligence, but is, of course, coloured with a strong anti-english feeling. mr. hay wrote on the back of his mémoire,--"all that is said in reference to great britain is false and malicious." m. rey's opinions of the moors and the present governors are still more bitter and unjust. i had an interview with el-martel-warabah, government auctioneer of slaves, from whom i obtained details respecting the slave-trade in tangier and morocco generally. there is no market for slaves in tangier. the poor creatures are led about the town as cattle, particularly in the main street, before the doors of the principal merchants, where they are usually disposed of. no jew or christian is permitted to buy or hold a slave in this country. government possess many slaves, and people hire them out by the day from the authorities. the ordinary price of a good slave is eighty dollars. boys, at the age of nine or ten years, sell the best; female slaves do hot fetch so much as male slaves, unless of extraordinary beauty. slaves are imported from all the south. the sultan levies no duty on the sale or import of slaves. when one runs away from his master, and takes refuge with another, the new master usually writes to the former, offering to buy him; thus slaves are often enticed away. they are sometimes allowed to abscond without their owners troubling themselves about them, their master's being unable either to feed or sell them. in cases of punishment for all serious offences, slaves are brought before the judicial authorities, and suffer the same punishment as free men. in cases not deemed grave, they are flogged, or otherwise privately punished by their masters. slaves went to war with abd-el-kader, against the french. the arabs of algeria had formerly many slaves. the chief depôt of slaves is morocco, the southern capital. ten thousand have been imported during one year; but the average number brought into morocco is, perhaps, not more than half that amount. the maroquine moors, before departing for any country under the british flag, usually give liberty to their slaves. on their return, however, they sell them again as slaves, or get rid of them some way or other. a slave once having tasted of liberty, can never again be fully reconciled to thraldom. moors resident in gibraltar, have frequently slaves with them. a few days ago, a slave-boy, resident in gibraltar, wished to turn christian, and was immediately sent back to tangier, and sold to another master. europeans, with whom i have conversed in tangier, assure me that slaves are generally well treated, and that cases of cruelty are rare. nevertheless, they eagerly seek their freedom when an opportunity offers. in , a man of great power and influence in the gharb (province of morocco), named el-haj mohammed ben el-arab, on a remonstrance of his slaves, who stated that the english had abolished slavery, and that they ought to have their liberty, called all his slaves together, to the number of seventy-two, and actually took the bold and generous resolution of liberating them. but, before releasing them from bondage, he lectured them upon the difficulty of finding subsistence in their new state of freedom, and then wrote out their _atkas_ of liberty. as might have been expected, some returned voluntarily to servitude, not being able to get a living, whilst the greater part obtained an honourable livelihood, enjoying the fruits of independent freedom. it is mentioned, as an instance of fidelity, that a negress is the gaoler of the women in tangier. [ ] at every moorish feast of consequence (four of which are celebrated here in a year), the slaves of tangier perambulate the streets with music and dancing, dressed in their holiday clothes, to beg alms from all classes of the population, particularly europeans. the money collected is deposited in the hands of their chief; to this is added the savings of the whole year. in the spring, all is spent in a feast, which lasts seven days. the slaves carry green ears of wheat, barley, and fresh dates about the town. the moorish women kiss the new corn or fruit, and give the slaves a trifle of money. a slave, when he is dissatisfied with his master, sometimes will ask him to be allowed to go about begging until he gets money enough to buy his freedom. the slave puts the âtka in his mouth (which piece of written paper when signed, assures his freedom), and goes about the town, crying, "fedeeak allah, (ransom of god!)" all depends on his luck. he may be months, or even years, before he accumulates enough to purchase his ransom. tangier moors pretend that the negroes of timbuctoo sacrifice annually a white man, the victim being preserved and fed for the occasion. when the time of immolation arrives, the white man is adorned with fair flowers, and clothes of silk and many colours, and led out and sacrificed at a grand "fiesta." slaves and blacks in morocco keep the same feast, with the difference, that not being able to get a man to sacrifice, they kill a bullock. such a barbarous rite may possibly be practised in some part of negroland, but certainly not at timbuctoo. all these tales about negro cannibals i am inclined to believe inventions. there never yet has been published a well authenticated case of negro cannibalism. the grand cicerone for the english at tangier, is benoliel. he is a man of about sixty years of age, and initiated into the sublimest mysteries of the consular politics of the shereefs. ben is full of anecdotes of everybody and everything from the emperor on the shreefian throne, down to the mad and ragged dervish in the streets. our cicerone keeps a book, in which the names of all his english guests have been from time to time inscribed. his visitors have been principally officers from gibraltar, who come here for a few days sporting. on the bombardment of tangier, ben left the country with other fugitives. the moorish rabble plundered his house; and many valuables which were there concealed, pledged by persons belonging to tangier, were carried away; ben was therefore ruined. some foolish people at gibraltar told ben, that the streets of london were paved with gold, or, at any rate, that, inasmuch as he (ben) had in his time entertained so many englishmen at his hospitable establishment at tangier (for which, however, he was well paid), he would be sure to make his fortune by a visit to england. i afterwards met ben accidentally in the streets of london, in great distress. some friends of the anti-slavery society subscribed a small sum for him, and sent him back to his family in gibraltar. poor ben was astonished to find as much misery in the streets of our own metropolis, as in any town of morocco. regarding his co-religionists in england, ben observed with bitterness, "the jews there are no good; they are very blackguards." he was disappointed at their want of liberality, as well as their want of sympathy for morocco jews. ben thought he knew everything, and the ways of this wicked world, but this visit to england convinced him he must begin the world over again. our cicerone is very shrewd; withal is blessed with a good share of common sense; is by no means bigoted against mahometans or christians, and is one of the more respectable of the barbary jews. his information on morocco, is, however, so mixed up with the marvellous, that only a person well acquainted with north africa can distinguish the probable from the improbable, or separate the wheat from the chaff. ben has a large family, like most of the maroquine jews; but the great attraction of his family is a most beautiful daughter, with a complexion of jasmine, and locks of the raven; a perfect rachel in loveliness, proving fully the assertion of ali bey, and all other travellers in morocco, that the fairest women in this country are the jewesses. ben is the type of many a barbary jew, who, to considerable intelligence, and a few grains of what may be called fair english honesty, unites the ordinarily deteriorated character of men, and especially jews, bora and brought up under oppressive governments. ben would sell you to the emperor for a moderate price; and so would the jewish consular agents of morocco. a traveller in this country must, therefore, never trust a maroquine jew in a matter of vital importance. mr. drummond hay, our consul at tangier, advised me to return to gibraltar, and to go by sea to mogador, and thence to morocco, where the emperor was then residing. adopting his advice, i left the same evening for gibraltar. i took my passage in a very fine cutter, which had formerly been a yacht, and had since been engaged as a smuggler of spanish goods. i confess, i was not sorry to hear that the spanish custom-house was often duped. the cutter had been purchased for the gibraltar secret service. the anti-slavery society had placed at my disposal a few yards of green cloth, for a present to the minister of the emperor. at the custom-house of havre-de-grace, i paid a heavy duty on it. but, when i got to irun, on the spanish frontier, (having determined to come through spain in order to see the country), the custom-house officers demanded a duty nearly double the cost of the cloth in london, so that there was no alternative but to leave it in their possession. the only satisfaction, or revenge which i had, was that of calling them _ladrones_ in the presence of a mob of people, who, to do justice to the spanish populace, all took my part. when i complained of this conduct at madrid, my friends laughed at my simplicity, and told me i was "green" in spanish; and in travelling through "the land of chivalry," and of "ingeniósos hildágos," ought, on the contrary, to thank god that i had arrived safe at madrid with a dollar in my pocket; whilst they kindly hinted, if i should really get through the province of andalusia safe to cadiz, without being stripped of everything, i must record it in my journal as a miracle of good luck. this was, however, exaggeration. i had no reason to complain of anything else during the time i was in spain. my fellow travellers (all spaniards), nevertheless, rebuked me for want of tact. "you ought," they said, "to have given a few pesetas to the guard of the diligencia, who would have taken charge of your cloth, and kept it from going through the custom-house." on reaching gibraltar, i made the acquaintance of frenerry, who for thirty years has been a merchant in morocco. mr. frenerry had frequent opportunities of personal intercourse with muley abd errahman, and had more influence with him than the british consul. indeed, at all times, a merchant is always more welcome to his imperial highness than a diplomatic agent, who usually is charged with some disagreeable mission. mr. frenerry was called, par excellence, "the merchant of the west." of course, mr. frenerry's opinions must be valuable on maroquine affairs. he says:--"the morocco moors like the english very much, and better than any other europeans, for they know the english to be their best friends. at the same time, the moors feel their weakness. they know also, that a day might come when the english would be against them, or have disputes with them, as in days past. the moors are, therefore, jealous of the english, though they consider them their friends; and do not like englishmen more than any other christians to travel in their country. in other respects, if well managed and occasionally coaxed or bribed with a present, the moors are very good natured, and as tractable as children." however, i find since the murder of mr. davidson, both the people and government of morocco have got a bad name in gibraltar; and opinion begins to prevail that it is almost impossible for an englishman to travel in the country. mr. frenerry recommends that a moor should be treated not proudly, but with a certain degree of firmness, to shew him you will not be trifled with. in this way, he says, you will always continue friends. with regard to the present emperor, mr. frenerry is a great apologist of his system. "the emperor is obliged to exclude foreigners as much as possible from his country. he does not want to tempt the cupidity of europeans, by showing them the resources of the empire. they are prying about for mines of iron and silver. he is obliged to forbid these geological wanderings. the subjects of his empire are divided in their feelings and interests, and have been driven there by every wave of human revolutions. the emperor does not wish to discover his weakness abroad, by letting europeans witness the bad faith and disloyalty of his heterogeneous tribes. the european consuls are much to blame; they always carry their heads too high, if not insolently. they then appoint jewish consuls along the coast, a class of men whom the hereditary prejudices of his mussulman subjects will not respect." there is certainly something, if not a good deal, to be said _for_ the emperor as well as _against_ him. i was obliged to wait some time at gibraltar before i could get a vessel for mogador. i missed one excellent opportunity from the want of a note from the gibraltar government. a moor offered to allow me to take a passage without any expense in his vessel, provided i could obtain a note from our government; but the governor of gibraltar required an introduction in form, and, before i could receive a letter from mr. hay to present to him, the vessel left for mogador. i therefore lost money and time without any necessity. chapter iv. departure from gibraltar to mogador.--the straits.--genoese sailors.-- trade-wind hurricanes en the atlantic coast of morocco.--difficulties of entering the port of mogador.--bad provisioning of foreign merchantmen.--the present representative of the once far-famed and dreaded rovers.--disembarkation at mogador.--mr. phillips, captain of the port--rumours amongst the people about my mission.--visit to the cemeteries.--maroquine wreckers.--health of the inhabitants of mogador.--moorish cavaliers "playing at powder" composed of the ancient nuraidians.--the barb.--the life guards of the moorish emperor.--martial character of the negro.--some account of the black corps of the shereefs.--orthodoxy of the shereefs, and illustrative anecdotes of the various emperors. on leaving the straits (commonly called "the gut,") a noble sight presented itself--a fleet of some hundred merchantmen, all smacking about before the rising wind, crowding every sail, lest it should change ere they got clear of the obstructive straits. many weeks had they been detained by the westerly gales, and our vessel amongst the rest. i felt the poignant misery of "waiting for the wind." i know nothing so wearisome when all things are made ready. it is worse than hope deferred, which sickens and saddens the heart. i have lately seen some newspaper reports, that government is preparing a couple of steam-tugs, to be placed at the mouth of the straits, to tow ships in and out. we may trust it will be done. but if government do it not, i am sure it would answer the purpose of a private company, and i have no doubt such speculation will soon be taken up. vessels freighted with perishable cargoes are often obliged to wait weeks, nay months, at the mouth of the straits, to the great injury of commerce. in our days of steam and rapid communication, this cannot be tolerated. [ ] after a voyage of four days, we found ourselves off the coast of mogador. the wind had been pretty good, but we had suffered some delay from a south wind, which headed us for a short time. we prayed for a westerly breeze, of which we soon got enough from west and north-west. the first twelve hours it came gently on, but gradually increased till it blew a gale. the captain was suddenly called up in the night, as though the ship was going to sink, or could sink, whilst she was running as fast as we would let her before the wind. but the real danger lay in missing the coast of mogador, or not being able to get within its port from the violence of the breakers near the shore. our vessel was a small genoese brig; and, though the genoese are the best sailors in the mediterranean--even superior to the greeks, who rank next--our captain and his crew began to quake. at daylight, the coast-line loomed before us, immersed in fog, and two hours after, the tall minaret of the great mosque of mogador, shooting erect, a dull lofty pyramid, stood over the thick haze lying on the lower part of the coast. this phenomenon of the higher objects and mountains being visible over a dense fog on the shore, is frequent on this side of the atlantic. wind also prevails here. it scarcely ever rains, but wind the people have nine months out of the twelve. it is a species of trade-wind, which commences at the straits, or the coasts of spain and portugal, and sweeps down north-west with fury, making the entire coast of morocco a mountain-barrier of breakers, increasing in its course, and extending as far as wadnoun, cape bajdor, cape blanco, even to the senegal. it does not, however, extend far out at sea, being chiefly confined to the coast range. our alarm now was lest we should get within the clutches of this fell swoop, for the port once past, it would have required us weeks to bear up again, whilst this wind lasted. the atlantic coast of morocco is an indented or waving line, and there are only two or three ports deserving the name of harbours--harbours of refuge from these storms. unlike the western coast of ireland, so finely indented by the atlantic wave, this portion of the morocco coast is rounded off by the ocean. our excitement was great. the capitano began yelping like a cowardly school-boy, who has been well punched by a lesser and more courageous antagonist. immediately i got on deck, i produced an english book, which mentioned the port of mogador as a "good" port. "per dio santo!" exclaimed our capitano; "yes, for the english it _is_ a good port--you dare devils at sea--for them it _is_ a good port. the open sea, with a gale of wind, is a good port for the _maladetti_ english." irritated at this extreme politeness to our gallant tars, who have so long "braved the battle and the breeze," i did not trouble farther the dauntless genoese, who certainly was not destined to become a columbus. now the men began to snivel and yelp, following the example of their commander. "we won't go into the port, santa virgine! we won't go in to be shivered to pieces on the rocks." at this moment our experienced capitano fancied we had got into shoal-water; the surf was seen running in foaming circles, as if in a whirlpool. now, indeed, our capitano did yelp; now did the crew yelp, invoking all the saints of the roman calendar, instead of attending to the ship. [ ] here was a scene of indescribable confusion. our ship was suddenly put round and back. my fellow passengers, a couple of jews from gibraltar, began swearing at the capitano and his brave men. one of them, whilst cursing, thought it just as well, at the same time, to call upon father abraham. our little brig pitched her bows two or three times under water like a storm-bird, and did _not_ ground. it was seen to be a false alarm. the capitano now took courage on seeing all the flags flying over the fortifications, it being friday, the mahometan sabbath. the silly fellow had heard, that the port authorities always hauled down their colours, when the entrance to the harbour was unsafe by reason of bad weather. seeing the colours, he imagined all was right. there are two entrances to the port of mogador; one from the south, which is quite open; the other from the north-west, which is only a narrow passage, with scarcely room to admit a ship-of-the-line. the 'suffren,' in which the prince de joinville commanded the bombardment of the town, stood right over this entrance, on the northern channel, having south-east the isle of mogador, and north-west the coast of the continent. the prince took up a bold and critical position, exposed to violent currents, to grounding on a rocky bottom, and to many other serious accidents. [ ] [illustration] as we neared this difficult entrance, we were all in a state of the most feverish excitement, expecting, such was the fury of the breakers, to be thrown on the rock on either side. thus, it was a veritable scylla and charybdis. a man from the rigging descried several small vessels moored snugly behind the isle. we ventured in with breathless agitation. a man from one of the fortifications, guessing or seeing, i suppose, our timidity and bad seamenship, cried out at the top of his lungs, "salvo!" which being interpreted, meant, "the entrance is safe." but this was not enough; we were to have another trial of patience. the foolish captain--to terrify us to the last--had to cast his anchor, as a matter of course; and imagine, dear reader, our alarm, our terror, when we heard him scream out, "the chain is snapped!" we were now to be driven out southwards by the fury of the wind, which had become a hurricane, no very agreeable prospect! happily, also this was a false alarm. the capitano then came up to me, to shake hands, apologize, and present congratulations on our safe harbouring. the perspiration of fever and a heated brain was coursing down his cheeks. the capitano lit an extra candle before the picture of the virgin below, and observed to me, whilst the men were saying their prayers of gratitude for deliverance, "per un miraculo della santissima vergina; noi sciamo salvati!"--(we are saved by a miracle of the most holy virgin!) which, of course, i did not or could not dispute, allowing, as i do, all men in such circumstances, to indulge freely in their peculiar faith, so long as it does not interfere with me or mine. it is well that our merchant-vessels have never been reduced to the condition of genoese craft, or been manned by such chicken-hearted crews. i believe the pusillanimity of the latter is traceable, in a great measure, to the miserable way in which the poor fellows are fed. these genoese had no meat whilst i was with them. i sailed once in a neapolitan vessel, a whole month, during which time the crew lived on horse-beans, coarse maccaroni, sardinian fish, mouldy biscuit, and griping black wine. meat they had none. how is it possible for men thus fed, to fight and wrestle with the billows and terrors of the deep? we had no ordinary task to get on shore; the ocean was without, but a sea was within port. the wind increased with such fury, that we abandoned for the day the idea of landing. we had, however, specie on board, which it was necessary forthwith to land. mr. philips, captain of the port, and a merchant's clerk, therefore, came alongside with great difficulty in a moorish boat, to take on shore the specie; and in it i embarked. this said barque was the miserable but apt representation of the by-gone formidable maroquine navy, which, not many centuries ago, pushed its audacity to such lengths, that the "rovers of salee" cruised off the english coast, and defied the british fleets. now the whole naval force of the once-dreaded piratic states of barbary can hardly boast of two or three badly-manned brigs or frigates. as to morocco, the emperor has not a single captain who can conduct a vessel from mogador to gibraltar. the most skilful _rais_ his ports can furnish made an attempt lately, and was blown up and down for months on the coasts of spain and portugal, being at last driven into the straits by almost miraculous interposition. what was this moorish boat in which i went on shore? a mere long shell of bad planks, and scarcely more ship-shape than the trunk of a tree hollowed into a canoe, leakily put together. it was filled with dirty, ragged, half-naked sailors, whose seamanship did not extend beyond coming and going from vessels lying in this little port. each of these mogadorian port sailors had a bit of straight pole for an oar; the way in which they rowed was equally characteristic. struggling against wind and current with their moorish rais at the helm, encouraging their labours by crying out first one thing, then another, as his fancy dictated, the crew repeated in chorus all he said:--"khobsah!" (a loaf) cried the rais. all the men echoed "khobsah." "a loaf you shall have when you return!" cried the rais. "a loaf we shall have when we return!" cried the men. "pull, pull; god hears and sees you!" cried the rais. "we pull, we pull; god hears and sees us!" cried the men. "sweetmeats, sweetmeats, by g--; sweetmeats by g--you shall have, only pull away!" swore the rais. "sweetmeats we shall have, thank god! sweetmeats we shall have, thank god!" roared the men, all screaming and bawling. in this unique style, after struggling three hours to get three miles over the port, we landed, all of us completely exhausted and drowned in spray. it is usual for moors, particularly negroes, to sing certain choruses, and thus encourage one another in their work. what, however, is remarkable, these choruses are mostly on sacred subjects, being frequently the formula of their confession, "there is no god, but one god, and mahomet is his prophet," &c. these clownish tars were deeply coloured, and some quite black. i found, in fact, the greatest part of the moorish population of mogador coloured persons. we may here easily trace the origin of the epithet "black-a-moor," and we are not so surprised that shakspeare made his moor black; indeed, the present emperor, muley abd errahman, is of very dark complexion, though his features are not at all of the negro cast. but he has sons quite black, and with negro features, who, of course, are the children of negresses. one of these, is governor of rabat. in no country is the colour of the human skin so little thought of. this is a very important matter in the question of abolition. there is no objection to the skin and features of the negro; it is only the luxury of having slaves, or their usefulness for heavy work, which weighs in the scale against abolition. as soon as we landed, we visited the lieutenant-governor, who congratulated us on not being carried down to the canary islands. then his excellency asked, in due studied form: "where do you come from?" _traveller_.--"gibraltar." _his excellency_.--"where are you going?" _traveller_.--"to see the sultan, muley abd errahman." _his excellency_.--"what's your business?" _traveller_.--"i will let your excellency know to-morrow." i then proceeded to the house of mr. phillips, where i took up my quarters. mr. willshire, our vice-consul, was absent, having gone up to morocco with all the principal merchants of mogador, to pay a visit to the emperor. the port of mogador had to-day a most wild and desolate appearance, which was rendered still more dreary and hideous by a dark tempest sweeping over it. on the shore, there was no appearance of life, much less of trade and shipping. all had abandoned it, save a guard, who lay stretched at the gate of the waterport, like a grim watch-dog. from this place, we proceeded to the merchants' quarter of the town, which was solitary and immersed in profound gloom. altogether, my first impressions of mogador were most unfavourable, i went to bed and dreamt of winds and seas, and struggled with tempests the greater part of the night. then i was shipwrecked off the canaries; thrown on the coast of wadnoun, and made a slave by the wild arabs wandering in the desert--i awoke. mr. phillips, mine host, soon became my right-hand man. his extraordinary character, and the adventures of his life are worth a brief notice. phillips said he was descended from those york jews, who, on refusing to pay a contribution levied on them by one of our most christian kings, had a tooth drawn out every morning (without the aid of chloroform), until they satisfied the cruel avarice of the tyrant. in person, phillips was a smart old gentleman, with the ordinary lineaments of his race stamped on his countenance. the greater part of his life has been spent in south america, where he attained the honours of aide-de-camp to bolivar. in those sanguinary revolutions, heaving with the birth of the young republic, he had often been shut up in the capilla to be shot, and was rescued always by the jesuit fathers, who pitied and saved the poor jew, on his expressing himself favourable to christianity. returning to england, after twenty years' absence, his mother did not fully recognize him, until he one day got up and admired, with youthful ardour, a china figure on the chimney-piece, which had been his toy in his boyhood. on the occurrence of this little domestic incident, the mother passionately embraced her lost prodigal, once dead, but now "alive again." phillips came to mogador on a military speculation, and offered to take the command of the emperor's cavalry against all his enemies. this audacity of a jew filled the moor with alarm. "how could a jew, who was not a devil, propose such an insult to the commander of the faithful, as to presume to take the charge of his invincible warriors!" nevertheless, the little fellow weathered the storm, and got appointed "captain of the port of mogador," with the liberal salary of about thirty shillings per month; but this did not prevent our aide-de-camp, now metamorphosed into a sea captain, from wearing _an admiral's_ uniform, which he obtained in a curious way on a visit to england. he met in the streets of london with an acquaintance, who pretended to patronize him. the gentleman jokingly said, "well, phillips, i must give you an uniform, since you are appointed captain of the port of mogador." the said gentleman received, a few months afterwards, when his quondam protégé was safe with his uniform strutting about mogador, to the amazement of the moors, and the delight of his co-religionists, a bill of thirty pounds or so, charged for "a suit of admiral's uniform for mr. phillips, captain of the port of mogador;" and found that a joke sometimes has a serious termination. phillips, on his first arrival in this country, entered into a diplomatic contest with the moorish authorities, demanding the privileges of a native british-born jew, and he determined to ride a horse, in order to vindicate the rights of british jews, before the awful presence of the shereefian court! about this business, the consul-general hay is said to have written eleven long, and mr. willshire about twenty-one short and pithy despatches, but the affair ended in smoke. phillips, with great magnanimity and self-denial, consented to relinquish the privilege, on the prayer of his brethren, natives of mogador, who were very naturally afraid, lest the incensed emperor might visit on them what he durst not inflict on the british-born jew. of the achievements of phillips in the way of science (for he assures he is born to the high destiny of enlightening both barbarians and civilized nations) i take the liberty, with his permission, of mentioning one. phillips brought here a pair of horse-shoes belonging to a drayhorse of the firm of truman, hanbury, buxton, and co., to astonish the moors by their size, who are great connoisseurs of horse-flesh. the moors protested their unbelief, and swore it was a lie,--"such shoes never shod a horse." phillips then got a skeleton of a head from england. this they also scouted as an imposition, alleging that phillips had got it purposely made to deceive them. "although they believed in the prophet, whom they never saw, they were still not such fools as to believe in everything which an infidel might bring to their country." phillips now gave up, in despair, the attempt to propagate science among the moors. our ancient aide-de-camp of bolivar is a liberal english jew, and boasts that, on christmas-day, he always has his roast-beef and plum-pudding. i supped with him often on a sucking-pig, for the christians breed pigs in this place, to the horror of pious mussulmen. this amusing adventurer subsequently left mogador and went to lisbon, where he purposed writing a memorial to the archbishop of canterbury, containing the plan, of a new unitarian system of religion, by which the jews might be brought within the pale of the christian church! for some time i felt the effects of my sea voyage; my apartment rocked in my brain. people speculated about the objects of my mission; the most absurd rumours were afloat. "the christian has come to settle the affairs of mr. darman, whom the emperor killed," some said. others remarked, "the christian has come to buy all the slaves of the country, in order to liberate them." the lieutenant-governor sent for phillips, to know what i came for, who i was, and how i passed my time? phillips told him all about my mission, and that i was a great taleb. when phillips mentioned to the governor, that great britain had paid a hundred millions of dollars for the liberation of slaves belonging to englishmen, his excellency, struck with astonishment, exclaimed, "the english sultan is inspired by god!" [illustration.] i visited the burying-place of christians, situate on the north-side of the town by the sea-shore. a fine tomb was erected here to the memory of mrs. willshire's father. the ignorant country people coming to mogador stopped to repeat prayers before it, believing it the tomb of some favourite saint. the government, hearing of this idolatry to a christian, begged mr. willshire to have the tomb covered with cement. when this was done, so perverse are these people, that they partially divested it of covering, and chipped off pieces of marble for their women, who ground them into powder, and dusted their faces with it to make them fair. every six months it is necessary to replaster the tomb. this cemetery is the most desolate place the mind of man can conceive. there is no green turf here to rest lightly on the bosom of the dead! no tree, no cypress of mourning; no shade or shelter for those who seek to indulge in grief. all is a sandy desolation, swept by the wild winds of the solitary shore of the ocean. [illustration] farther on, is the moorish cemetery, which i passed through. what a spectacle of human corruption! here, indeed, we may learn to despise this world's poor renown, and cease tormenting ourselves with vain and godless pursuits. it was then sunset, the moon had risen far up on the fading brow of the departing day, casting pale lights and fearful shadows over this house of the dead. it was time to return, or the gates of the city would shut me out amidst the wreck of poor human dust and bones. i saw, moving in the doubtful shadows of approaching night, the grave-digging hyaena! it is an ill wind that blows nobody good. the wreckers of this coast boldly assert that a shipwreck is a blessing (_berkah_), sent to them by providence. the port authorities have even the impudence to declare, that to erect lighthouses at the mouth of the ports would be thwarting the decrees of divine providence! in spite of all this, however, at the urgent request of mr. willshire, when, on one occasion, the weather was very bad, the governor of mogador stationed guards on various parts of the coast to preserve the lives and property of shipwrecked vessels. but i do not think i have heard worse cases of moorish wreckers, than those which have happened not very many years ago on the french and english coasts. some of my readers will recollect the case of an indiaman wrecked off the coast of france, when poor ladies in a state of suspended animation, had their fingers cut off to get possession of their diamond-rings. during my stay at mogador, a courier arrived from sous, bringing the news of some christians being wrecked off the coast, a jew had purchased one poor fellow from the arabs for two camels. two others were dead, their bodies cast upon the inhospitable beach by the atlantic surge, where they lay unburied, to be mangled by the wild tribes, or to feed the hungry hyaena. some of the merchants came hither from the capital; amongst the rest, mr. and mrs. elton, they, as well as others, brought a favourable account of the emperor and his ministers, and lauded very much the commercial policy of the governor of mogador. moderation, it is said, is the characteristic of the court's proceedings towards the merchants. trade was not very brisk, it being the rainy season, when the arabs are occupied with sowing the ground; the busy time is from september to january. the produce sold at that time was simply that which is left of the past season, having been kept back with the object of getting a better price for it. gum is brought in great quantities for exportation. an immense quantity of sugar is imported, a third of which is loaf beet-root sugar brought from marseilles. mr. phillips came to me, to beg ten thousand pardons for having only fowls for dinner. one morning two bullocks were killed by the jews, but not "according to the law," and the greater part of the jews that day would have to go without meat. on these occasions, the jews sell their meat to the moors and christians at a reduced price. phillips observed, "i am obliged to eat meat according to the law, or i should have no peace of my life." a good many people were affected by colds, but the climate of mogador is reckoned very good. all the year round there is not much variation; n.w. and n.e. winds bring cold in winter, and cool refreshing breezes in summer. there was not a single medical man in mogador, although there were some fifty europeans, including jews. some years ago a clever young man was practising here. for one year, each european paid his share of salary; but alas! those whom god blessed with good health, refused to pay their quota to the support of a physician for their sickly neighbours, consequently, every european's life was in the greatest danger, should a serious accident occur to them. with regard to money, they would prefer a broken leg all their life time to paying five pounds to have it set. the consuls of tangier subscribe for a resident physician. [illustration.] one afternoon, i went to see the moorish cavalry "playing at powder," (lab elbaroud) being a stirring and novel scene. a troop of these haughty cavaliers assembled with their chiefs almost daily on the playa, or parade. then they divided themselves into parties of twenty or thirty; proceeding with their manoeuvres, the cavaliers at first advance slowly in a single line, then canter, and then gallop, spurring on the horse to its last gasp, meantime standing up erect on their shovel-stirrups, and turning from one side to the other; looking round with an air of defiance, they fire off their matchlocks, throw themselves into various dexterous attitudes, sometimes letting fall the bridle. the pieces being discharged, the horses instantaneously stop. the most difficult lesson a barb learns, is to halt suddenly in mid career of a full gallop. to discharge his matchlock, standing on the stirrups while the horse is in full gallop, is the great lesson of perfection of the maroquine soldiery. the cavaliers now wheel out of the way for the next file, returning reloading, and taking their places to gallop off and fire again. crowds of people attend these equestrian exhibitions, of which they are passionately fond. they squat round the parade in double or treble rows, muffled up within their bournouses, in mute admiration. occasionally women are present, but females here join in very few out-door amusements. when a whole troop of cavaliers are thus manoeuvering, galloping at the utmost stretch of the horses' muscles, the men screaming and hallowing "hah! hah! hah!" the dust and sand rising in clouds before the foaming fiery barb, with the deafening noise and confusion of a simultaneous discharge of firelocks, the picture represents in vivid colours what might be conceived of the wild nubian cavalry of ancient africa. [ ] today there was a mishap; several cavaliers did not keep up the line. the chief leading the troops, cried out in a rage, and with the voice of a senator, "fools! madmen! are you children, or are ye men?" christians or jews standing too near, are frequently pushed back with violence; and we were told "not to stand in the way of mussulmen." these cavaliers are sometimes called _spahis_; they are composed of moors, arabs, berbers, and all the native races in morocco. they are usually plainly dressed, but, beneath the bournouse, many of them wear the moorish dress, embroidered in the richest style. some of the horses are magnificently caparisoned in superb harness, worked in silk and gold. fine harness is one of the luxuries of north africa, and is still much used, even in tunis and tripoli, where the new system of european military dress and tactics has been introduced. the horse is the sacred animal of morocco, as well as the safeguard of the empire. the sultan has no other military defence, except the natural difficulties of the country, or the hatred of his people to strangers. he does not permit the exportation of horses, nor of barley, on which they are often fed. [ ] but the defeat of the emperor's eldest son, sidi mahomed, at the battle of isly, who commanded upwards of forty thousand of these cavaliers, has thrown a shade over the ancient celebrity of this moorish corps, and these proud horsemen have since become discouraged. on that fatal day, however, none of the black bodyguard of the emperor was brought into action. these muster some thirty thousand strong. this corps, or the abeed-sidi-bokhari, [ ] are soldiers who possess the most cool and undaunted courage; retreat with them is never thought of. unlike the janissaries of old, their sole ambition is to _obey_, and not to _rule_ their sovereign. this fidelity to the shereefs remains unshaken through all the shocks of the empire, and to the person of the emperor they are completely devoted. in a country like morocco, of widely distinct races and hostile tribes, all naturally detesting each other, the emperor finds in them his only safety. i cannot withhold the remark, that this body-guard places before us the character of the negro in a very favourable light. he is at once brave and faithful, the two essential ingredients in the formation and development of heroic natures. it will, i trust, not be deemed out of place to consider for a moment the warlike propensities and qualities of the negro. every european who has penetrated africa, confesses to the bellicose disposition of the negro, having seen him engaged with others in perpetual conflict. the choice and retention of a body-guard of blacks by the moorish emperor, also triumphantly prove the martial nature of the negro race. but the negro has signally displayed the military qualities of coolness and courage in many instances, two or three of which i shall here take the liberty of mentioning, in connexion with the affairs of algeria. mr. lord relates, on the authority of the french, that, when the invading army invested fort de l'empereur, and had silenced all its guns, the dey ordered the turkish general to retreat to the kasbah, and leave three negroes to blow up the fort. it seemed, therefore, abandoned, but two red flags floated still on its outward line of defence, and a third on the angle towards the city. the french continued all their efforts towards effecting a practicable breach. three negroes were now seen calmly walking on the ramparts, and from time to time looking over as if examining the progress of the breach. one of them, struck by a cannonball, fell; and the others, as if to avenge his death, ran to a cannon, pointed it, and fired three shots. at the third, the gun turned over, and they were unable to replace it. they tried another, and as they were in the act of raising it, a shot swept the legs from under one of them. the remaining negro gazed for a moment on his comrade, drew him a little aside, left him, and once more examined the breach. he then snatched one of the flags, and retired to the interior of the tower. in a few minutes, he re-appeared, took a second flag and descended. the french continued their cannonade, and the breach appeared almost practicable, when suddenly they were astounded by a terrific explosion, which shook the whole ground as with an earthquake. an immense column of smoke, mixed with streaks of flames, burst from the centre of the fortress; masses of solid masonry were hurled into the air to an amazing height, while cannon, stones, timbers, projectiles, and dead bodies were scattered in every direction. what was all this? the negro had done his duty--the fort was blown up! in a skirmish near mascara, one of abd-el-kader's negro soldiers killed two frenchmen with his own hand. the emir, who was an eye-witness of his bravery, rewarded him on the field of battle by presenting him with his own sword and the cross of the crescent, the only military order in the service, and which is never awarded except fur a very distinguished action. colonel scott says the black was presented to him, and seemed as proud of the honour conferred on him as if he had been made a k.g.c.b. in the strifes and disputes for succession that have characterized the history of the barbary princes, and reddened their annals with blood, nothing has been more remarkable than the fidelity of the negroes to their respective masters, and the bravery with which they have defended them to the last hour of their reign or existence. when all his partisans have deserted a pretender, when the soldiers of the successful competitor to the throne have been in the act of pouncing upon the fallen or falling prince, a handful of brave followers has rushed to the rescue, and surrounded the person of their beloved leader, pouring out their life-blood in his defence--and these men were negroes! to use a vulgar metaphor, the negro will defend his master with the savage courage and tenacity of a bull-dog. and this is the principal reason which has induced the despotic princes of north africa to cherish the negroes, of whom they have encouraged a continual supply from the interior. the history of this imperial guard of negroes is interesting, as showing the inconveniences as well as the advantage of such a corps, for these troops have not been always so well conducted as they are at present. at one time, the shereefs claimed a species of sovereignty over the city of timbuctbo and the adjacent countries. in the year , muley ismail determined to re-people his wasted districts by a colony of negroes. his secret object was, however, to form a body guard to keep his own people in check, a sort of black swiss regiment, so alike is the policy of all tyrants. in a few years, these troops exceeded , men. finding their numbers so great, and their services so much needed by the sultan, they became exigeant and rapacious, dictating to their royal master. muley abdallah was deposed six times by them. finding their yoke intolerable, the sultan decimated them by sending them to fight in the mountains. others were disbanded for the same reasons by sidi mohammed. still, the effect of this new colonization was beneficially experienced throughout the country. the moors taking the black women as concubines, a mixed race of industrious people sprang up, and gave an impetus to the empire. it is questionable, however, if north africa could he colonized by negroes. by mixing with the caucasian race, this experiment partly succeeded. but in general, north africa is too bleak and uncongenial for the negroes' nature during winter. the negro race does not increase of itself on this coast. their present number is kept up by a continual supply of slaves. when this is stopped, coloured people will begin gradually to disappear. it is unnecessary to tell my readers that the shereefs are very sensitive on matters of religion; but an anecdote or two may amuse them. a french writer expatiating in true gallic style, calls morocco the "arrière-garde en afrique of islamism," and "une de ses armées de réserve." indeed, the coasts and cities of morocco are inundated with saints of every description and degree of sanctity. morocco, in fact, is not only the _classic_ land of marabouts, but their home and haunt, and sphere of agitation. there are ten thousand abd-el-kaders and bou mazas all disputing authority with the high priest, who sits on the green throne of the shereefs. sometimes they assume the character of demagogues, and inveigh against the rapacity and corruption of the court and government. at others they appear as prophets, prophets of ill, by preaching boldly the holy war. the french in africa now furnish them with an everlasting theme of denunciation. from morocco they travel eastwards, filling the sahara and the atlas with the odours of their holy reputation. so that religious light, like that of civilization, is now moving from the west--eastwards, instead of, as in times past, from the east--eastwards. the maroquine mahometans may be cited as a case in point. they find too frequently only the form of religion in the east, as we do in the eastern churches. they are beginning to assault mecca as we have assaulted jerusalem. now for an anecdote or two illustrative of the high state of orthodoxy professed by the shereefs. some time ago, a number of handkerchiefs were brought, or rather smuggled into mogador, having printed upon them passages from the koran. one of them got into the hands of the emperor, who thinking the christians were ridiculing the sacred book, ordered instanter all the cities of the coast to be searched to discover the offender who introduced them. happily for the merchant he was not found out. his highness commanded that all the handkerchiefs which were collected should be destroyed. when mr. davidson was at morocco, he prescribed some seidlitz water for the use of the sultan, and placed on the sides of two bottles, containing the beverage, arabic verses from the koran. the sultan was exceedingly exasperated at this compliment to his religion, and had it privately intimated to mr. davidson not to desecrate the holy book in that abominable manner. the latter then very prudently gave up to the minister all the printed verses he had brought with him, which were concealed from public view. but if some of these emperors are so rigid and scrupulous, there are others more liberal and tolerant. muley suleiman was a great admirer of the european character, and was much attached to a mr. leyton, an english merchant. this merchant was one day riding out of the city of mogador, when an old woman rushed at him, seized the bridle of his horse, and demanded alms. the merchant pushed her away with his whip. the ancient dame seeing herself so rudely nonsuited, went off screaming revenge; and although she had not had a tooth in her head for twenty long years, she noised about town that mr. leyton had knocked two of her teeth out, and importuned the governor to obtain her some pecuniary indemnification. his excellency advised mr. leyton to comply, and get rid of the annoyance of the old woman. he resolutely refused, and the governor was obliged to report the case to the emperor, as the old lady had made so many partisans in mogador as to threaten a disturbance. his imperial highness wrote a letter to the merchant, condescendingly begging him to supply the old woman with "two silver teeth," meaning thereby to give her a trifling present in money. mr. leyton, being as obstinate as ever, was ordered to appear before the emperor at morocco. here the resolute merchant declared that he had not knocked the teeth out of the old woman's head, she had had none for years, and he would not be maligned even in so small a matter. the emperor was at his wits' end, and endeavoured to smooth down the contumacious leyton, to save his capital from insurrection; imploring him to comply with the lex talionis, [ ] and have two of his teeth drawn if he was inflexibly determined not to pay. the poor emperor was in hourly dread of a revolution about this tooth business, and at the same time he knew the merchant had spoken the truth. strange to say, mr. leyton at last consented to lose his teeth rather than his money. however, on the merchant's return from the capital to mogador, to his surprise, and no doubt to his satisfaction, he found that two ship-loads of grain had been ordered to be delivered to him by the emperor, in compensation for the two teeth which he had had punched out to satisfy the exigencies of the empire. chapter v. several visits from the moors; their ideas on soldiers and payment of public functionaries.--mr. cohen and his opinion on maroquine affairs.-- phlebotomising of governors, and ministerial responsibility.--border travels of the shedma and hhaha tribes.--how the emperor enriches himself by the quarrels of his subjects.--message from the emperor respecting the anti-slavery address.--difficulties of travelling through or residing in the interior.--use of knives, and forks, and chairs are signs of social progress.--account of the periodic visit of the mogador merchants to the emperor in the southern capital. i received several visits from the moors. as a class of men, they are far superior in civility and kindness to the moorish population of tangier. so much for the foolish and absurd stories about the place, which tell us that it is the only city of the empire in which christians can live with safety and comparative comfort. these tales must have been invented to please the tangier diplomatists. the contrary is the fact, for, whilst the moors of tangier consist of camel drivers and soldiers, there are a good number of very respectable native merchants in mogador; nevertheless, a large portion of the population is in the pay of government as militia, to keep in check the tribes of the neighbouring provinces; but their pay is very small, and most of them do a little business; many are artizuns and common labourers. as a specimen of their ordinary conversation, take the following. _moors_.--"all the people of morocco are soldiers; what can the foreigner do against them? morocco is one camp, our sultan is one, we have one prophet, and one god." _traveller_.--"in our country we do not care to have so many soldiers. we have fewer than france, and many other countries; but our soldiers do not work like yours; they are always soldiers, and fight bravely." _moors_.--"we don't understand; how wonderful! the french must conquer you with more soldiers." _traveller_.--"we have more ships, and our principal country is an island; the sea surrounds us, and defends us." _moors_.--"how much pay has the governor of gibraltar?" _traveller_.--"about , dollars per annum." _moors_.--"too much; why, the koed of mogador is obliged, instead of receiving money, to send the emperor, at a day's notice, , or , dollars! or if he does not pay, he is sent to prison at once; his head is not the value of a slave's." it appears that the old governor (who is now in morocco) positively refuses any salary or presents; his excellency is a man of some small property, and finds this plan answers best. he will not be fattened and bled as the emperor treats other governors. he politely hinted this to the emperor when he accepted office; since then, he has resolutely refused all presents from the merchants, so that the emperor has no excuse whatever for bleeding him under the pretext that he is afflicted with a plethora, from his exactions on the people. the moneys referred to by the moors are the custom dues, which are collected by a separate department, and transmitted direct, to the emperor. whilst residing at mogador, mr. cohen arrived from morocco, where he had been with the merchants. he is the english jew who assisted mr. davidson in his travels through morocco. his experience in maroquine affairs is considerable, and i shall offer his conclusions concerning the present state of the empire. i prefer, indeed, giving the opinion of various residents or natives of the country to our own. mr. cohen's ideas will be found to differ exceedingly from that of the (imperial) merchants, who, in point of fact, are not free men, and cannot be trustworthy witnesses. as mr. elton justly observed, the europeans are so much involved with the emperor, that they are almost obliged to consent publicly to the violent death of the unfortunate jew, dorman, although he was under the french protection, and likewise a kind of vice-consul. mr. cohen says--"the people of morocco are tired of their government, tired of being pillaged of their property, tired of the insecurity and uncertainty of their possessions; that is to say, of the few things which still remain in their hands." mr. cohen goes so far as to say--that, were a strong european power to be established on the coast, the entire population would flock to its support. he gives the following instance of the style and manner in which the emperor bleeds the governors of provinces. a few years ago, a governor of mogador presented himself to the sultan of fez. he was received with all due honours. the governor then begged leave to return to morocco. he was dismissed with great demonstrations of friendship. he arrived at morocco, and the governor of that city immediately informed him that he was his prisoner, the sultan having a claim against him, of , dollars. at length, the poor dupe of royal favour obtained permission to go back to mogador and to sell all he had, in order to make up the sum of , dollars. this is the way in which things are managed there. of maroquine policy, mr. cohen says, "that when the sultan finds himself in a scrape, he gives way, though slightly dilatory at first. so long as he sees that he does not commit himself, or is not detected, he does what he likes with his own and other people's likewise, to the fullest extent of his power. but on any mishap befalling him, muley abd errahman, whenever he can, always shifts the responsibility upon his ministers, and if one of them gives his advice, and the course taken therein does not succeed, woe be to the unhappy functionary!" some years ago, a number of troops rebelled against the emperor. at the instance of the prime minister, ben dris, they were pardoned; but, instead of receiving gratefully this imperial mercy, the troops broke out afresh in rebellion, which, with great difficulty, was quelled by the sultan. this, however, being accomplished, he called the prime minister before him, and thus addressed the amazed vizier. "now, sir, receive four hundred bastinadoes for your pains, and pay me , ducats; you will then take care in future how you give me advice." nevertheless, ben dris still remained vizier, and continued so till his death. bastinadoing a minister in morocco is, however, much the same as a forced resignation, or the dismissal of a minister in europe. doubtless ben dris thought himself surprisingly lucky that the emperor did not cut off his head. it was the late mr. hay's opinion, that muley abd errahman was a good man, but surrounded with bad advisers. the probability seems rather, that he took all the credit of the good acts of his advisers, and flung on them the odium of all the bad acts committed by himself, as many other despotic sovereigns have often done before him. with regard to the disaffection of the people, as alleged by mr. cohen, its verification is of great importance to us, and our appreciation of it equally so. we might be counting upon the resistance of the maroquines against an invasion of the french, and find, to our astonishment, the invaders received as deliverers from the exactions and tyrannies of the shereefian oppressor. the fact is, morocco will never be able to resist the progress of nations any more than china, especially since she has got the most restless people in the world for her neighbours. besides, during the last thirty years, many of the maroquines have visited europe, and their eyes are becoming opened, the film of moorish fanaticism has fallen off; even on their aggressive neighbours, they see the exercise of a government less rapacious than their own, and more security of life and property. still, the emperor will use every means to build up a barrier against innovation. just at this time, a _rekos_ (courier) arrived from mr. willshire (now at morocco), bringing letters in answer to those which i had addressed to him, touching my visit to the emperor. he writes that he had "already received orders from his imperial majesty respecting the object of my mission," which words give me uneasiness, as they are evidently unfavourable to it, and consequently to my journey to morocco. there is a misunderstanding between the provinces of shed ma and hhaha. these districts adjoin mogador, the city belonging to hhaha. shedma is mostly lowland and plains, and hhaha highlands and mountains, which form a portion of the south-western atlas, and strike down into the sea at santa cruz. there seems to be no other reason for those frequent obstinate hostilities on both sides, except the nature of the country. it is lamentable to think, because "a narrow frith" divides two people, or because one lives in the mountains and the other in the plains, that therefore they should be enemies for ever! strange infatuation of poor human nature. here the feud legend babbles of revenge, and says that, in the time of muley suleiman, one day when the hhaha people were at prayers at mogador, during broad day light, the shedma people came down upon them and slaughtered them, and, whilst in the sacred and inviolable act of devotion, entered the mosques and pillaged their houses. this produced implacable hatred between them, which is likely to survive many generations; but the story was told me by a hhaha man, and not improbably the people of shedma had some plausible reason for making this barbarous attack. even before this piece of treachery of one mussulman towards another at the hour of prayer, the feuds seemed to have existed. it is a remarkable circumstance in the history of islamism, that many of the most treacherous and sanguinary actions of mahometans have been committed within the sacred enclosures of the mosques, and at the hour of prayer. one of the caliphs having been assassinated in a mosque, seems to have been the precedent for all the murders of the kind which have followed, and indelibly disgrace the mussulman annals. these hhaha and shedma people are also borderers, and fight with the accustomed ferocity of border tribes. their conflicts are very desultory, being carried on by twos and threes, or sixes and sevens, and with sticks, and stones, and other weapons, if they cannot get knives, or matchlocks. meanwhile, the emperor folds his arms, and looks on superbly and serenely. when the two parties are exhausted, or have had enough of it for the present; his imperial highness then interferes, and punishes both by fine. indeed, it pays him better to pursue this course; for, instead of spending money in the suppression of factious insurrections, he gains by mulcting both parties. the sultan, in fact, not only aggrandizes himself by the quarrels of his own subjects, but he profits by the disputes between the foreign consuls and his governors. the imbroglio which took place some years since, between the governor of mogador and the french consul, m. delaporte, is sufficiently characteristic. an algerine mussulman, who was of course a french subject, behaved himself very indecent, by setting all the usual rules of mahometan worship at defiance. this was a great scandal to the faithful. the governor of mogador, in defiance of religion, took upon himself to punish a french mussulman. the french consul remonstrated strongly in presence of the governor, almost insulting him before his people. the sultan approved the conduct of his governor. the consul general decided that both parties ought to be removed, and the french government recalled their vice-consul. the sultan, promised, but did not dismiss his governor, or rather the governor himself would not be dismissed. the french reiterated their complaints, which were supported by a small squadron sent down to mogador. the governor was now cashiered, and was besides obliged to pay the emperor a fine of thirteen thousand dollars, upon the pretext of appeasing the offended majesty of his royal master. so the sultan always makes money by the misadventures of his subjects. to indemnify the poor governor for his fine, he received soon after another appointment. on his return from morocco, having waited upon mr wiltshire regarding the presentation of the petition of the anti-slavery society, the vice-consul explained the great difficulty the emperor had in receiving a petition which called for an organic change in the social condition of the country, and that, indeed, the abolition of slavery was "contrary to his religion." i then represented to mr. willshire the propriety at least of waiting for the arrival of the governor of mogador from morocco, in order to have a personal interview with him, to which the vice-consul acceded. the difficulties of travelling through morocco; and of residing in the inland towns have been already mentioned. in further proof, mr. elton related that, whilst the merchants visited the emperor in the, southern capital, a watch-maker, a european and a christian, asked permission of the minister to dwell in the quarter of the moors, instead of that of the jews, in which latter the europeans usually reside. the minister replied, "you may live there if you like, but you must have ten soldiers to guard you." such a reply from the minister, and whilst the merchants were protected by the presence of the emperor himself, is all conclusive as to the insecurity attached to europeans in the interior towns. morocco itself is a city of profound gloom, where the moor indulges to the utmost his taciturn disposition, and melancholy fatalism. it is, therefore, not an enchanting abode for europeans, who, whilst there waiting on the emperor, are obliged constantly to ride about to preserve their health, or they would die of the suffocating stench in the jew's millah, or quarter. but, in taking this equestrian exercise, they are not unfrequently insulted. an ungallant cavalier deliberately stopped mrs. elton by riding up against her. the lady spurred her horse and caught with her feet a portion of his light burnouse, dragging it away. he was only prevented riding after and cutting her down, by one of the emperor's secretaries, who was passing by at the time. mr. elton had a fine black horse to ride upon. the populace were so savage at seeing an infidel mounted upon so splendid an animal, that they hooted: "curse you, infidel! dismount you dog!" these instances shew the sauciness of the vulgar, and are a fair example of the conduct of the moors. i am told by barbary jews, it would be next to impossible for a christian to walk without disguise in broad daylight at fez. not so much from the hostility of the populace, as from their indecent and vehement curiosity. however, in these cases, i am obliged to give the testimony of others. mr. cohen, when travelling through the interior, assumes the character of a quack doctor, the best passport in all these countries. practising as he goes, he manages to get enough to bear his charges on the way. oliver goldsmith piped, but in morocco the traveller and stranger physics his way. to europeans, mr. cohen gives this advice--"never to stay more than one night at any place." "mr. davidson," he says, "stopped so long at wadnoun, that all the desert, as far as timbuctoo, heard of his projects and travels, and were determined to waylay and plunder him." but, on the contrary, with respect to my own experience in the desert, the people appeared equally hostile or offended at my taking them by surprise. desert travelling after all is mostly an affair of luck. six travellers might be sent to timbuctoo and three return, and three be murdered, and yet the three who were murdered might have been as prudent and as skilful as the three who were successful. the maroquine government often shew a perfect chinese jealousy of europeans travelling in the interior. when doctor willshire, brother of the consul, returned from morocco, the government gave orders that "he should be taken directly to mogador, and not be allowed to turn to the right hand or to the left, to collect old stones or herbs." this lynx-eyed government imagined they saw in doctor willshire's botanical and mineralogical rambles, a design of spying out the powers and resources of the country. the consentaneous progress of morocco in the universal movement of the age, is argued by the merchants from an increased use of chairs, and knives and forks. some years ago, scarcely a knife and fork, or a chair was to be found in this part of morocco. now, almost every house in the jewish quarter has them. the jew of barbary can use them with less scruple than the orthodox tory moor, who sets his face like flint against all changes, because his european brethren adopt them. many innovations of this domestic sort are introduced from europe into north africa through the instrumentality of native jews. tea has become an article of universal consumption. it is, indeed, the wine of the maroquine mussulmen. [ ] even in remote provinces, amongst bebers and bedouins, the most miserable looking and living of people the finest green tea is to be found. you enter a miserable looking hut, when you are amazed by the hostess unlocking an old box, and taking out a choice tea service, cups, saucers, tea-pot, and tea-tray, often of white china with gilt edges. these, after use, are always kept locked up, as objects of most precious value. the sugar is put in the tea-pot, and the moors and jews usually drink their tea so sweet that it may be called syrup. but if any lady tries the plan of melting the sugar while the tea is brewing in the tea-pot, she will find the tea so prepared has acquired a different, and not disagreeable flavour. morocco has its fashions and manias as well as europe. house building is now the rage. they say it is not so easy for the sultan to fleece the people of their property when it consists of houses. almost every distinguished moor in the interior has built, or is building himself a spacious house. this mania is happily a useful one, and must advance the comfort and sanitary improvement of the people. it is as good as a health of towns bill for them. the merchants having all returned from morocco, i shall give some account of their visit to the emperor. the ancient rule of imperial residence was, that the sultan should sojourn six months in fez, and six months in morocco, the former the northern, and the latter the southern capital. this is not adhered to strictly, the emperor taking up his abode at one capital or the other, and sometimes at micknos, according to his caprice. he never fails, however, to visit morocco once a year, on account of its neighbourhood to mogador, his much loved, and beautiful commercial city. the emperor himself, before his accession to the throne, was the administrator of the customhouse of this city, where he has acquired his commercial tastes and habits of business, which he has cultivated from the very commencement of his reign. when the emperor resides in the south, he receives visits from the merchants of mogador. these visits are imperative on the merchants, if they are his imperial debtors, or even if they wish to maintain a friendly feeling with his government. upon an average, the visits or deputations of merchants, take place every three or four years; more frequently they cannot well be, because they cost the merchants immense sums in presents, each often giving to the value of three or four thousand dollars. in return, they receive additional and prolonged credits. the number of imperial merchants is about twenty, three of whom are englishmen, messrs. willshire, elton, and robertson. most of the rest are barbary jews. [ ] there is a belgian merchant who did not go with these. this gentleman, owing nothing to the emperor, preferred to pay duty on shipping his merchandize, on which by payment of ready money, he gets per cent discount. this plan, however, does not enable him to compete with the imperial merchants, whose duties accumulate till they are years and years in arrear. and when these arrears have gone on increasing till there is no chance of payment, the emperor, in order to keep up his firms of enslaved merchants, will rather remit half or more of the debt, in consideration of a handsome present, than encourage merchants to make ready money payments. the largest debt owing by a single firm, is that of a native jew, viz., , dollars. the amount of the debt of the united mogador merchants is more than one million and a half of dollars. the usual course of the merchants is to pay the debt off by monthly instalments. as an instance of the emperor's straining a point to keep solvent one of his mercantile firms, on the occasion of the visit of the merchants to morocco, his imperial highness lent the house of hasan joseph (jews) , dollars in hard cash, which, to my knowledge, were paid to them out of the coffers of the mogador custom-house. this was certainly an instance of magnanimous generosity on the part of muley abd errahman. but the emperor's genius is mercantile, and he is determined to support his imperial traders; and his conduct, after all, is only the calculation of a raiser. it must be mentioned, however, to the honour of mr. elton, that on the bombardment of mogador, he and his lady were allowed to leave at once, having paid up all their government debt. indeed, the governor of that place, was always accustomed to say to the collector of the returns of the monthly payment of instalments: "now, go first to mrs. elton; she will be sure to have the money ready for you. and we must have money to-day from some of the merchants." on another occasion, his excellency called the lady of mr. elton, "the best man amongst the merchants." mrs. elton, being a vivacious, energetic lady, was often called "the woman of the christians." the following are the stations at which the merchants stop from mogador to morocco, to visit the emperor. st. emperor's gardens; five hours from mcgador, where are some fine fig trees, and a spring. nd. aïn omas. rd. seeshouar. th. wad enfes. the country, for the first two days, is beautifully rural, scattered over with noble argan forests, on the third and fourth days, the journey is through plains and an open country. on the second day, after leaving mogador, you obtain a distinct view of the great atlas range at the back of morocco; on the fifth, as you approach the capital, the country is overspread with wild date-palms, palmettos, or dwarf palms. the view of "towering atlas that supports the sky," now stands forth, vaster and more magnificent as you approach the capital, and is the only feature of surpassing interest on the journey; but it suffices to absorb all the attention of the traveller. as he gazes on the giant mountain, which seems to support with its huge rocky arms the frame-work of the skies, its head covered with everlasting snow, he forgets the fatigue of his painful route under an african sun; and, lost in pious musings, adores the omnipotent being who laid the foundation of this solid buttress. halfway is called "the neck of the camel," where there is a well in the midst of a scene extremely desert and dreary. here all the donkeys of the party of merchants died from want of water. the water of this well is not permitted to be drunk by animals, in obedience to the solemn testament of the saint who dug it. the poor horses and mules were tied close up to the well, looking wistfully at the water when drawn for the biped animals, and snuffing the scent; but they were not allowed to taste a drop. two horses broke loose and fought, their combat being aggravated by thirst, "see!" cried the moors to the merchants, "the saint is angry with you for having wished to give his water to horses." our merchants, however, in defiance of the saint (this invisible enemy of the lower creation) and of his supporters, got a supply of water, which during the night, and en marche the next day, they distributed to their steeds. the accommodation on the way, and at the capital is very bad, even the waiting-room near the palace, appropriated to the christians, is but an old dilapidated shed, with one of its sides knocked out, or never filled in. "everything," say our merchants, "is going to rack and ruin in the capital. the emperor will not even repair his palaces, or the jealousies in which he keeps his women; money is his only pursuit and his god." their residence in the capital was very disagreeable, all being cooped up in the jews' quarter, and obliged to subsist on victuals cooked by these people, which made certain of them unwell, for some of the barbary jew's food is very indigestible. the presentation of the merchants to the emperor was conducted as follows: at nine in the morning, they were admitted into a garden in presence of about two thousand imperial guards, all drawn up in file, looking extremely fierce. passing these bearded warriors, they were conducted into a large square lined with buildings, where, after waiting about five minutes, the gate of the palace was suddenly thrown open, and the emperor rode out superbly mounted on a white horse, followed on foot by a group of courtiers. his imperial highness was attended by the governor of mogador, who walked by his side. the first persons presented to the shereefian lord were the officials of mogador, who were introduced by the governor of that city; afterwards came some moorish grandees; then the christians were presented, and finally the jewish merchants. the latter were introduced by the governor of mogador, the jews taking off their shoes as they passed before the emperor. one passed at a time, with his cadeau behind him, carried by an attendant jew. as the merchants moved on, his imperial highness asked their names, and condescended to thank each of them separately for his offering. the merchants carried in their hand, an invoice of their respective presents, and gave it to the governor, for the articles on their delivery are not exposed before the eyes of the sultan. to open the budget would be a breach of good breeding, and would shock the imperial modesty. fifteen merchants were introduced, and the ceremony of presentation lasted about twenty minutes; this being concluded, the merchants were permitted to perambulate the gardens of the emperor, and to pluck a little fruit. they were afterwards delayed a fortnight, waiting to present a _cadeau_ to the emperor's eldest son. such are the details of this journey, which i got from the merchants themselves. mr. willshire, being a consul and great customer of his imperial highness, also received a gift of a horse in exchange. the united value of the presents to the emperor, on this occasion, was fifty thousand dollars, which amply indemnifies him for his money-lending, and the credit that he gives. they consisted principally of articles of european manufactures. his imperial highness afterwards sells them to his subjects on his own account. of course, amongst this mass of presents, there are many nice things such as tea, sugar, spices, essences &c., for his personal comfort and luxury, as well as for his harem, besides articles of dress and ornament. it will not be out of place here, to give a brief account of the commerce of morocco. in doing so, we must take into consideration the prodigious quantity of imports and exports, of which there are no statistics in the imperial custom-houses, and no consular returns. let us estimate the population of morocco at its general compensation of eight millions, and suppose that each spends a dollar per annum in the purchase of european manufactures. this will raise the value of imports at once to eight millions of dollars per annum. it is notorious that the contraband trade of tangier, and tetuan, and the northern coast generally doubles or trebles the commerce that passes through the customhouse; but the legal trade is not well ascertained. mr. hay once sent, i believe, to the agent of mogador, a list of questions to be answered by the consular department. the gentleman, who was an unsalaried vice-consul, appalled at the number of interrogatories, immediately replied, "that he had his own business to attend to; he could not sit down to compose consular returns, which would require weeks of labour; and if it were considered part of his duties to answer such questions, he begged to resign at once his vice-consulship." as to the barbary jews, who have charge of some of the vice-consulates, they are necessarily incapacitated, by reason of their want of education, for such an employment. it is, therefore, hopeless to attempt to give any accurate account of the commerce of morocco, i can only annex a few details of those things of which we are actually cognizant. whatever may be said of the indolent habits of the moors, they were once, and still are, a commercial people. spain, the neighbour of morocco, still feels the loss of the moors. they were the really industrious classes settled in spain. the merchants, the artists, the operatives, and agriculturists unfortunately have left behind them few inheriting their habits of perseverance. little, indeed, can be expected in spain, where the maxim is adopted, that "nobility may lie dormant in a servant, but becomes extinct in a merchant." spain lost upwards of three millions of intelligent and industrious moors, a shock she will never recover. the bombardment of a commercial city of this country would not do the injury which is commonly imagined. the ports are numerous though not very good. a single house or shed on the beach of mogador, or tangier, is a sufficient custom-house for the moors. there are no great deposits of goods on the coast, for as soon as the camels bring their loads of exports, these are shipped, and the camels immediately return to the interior, laden with imported goods or manufactures. mogador is the great commercial depôt of the atlantic coast, and therefore "the beautiful ishweira, the beloved town," of muley abd errahman. its trade is principally, however, with the south, the provinces of sous and wadnoun, and the western sahara. mogador is also the bona-fide port of the southern capital of morocco. two-thirds of the commerce of mogador is carried on with england, the rest is divided among the other nations of europe; but of this third, i should think france has one half. the port of mogador has usually some half-a-dozen vessels lying in it, but from twenty to thirty have been seen there. they are usually sixty days discharging and taking in cargo. each vessel pays forty dollars port-dues, which must press very heavily upon small vessels, but it is seldom that a vessel of less than one hundred tons is seen at mogador. the grand staple exports are only two, gum and almonds; upon the sale of these, the commercial activity of this city entirely depends. english vessels come directly from london, the french from marseilles; but so badly is this commerce managed that, at the present time, morocco produce is higher in mogador than it is in london or marseilles; for instance, morocco almonds are cheaper in london than mogador. mazagan, and some few other ports, export produce direct to europe, but tangier is the next commercial port of the empire. there is an important trade in manufactures and provisions carried on between tangier and gibraltar. the fez merchants have resident agents in gibraltar. curious stories are told of maroquine adventurers leaving tangier and fez as camel-drivers and town-porters, and then assuming the character and style of merchants in gibraltar, throwing over their shoulders a splendid woollen burnouse, and folding round their heads a thoroughly orthodox turban in large swelling folds of milk-white purity. in this way, they will walk through the stores of gibraltar, and obtain thousands of dollars' worth of credit. the merchant-emperor found it necessary to put a stop to this, and promulgated a decree to the effect, that "he would not, for the future, be responsible for the debts of any of his subjects contracted out of his dominions." this was aimed at these trading adventurers, and the decree was transmitted to the british consul, who had it published in the gibraltar gazette while i was staying in that city. up to this time, the emperor, singularly enough, had made himself responsible for all the debts of his subjects trading with gibraltar. the trade in provisions at tangier is most active, bullocks, sheep, butcher's meat, fowls, eggs, game and pigeons, grain and flour, &c., are daily shipped from tangier to gibraltar. the garrison and population of gibraltar draw more than two-thirds of their provisions from this and other northern parts of morocco. this government speculates in and carries on commerce; and, like most african and asiatic governments, has had its established monopolies from time immemorial, of some of which it disposes, whilst it reserves others for itself, as those of tobacco, sulphur, and cochineal. all the high functionaries engage in commerce, and this occupation of trade and barter is considered the most honourable in the empire, sanctioned as it is by the emperor himself, who may be considered as the chief of merchants. the monopolies are sold by public auction at so much per annum. on its own monopolies, government, as a rule, exacts a profit of cent per cent. the following is a list of the monopolies which the emperor sells, either to his own employers or to native and foreign merchants. . leeches.--this is one of the most recently established monopolies, dating only about twenty years back. the trade in leeches was set on foot by mr. frenerry; it brought, at first, but a few dollars per annum, and now the monopoly is sold for , . leeches are principally found in the lakes of the north-west districts, called the gharb. . wax.--this monopoly is confined almost exclusively to the markets of tangier and el-araish. it sold, while i was in the country, for three thousand dollars. . bark.--this is a monopoly of the north, principally of the mountainous region of rif. it is farmed for about sixteen thousand dollars. . the coining of copper money.--the right of coining money in the name of the emperor, is sold for ten thousand dollars to each principal city. it is a dangerous privilege to be exercised; for, should the alloy be not of a quality which pleases the emperor, or the particular governor of the city, the unfortunate coiner is forthwith degraded, and his property confiscated. indeed, the coiner sometimes pays for his negligence, or dishonesty, with his head. . millet, and other small seeds.--this monopoly at tangier is sold for five hundred dollars. the price varies in other places according to circumstances. . cattle.--the cattle exported from tetuan, tangier, and el-araish, for the victualling of gibraltar, is likewise a monopoly; it amounted during my stay to , dollars. in consequence of an alleged treaty, but which does not exist on paper, the emperor of morocco has bound himself to supply our garrison of gibraltar with , head of cattle per annum, , of which must be shipped from tangier, the rest from other parts of the gharb, or north-west. british contractors pay five dollars per head export duty, the ordinary tax is ten. it is estimated, however, that some three or four thousand head of cattle are annually exported from morocco for our garrison. the gibraltar commissariat contractors complain, and with reason, that the maroquine monopolist supplies the british government with "the very worst cattle of all western barbary." these monopolies do not interfere with the custom-house, which levies its duties irrespectively of them. leeches pay an export duty of s. d. the thousand; wax pays an _ad valorem_ duty of fifty per cent; bark pays a very small duty, and millet scarcely a penny per quintal. independently of these monopolies, there are exports of merchandise of a special character, and requiring a special permission from the sultan, such as grains and beasts of burden; and, if we may be permitted, bipeds, or jews and jewesses. his imperial highness has absolute need of jews to carry on the commerce of the country. no male adult jew, or child, can leave the ports of morocco, without paying four dollars customs duty. a jewess must pay a hundred dollars. the reason of there being such an excessive export-duty on women is to keep them in the country, as a sort of pledge for the return of their husbands, brothers or fathers, in the event of their leaving for commercial or other purposes. slaves are not exported from morocco. besides the payment of special impost on exportation, wool pays a duty of three dollars per quintal, and two pounds of powder when dirty, and double when washed. a bullock pays export duty ten dollars, and a sheep one. sheepskins eight dollars the hundred, bullock-skins three dollars per quintal, and goat-skins the same. of grain, wheat pays an export duty of three-fourths of a dollar per fanega, or about a quintal. barley is not exported, there being scarcely enough for home consumption. horses are exported in small numbers, by special permission from the emperor, a few years since when spain threatened the frontier of portugal, the english government found it necessary to come to the aid of the latter country, and mr. frenerry was commissioned by our government to purchase of the emperor five hundred horses for portugal. his imperial highness called together his governors of cities, and shieks of provinces, and after a long debate, it was unanimously decided that so large a number of horses could not be sold to the christians without danger to the empire, whilst also, the transaction would be contrary to the principles of islamism. should an individual wish to export a single horse, he would have to pay sixty dollars, a duty which entirely amounts to a prohibition, many of the boasted beasts not being worth twenty dollars. a mule pays forty, and an ass five dollars. mules are much dearer in morocco and in other parts of barbary than horses. camels are rarely exported, and have no fixed import. the queen of spain, some time ago, solicited the sultan for four camels, and his imperial highness had the gallantry to grant the export free of duty. there are several exports which are not monopolies. these are principally from the south. the following are some of them. ostrich feathers.--these are of three qualities; the first of which pays three dollars per pound, the second quality one and a half dollars, and the third, three-quarters of a dollar. many feather merchants are now in mogador visiting at the feasts of the jews, who reside in sous and wadnoun, and have communications with all the districts of the sahara. elephants' teeth.--ivory pays an export duty of ten per cent. during late years, both ivory and ostrich feathers have lost much of their value as articles of commerce. gums.--gum-arabic pays two dollars per quintal export duty, and gum sudanic an ad valorem duty of ten per cent. but now-a-days only the very best gum will sell in english markets; the inferior qualities, as of all other barbary produce, are shipped to marseilles. one looks with extreme interest at the beautiful pellucid drops of sudanic gum, knowing that the arabs bring some of it from the neighbourhood of timbuctoo. almonds.--both the sweet and the bitter, in the shell, or the oil of almonds, pay three dollars per quintal. ship-loads at once are exported from mogador direct for soudan. red woollen sashes are exported at five dollars per dozen. the spaniards take a great quantity. tanned skins, especially the red, or morocco, are exported at ten per cent, _ad valorem_. slippers pay a dollar the hundred. the haik or barracan is exported in great numbers to the levant by the pilgrims. the vessels, also, that carry pilgrims from morocco, return laden with these and other native manufactures. barbary dried peas are exported principally to spain, paying a dollar the quintal. fez flour pays one dollar and a half per fanega; dates pay five dollars the quintal; fowls and eggs, the former two dollars per dozen, the latter two dollars per thousand; oranges and lemons pay a dollar the thousand. gold is brought from soudan over the desert, and is sometimes exported. i have no account of it, and never heard it mentioned in morocco as an article of any importance. olive-oil is exported from the north, but not in great quantities. the amount exported in a recent year was about the value of £ , sterling. the olive is not so much cultivated in morocco as in tunis and tripoli. besides the articles above mentioned, antimony, euphorbium, horns, hemp, linseed, rice, maize, and dra, orchella weed, orris-root, pomegranate peel, sarsaparilla, snuff, sponges, walnuts, garbanyos, gasoul, and mineral soap, gingelane, and commin seeds, &c., are exported in various quantities. [ ] it was reported in the mercantile circles, that representations would be made to the emperor to place the trade of the country upon a regular, and more stable footing. all nations, indeed, would benefit by a change which could not but be for the better. but i question whether his imperial highness will give up his old and darling system of being the sovereign-merchant of the empire. it is not the interest of great britain to annoy him, for we have always to look at gibraltar. but it would be desirable if christian merchants could be found to undertake the duty, to have all the vice-consuls of the coast christians, in preference to jews. by having jewish consuls, we place ourselves in a false position with the emperor, who is obliged to submit to the prejudices of his people against hebrews. british merchants ought to be allowed to visit their own vessels whilst in port, to superintend, or what not, the stowing or landing of their goods, as they are entitled to do by treaty. spanish dollars are the chief currency in morocco; but there are also doubloons and smaller gold coins. this currency, the merchants manage very badly. a doubloon loses sixteen pence, or four maroquine ounces in exchange at mogador, whilst at the capital of morocco, three days' journey from this, it passes for the same value it bears in spain and gibraltar. as to the revenues of the government of morocco, our means of information are still more uncertain and conjectural, than those we possess regarding commerce. a french writer asserts, that the tithes upon land assigned by the koran and the capitation tax on the jews, produce from twenty to thirty million francs (or say about one million pounds sterling) per annum. this, perhaps, is too large a sum. about a century ago, the revenues of moocco were estimated at only £ , sterling per annum. but if muley abd errahman has fifty millions of dollars, or ten millions sterling in the vaults of mequinez, he may be considered as the richest monarch in africa, nay in all europe. it is positively stated that muley ismail left this amount, or one hundred millions of ducats in the imperial treasury, which sidi mahommed reduced to two millions. it may have been the great object of the life of the present sultan to restore this enormous hoard. no country is rich or safe without a vast capital in hand as a reserve for times of trouble, war, or famine. but it is not necessary that such reserve should be in the hands of a government. this, a maroquine prince cannot comprehend, and he decides as to the riches and poverty of his country by the amount he possesses in his royal vaults. in treating of trade, and comparing its exports with the peculiar products and manufactures of the cities and towns, hereafter to be enumerated, we may approximate to an idea of the resources of the maroquine empire, but everything is more or less deteriorated in this naturally rich country. cattle and sheep, grain and fruits, are of inferior quality, owing to the want of proper culture. no spontaneous growth is equal to culture, for such is the ordinance of divine providence. half of this country is desert. the iron hand of despotic government presses heavily upon all industry. if we add to this defective state of culture, the miserably moral condition of the people, we have the unpleasant picture of an inferiority civilized race of mankind scattered over a badly cultivated region. not all the magnificence of the glorious atlas can reconcile such a prospect to the imagination. but, unhappily, morocco does not constitute a very striking exception to the progress of civilization along the shores and in the isles of the mediterranean. many countries in southern europe are in a state little superior, and the moorish civilization is almost on a par with that of the grecian, sicilian, or maltese, and quite equal to turkish advancement in the arts and sciences of the nineteenth century. the only real advantage of the turks over the moors consists in the improvements the former have made in the organization of the army. whoever travels through morocco, and will but open his eyes to survey its rich valleys and fertile plains, will be impressed with the conviction that this country, cultivated by an industrious population, and fostered by a paternal government, is capable of producing all the agricultural wealth of the north and the south of europe, as well as the tropics, and of maintaining its inhabitants in happiness and plenty. chapter vi. influence of french consuls.--arrival of the governor of mogador from the capital; he brings an order to imprison the late governor; his character, and mode of administering affairs.--statue of a negress at the bottom of a well.--spanish renegades.--various wedding festivals of jews.--frequent fetes and feastings amongst the jewish population of morocco.--scripture illustration, "behold the bridegroom cometh!"--jewish renegades.--how far women have souls.--infrequency of suicides. notwithstanding the sarcasm of a french journalist that the french and other europeans consuls are "consuls des jusifs, et pour la protection des jusifs," the french consuls both here and at tangier, have real power and influence with the government. the governor of mogador, sidi haj el-arby, arrived from morocco. his excellency feared an attack from the shedma and the hhaha people, and was obliged to have a strong escort. not long ago, the sultan himself had a narrow escape from falling into the hands of a band of insurgents; their object was to make their lord-paramount a prisoner, and extort concessions as the price of his liberty. this will help us to form an opinion of the want of sympathy between potentate and subjects in morocco. his excellency brought an order from the imperial despot to imprison the late governor, if the balance of , dollars was not instantly forthcoming, he having only paid nine out of the , demanded. the late governor was confined in his house, instead of in the common prison. it was said he was worth , dollars, but that he was afraid to make too prompt a payment of the demand of the emperor, lest he should be called upon for more. however, his furniture, horses, and mules were sold in the public streets; a melancholy spectacle was the degradation of a former governor of this city. [ ] the moors look upon these things as matters of course, or with indifference, quietly ejaculating, "it is destiny! who can resist?" but the moor, nevertheless, can clearly discern that wealth is a crime in the eyes of their sovereign. i am not surprised at the present governor absolutely rejecting all presents, and making the people call him by the _soubriquet_ of "the governor of _no_ presents," a short time after his appointment, a merchant having left his excellency a present during his absence from home, was immediately summoned before him, when the following dialogue ensued:-- _his excellency._--"sir, how dare you leave a present at my house?" _the merchant._--"other governors before your excellency have received presents." _his excellency._--"i am a governor of no presents! how much do you owe the sultan, my master?" _the merchant._--"i--i--i--don't know," (hesitating and trembling) _his excellency._--"very well, when you owe the sultan nothing, bring me a present, and take this away, and make known to everybody, that haj el-arby receives _no_ presents." the fact is, the governor knows what he is about. were his excellency to receive , dollars per annum as presents from the merchants of mogador, the sultan would demand of him , ; besides, there is not a merchant who makes a present that does not demand its value, a _quid pro quo_ in the remission of custom-duties. sidi-el-arby is also a thorough diplomatist, so far as report goes; he promises anybody anything; he keeps all on the tiptoe of most blessed expectation, and so makes friends of everybody. "to his friend, cohen," he says, "i'll take you back to my country with me, and make you rich; we are of the same country." to phillips, "you shall have a ship of your own soon." to the merchants, "the sultan shall lend you money whenever you want it." to the moors in general, "you shall have your taxes reduced." in this way, his excellency promises and flatters all, but takes very good care to compromise himself with none. the frequented as well as the unfrequented spots are centres of superstition. in the sahara, by a lonely well, in the midst of boundless sterility, where the curse on earth seems to have burnt blackest, a camel passes every night groaning piteously, and wandering about in search of its murdered master, so the tale was told me. now, about two day's journey from mogador, there is also a well, containing within its dank and dark hollow a perpetual apparition. at its bottom is seen the motionless statue of a negress, with a variety of wearing materials placed beside her, all made of fine burnished gold, and so bright, that the dreary cavern of the deep well is illuminated. whoever presumes to look down the well at her, and covets her shining property, is instantaneously seized with thirst and fever; and, if he does not expire at once, he never recovers from the fatal effects of his combined curiosity and avarice. people draw water daily from this well, but no one dare look down it. truth may be in this well! since there is a sad want of it on this, as on other parts of the world. i was introduced to a spanish renegade, a great many make their escape from the presidios of the north. on getting away from these convict establishments, they adopt the mahometan religion, are pretty well received by the maroquines, and generally pass the rest of their days tranquilly among the moors. i imagine the better sort of them remain christians at heart, notwithstanding their public assumption of islamism. this renegade was a stonemason, whom i found at work, and he was not at all distinguishable by strangers from the moors, being dressed precisely in the same fashion. i had some conversation with him, which was characteristic of conceit, feeling and honour. _traveller_--"how long have you escaped?" _renegade._--"more than twenty years." _traveller._--"do you like this country and the moors?" _renegade._--"better is marruécos than spain." _traveller._--"shall you ever attempt to return to spain?" _renegade._--"why? here i have all i want. besides, they would stretch my neck for sending a fellow out of the world without his previously having had an interview with his confessor." _traveller._--"are you not conscience-stricken? having committed such a crime, how can you mention it?" _renegade._--"pooh, conscience! pooh, corazor!" many of those wretched men have indeed lost their corazor, or it is seared with a red-hot iron. some hundreds of these spanish convicts are scattered over the country, but they soon lose their nationality. it is probable that, from some knowledge of them, the emperor presumed lately to call the spaniards "the vilest of nations," and yet at various times, the maroquines have shown great sympathy for the spaniards. some of these renegades were found at the battle of isly in charge of field-pieces, where, according to the french reports, they displayed great devotion to the cause of the emperor. when the governors of the convict settlements find too many on his hands, or the prisons too full, they let a number of their best conducted escape to the interior. the presence of those cut-throats in morocco may have something to do with such broils as the following, of which i was a witness. two fellows quarrelled violently, and were on the point of sticking one another with their knives, when up stepped a third party and cried out, "what! do you intend to act like christians and kill one another?" at the talismanic word of eusara ("christians, or nazareens,") they instantly desisted and became friends. the term "christian or nazareen," is one of the most oppobrious names with which the people of mogador can abuse one another. the weddings and attendant feasts of the jews are the more remarkable, when we consider the circumstance of the social state of this oppressed race in morocco, their precarious condition, and the numberless insults and oppressions inflicted on them by both the government and the people; i was present at several of these weddings, and shall give the readers a glimpse of them. i had read and heard a great deal about the persecution of the jews in morocco, and was, therefore, not a little surprised to meet with these continual feasts and festivals among a people so much talked about as victims of mussulman oppression. i find two sentences in my notes containing the pith of the whole. "the jews continued their feasts; about a third of their time is spent in feasting." again--"amidst all their degradation, the jew we saw to-day recreating themselves to the utmost extent of their capacities of enjoyment." it appears that during the time i was at mogador there was an unusual number of weddings, and then followed the feast of the passover. i think, whilst i was at tangier, weddings or celebration of weddings were going on every night. it may be safely asserted, that no people in barbary enjoy themselves more than the jews, or more pamper and gratify their appetites. what with weddings, feasts, and obligatory festivals, their existence is one round of eating and drinking. these feasts, besides, do not take place in a corner, nor are they barricaded from public, or envious, or inquisitorial view, but are open to all, being attended by christians, moors and arabs. these wedding-feasts are substantial things. here is the entry in my journal of an account of them: "a bullock was killed at the house of the bridegroom, tea and cakes and spirits were freely, nay universally distributed there. the company afterwards went off with the bridegroom to the house of the bride, where another distribution of the same kind took place, whilst half of the bullock was brought for the bride's friends. here the bridegroom, in true oriental style, mounted upon a couch of damask and gold. the bride, laden with bridal ornaments of gold and jewels, and covered with a gauze veil, was led out by the women and placed by his side. she was then left alone to sit in state as queen of the feast, whilst the company regaled themselves with every imaginable luxury of eating and drinking. her future husband now produced, as a present for his bride, a splendid pair of jewelled ear-rings, which were held up amidst the screaming approbation of the guests. the jewesses present, were weighed down under the dead weight of a profusion of jewels and gold, tiaras of pearls, necklaces of coral and gems, armlets, wristlets and legets of silver gold and jet, with gold and silver braided gowns, skirts and petticoats. this fiesta was kept up for seven days. astonished at the profusion of jewels worn by the various guests, i received a solution by a question i asked, touching this mavellous circumstance. the greater part of the jewels, worn on these occasions, are borrowed from friends and neighbours; they must belong to some of the jewish families, and their quantity shews the great wealth possessed by the jews living under this despotic government, i assisted at the celebration of the nuptials of a portion of the family of the feather merchants, a rich and powerful firm established in the south for the purchase of ostrich-feathers. this was a wedding of great _éclat_; all the native jewish aristocracy of mogador being invited to it. the festivities, beginning at noon, i first entered the apartment where the bride was sitting in state. she was elevated on a radiant throne of gold and crimson cushions amidst a group of women, her hired flatterers, who kept singing and bawling out her praises. "as beautiful as the moon is rachel!" said one. "fairer than the jessamine!" exclaimed another. "sweeter than honey in the honey-comb!" ejaculated a third. her eyes were shut, it being deemed immodest to look on the company, and the features of her face motionless as death, which made her look like a painted corpse. to describe the dresses of the bride would be tedious, as she was carried away every hour and redressed, going through and exhibiting to public view, with the greatest patience, the whole of her bridal wardrobe. her face was artistically painted; cheeks vermillion; lips browned, with an odoriferous composition; eye-lashes blackened with antimony; and on the forehead and tips of the chin little blue stars. the palms of the hands and nails were stained with henna, or brown-red, and her feet were naked, with the toe-nails and soles henna-stained. she was very young, perhaps not more than thirteen, and hugely corpulent, having been fed on paste and oil these last six months for the occasion. the bridegroom, on the contrary, was a man of three times her age, tall, lank and bony, very thin, and of sinister aspect. the woman was a little lump of fat and flesh, apparently without intelligence, whilst the man was a barbary type of dickens' fagan. the ladies had now arranged themselves in tiers, one above the other, and most gorgeous was the sight. most of them wore tiaras, all flaming with gems and jewels. they were literally covered from head to foot with gold and precious stones. as each lady has but ten fingers, it was necessary to tie some scores of rings on their hair. the beauty of the female form, in these women, was quite destroyed by this excessive quantity of jewellery. these jewels were chiefly pearls, brilliants, rubies and emeralds. they are amassed and descend as heir-looms in families, from mother to daughter. some of the jewels being very ancient, they constitute the riches of many families. in reverses of fortune, they are pledged, or turned into money to relieve immediate necessity. the upper tiers of ladies were the youngest, and least adorned, and consequently the prettiest. the ancient dowagers sat below as so many queens enthroned, challenging scrutiny and admiration. they were mostly of enormous corpulency, spreading out their naked feet and trousered legs of an enormous expanse. several dowagers seemed scarcely to be able to breathe from heat, and the plethora of their own well-fed and pampered flesh. we had now music, and several attempts were made to get up the indecent moorish dance, which, however, was forbidden as too vulgar for such fashionable jews, and honoured by the presence of europeans. not much pleased with this spectacle, i looked out of the window into the patio, or court-yard, where i saw a couple of butchers' boys slaughtering a bullock for the evening carousal. a number of boys were dipping their hands in the blood, and making with it the representation of an outspread hand on the doors, posts and walls, for the purpose of keeping off "the evil eye," (_el ojo maligno,_) and so ensuring good luck to the new married couple. i then mounted the house-top to see a game played by the young men. here, on the flat roof, was assembled a court, with a sultan sitting in the midst. various prisoners were tried and condemned. two or three of the greatest culprits were then secured and dragged down to the ladies, the officers of justice informing them that, if no one stepped forward to rescue them, it was the sultan's orders that they should be imprisoned. several young jewesses now clamourously demanded their release. it is understood that these compassionate maidens who, on such occasions, step forward to the rescue, and take one of the young men by the hand, are willing to accept of the same when it may hereafter be offered to them in marriage, so the contagion of wedding-feasts spreads, and one marriage makes many. i now proceed to the supper-table of the men, where the party ate and drank to gluttonous satiety. several rabbis were hired to chant, over the supper-table, prayers composed of portions of scripture, and legends of the talmud. the dinning noise of bad music, and horrible screaming, called singing, with the surfeit of the feast, laid me up for two days afterwards. the men supped by themselves, and the women of course were also apart. my host, anxious that i should see all, insisted upon my going to have a peep at the ladies whilst they were supping. unlike us men, who sat up round a table, because there were several europeans among us, the women lay sprawling and rolling on carpets and couches. in their own allotted apartments, these gorgeous daughters of israel looked still more huge and enormous, feasting almost to repletion, like so many princesses of the royal orgies of belshazzar. but this was a native wedding, and, of course, when we consider the education of these barbary women, we must expect, when they have drink like the men, white spirits for protracted hours until midnight, the proprieties of society are easily dispensed with. happily the class of women, who so kept up the feast, were all said to be married, the maidens having gone home with the bride. very different, indeed, was another distinguished wedding at which i had the honour of assisting, and which all the european consuls and their families attended, with the _élite_ of the society of mogador; this was the marriage of m. bittern, of gibraltar, with miss amram melek. the bridegroom was the portuguese consul, the bride, the daughter of the greatest jewish merchant of the south, and consequently the emperor's greatest and most honoured debtor. the celebration of this wedding lasted fourteen days. on the grand day, a ball and supper were given. all the moors of the town came to see the christians and their ladies dance. our musician, or fiddler, kept away from some petty pique, and we were accordingly reduced to the hard necessity of making use of a drum and whistling, both to keep up our spirits and serve up the quadrilles. we had, however, some good singing to make up for the disappointment. his excellency the governor intended to have honoured us with his presence, but he gave way to the remonstrance of an inflexible marabout, who declared it a deadly sin to attend the marriages of jews and christians. the marriage guests were of three or four several sets and sorts. there was the european coterie, the choicest and most select, graced by the presence of the bride; then the native aristocrats, and here were the gorgeous sultanas and fezan spouses; then the lesser stars, and the still more diminished. finally, the "blind, the lame, and the halt," surrounded the doors of the house in which the marriage-feast was held, receiving a portion of the good things of this life. the whole number of guests was not more than two hundred. plenty of european jewesses shone as bewitching stars at this wedding; but all _param_ to us poor christians. indeed, there is as little as no lovemaking, and match-making amongst the isolated nazarenes; for, out of a population of some fifty european families, there are only two marriageable christian ladies. the bride is frequently fetched by the bridegroom at midnight, when there is a cry made, "behold, the bridegroom cometh; go ye forth to meet him!" (matt xxv-- ). this ancient custom prevails most among the moors. once, whilst at nabal, in tunis, i was roused from my sleep at the dead of the night by wild cries, and the discharging of fire-arms, attended with a blaze of torches. the bridegroom was conveying his bride to his home. a crowd of the friends of the newly-married couple, followed the camel which carried the precious burden; all were admitted to the feast in the court-yard, and the doors were shut for the night. at the wedding of the lower classes of the jews, after dancing and music, there is always a collection made for the bride, or the musicians. on these occasions, the master of the ceremonies calls out the names of the donors as they contribute to the support of the festivities. i was somewhat taken by surprise to hear my name called out, bashador inglez (english ambassador) when i attended one of the weddings. but the fellow, making the announcement, attracted my attention more than his flattering compliment. he was dressed in moorish costume with an immense white turban folded round his head. i could not conceive the reason of a moor taking such interest in feasts of the jews. the secret soon transpired. he was a renegade, who had apostatized for the sake of marrying a pretty girl. his heart is always with his brethren, and the authorities good-naturedly allow him to be master of the ceremonies at these and other feasts, to preserve order, or rather to prevent the jews from being insulted by the mahometans. there are always a few jewish renegades in large moorish towns, just enough, i imagine, to convince the mahometans of the superiority of their religion to that of other nations; for whilst they obtain converts from both jews and christians, and make proselytes of scores of blacks, they never hear of apostates from islamism. the manner, however, in which these renegades abandon their religion, is no very evident proof of the divine authority of the prophet of mecca. here is an instance. a boy of this town ran away from his father, and prostrated himself before the governor, imploring him to make him a mussulman. the governor, actuated by the most rational and proper feeling, remarked to the boy, "you are a child, you have not arrived at years of discretion, you have not intellect enough to make a choice between two religions." the boy was kept confined one night, then beaten, and sent home in the morning. another case happened like this when the boy was admitted within the pale of islamism. jewish boys will often cry out when their fathers are correcting them, "i will turn mussulman!" a respectable jew, who related this to me, observed, "were i to hear any of my sons cry out in this manner, i would immediately give them a dose of poison, and finish them; i could not bear to see my children formed into mussulman devils." it really seems the vulgar opinion among the jews and moors of this place, that females have no souls. i asked many women themselves about the matter; they replied, "we don't care, if we have no souls." a rabbi observed, "if women bear children, make good wives, and live virtuously and chastely, they will go to heaven and enjoy an immortal existence; if not, after death, they will suffer annihilation." this appears to be the opinion of all the well-educated. but a jewish lady who heard my conversation with the rabbi, retorted with spirit: "whether i bear children or not, if my husband, or any man has a soul, i have one likewise, for are not all men born of us women?" all, however, are well satisfied with this life, whatever may happen in the next; male and female jews and mussulmen hold on their mutual career with the greatest tenacity. i made inquiries about suicides, and was told there were never any persons so foolish as to kill themselves. "we leave it to the emperor to take away a man's life, if such be the will of god!" and yet the moors are habitually a grave, dreamy and melancholy people. no doubt the light, buoyant atmosphere keeps them from falling into such a state of mental prostration as to induce suicide. i now found that many people looked upon me, in the language of the jewish renegade, as an ambassador, and some went so far as to say, "i can make war with the emperor if i like;" others persisted in saying "i am going in search of the murdered davidson." a man took the liberty of telling mr. elton. "a very mysterious christian has arrived from the sultan of the english. the governor hearing that he had ordered a pair of moorish shoes, sent word to the shoemaker to be as long about them as possible. this nazarene is going to disguise himself as one of us, in order to spy out our country." the moors are certainly a timid and suspicious race. they feel their weakness, and they are frightened of any christian who does not come to their country on commercial pursuits, as a sportsman, or in some directly intelligible character. chapter vii. interview with the governor of mogador, on the address of the anti-slavery society.--day and night side of the mission adventure.--phillips' application to be allowed to stand with his "shoes on" before the shereefian presence.--case of the french israelite, dannon, who was killed by the government.--order of the government against europeans smoking in the streets.--character of haj mousa, governor of mazagran.--talmudical of a sousee jew.--false weights amongst the mogador merchants.--rumours of war from the north, and levy of troops.--bragadocio of the governor.--mr. authoris's opinion on the state of the country.--moorish opinions on english abolition.--european slavery in southern morocco.--spanish captives and the london ironmongers company.--sentiments of barbary jews on slavery. i had an interview by special appointment with his excellency the governor of mogador regarding the address to be presented to the shereefian population from the anti-slavery society. i may at once premise that from what i heard of mr. hay's diplomatic powers and influence with the sultan, as well as the peculiar situation in which mr. willshire was placed, encumbered with great liabilities to his highness' custom-house, i already abandoned all hopes of success, and even thought myself fortunate in being able to obtain an interview with the governor of this commercial city. to have expected anything more, would have been extremely unreasonable on my part, under such circumstances. it will be as well if i give the address in this place. [ ] friday was appointed, being a quiet day, and the mussulman sabbath, when his excellency had little business on hand. the moors usually devote the morning of their sabbath to prayer, and afternoon to business and amusement. our party consisted of myself, mr. willshire, the british vice-consul, and mr. cohen as interpreter. about four o'clock p.m. we found the governor quite alone, telling his rosary of jet beads, squatting on his hams upon the floor of a little dirty shop, not more than eight feet by six in dimensions, with a ceiling of deep hanging cobwebs which had not been brushed away for a century. a piece of coarse matting was spread over the ground floor, and a sheepskin lay on it for his excellency to repose upon, but no furniture was to be seen. there was indeed an affectation of nakedness and desolation. pen and ink were placed by his side, and a number of official papers were strewn about, with some letters bearing the seal of the emperor. this shop (or reception room) was situate in an immense gloomy square; it was the only one open, and here were the only signs of life. the governor had forbidden any of his subjects to be present at the audience, unwilling and afraid lest any should hear a whisper of the question of abolition in the orthodox states of his imperial master. sidi hay elarby was an elderly man, with a placid and intelligent countenance. his manners throughout the interview were those of a perfect moorish gentleman. the governor could not be distinguished from the people by his dress. he wore a plain white turban, plain burnouse and a pair of common slippers. in such state, we found the the highest functionary of this important city. his excellency began by asking me how i was, and welcoming me to his country. i then handed a written speech to the interpreter, who, being a jew, pulled off his shoes, and crouching down before the governor, read to him paragraph by paragraph. each passage was further discussed and replied to by the governor with energy, nay with vehemence. the interview lasted till dark--nearly two hours. the following is a copy of the written speech, which was read for the purpose of introducing the address, and supplying topics of conversation. "may it please your excellency, the mission with which i am charged to this country is to persuade his imperial majesty, the emperor of morocco, to co-operate in any way which his imperial majesty may deem proper, with the people of england for the abolition of slavery. i am sent to the court of morocco by a society of english gentlemen, whose object is to persuade all men, in all parts of the world, to abolish the traffic in human beings, as a traffic contrary to the rights of men and the laws of god. "in undertaking this mission, these gentlemen applied to the government of our sovereign queen to furnish me with letters of recommendation to the british consuls of this country, the representatives of her majesty the queen of england. copies of these letters are in the possession of mr. willshire. those letters express strong sympathy for the objects of the mission, and require the consuls to give me their fullest protection; and so far, our gracious queen, the government, and the english people, are all agreed that it is a good thing to address his imperial majesty the emperor of morocco, to co-operate with and to assist them in putting down the traffic in slavery in every part of the world. "if the government of the queen had thought that they should recommend to your excellency and your royal master anything contrary to your religion, they could not have given me letters of introduction to their consuls in this country. rest assured that the english people believe it to be agreeable to the doctrines and precepts of all religions to abolish the traffic in human flesh and blood. "i pray, therefore, your excellency to receive the petition, of which i am the bearer, from the society of english gentlemen. our government have already spent three hundred millions of dollars, the money of the people of england, to destroy the traffic in human beings; every day our government continues to spend vast sums, adding to this enormous amount for the same object of humanity. i am sure that, if your imperial master value the friendship of england and the british government, if it be a politic and good thing for morocco to be allied with the most powerful christian nation in the world, the most certain way to conciliate and found this alliance on a durable basis, is to cooperate with the people of england for the abolition of the traffic in slaves, and graciously to receive this address from the society of abolitionists in london. "we come not to your excellency with force of arms--this could not be just; we use only moral persuasion. our religion disapproves of compulsion in all such affairs. but i can assure your excellency that the english people will never cease, though all nations be against them, as long as god almighty holds them up as a people, to endeavour in every possible way, to persuade and convince the world that the traffic in human beings is a great crime." the governor replied in these terms: "your mission is against our religion, i cannot entertain it or think of it, in any way whatever. if, in other countries, the traffic in slaves is contrary to the religion of those countries, in this it is not; here it is lawful for us to buy and sell slaves. mahomet, our prophet, has authorized us to do this; but, at the same time, our slaves must be fed and clothed like ourselves. if you wish a proof of this, you can go and look at my slaves," (pointing to his house). "to be holders of slaves, is a merit with us. "your address ought to come directly from your government, from your queen to our sultan. it is not enough that it is recommended by your government. the european sovereigns are accustomed to act by the advice of their counsellors and ministers; but the sultan of morocco always acts without advice or councils. [ ] if the address had come from the queen, it would have been received, and an answer would have been returned accordingly. then if your government had been offended at the answer of my master not agreeing with their opinion, they could have taken their own satisfaction in any way they might have thought proper (or have made war on us). "the money which you say the people of england have spent for the suppression of the slave trade, has been, according to our opinion and religion, misspent, and employed to destroy a system of which we approve, and consider lawful. still, i hope god will give your country more money to spend, and in abundance. "the english people and the people of morocco have been, from time immemorial, great friends, proofs of which i can give you. the guns that we get from other christian nations, are never so good as those we get from england. besides, we always give the english whatever they ask for. when the french were at war with spain and wished to take ceutra from her, the english demanded from our sultan, a small island near ceutra, to prevent the french from landing and seizing ceutra. to this request, my sultan acceded; and to show you that the english are our particular friends, the english gave the island back to us when the war was at an end." mr. willshire now endeavoured to present the address of the anti-slavery society, praying his excellency to accept it. on which, the governor continued with his usual vivacity, "no; i am sorry i cannot accept it; if i do, the sultan must also, for now i act as the sultan. indeed, i dare not receive the address, nor write to our lord [ ] about it. nor can i look at it, for in case the sultan asks me about it, i must swear that i have not touched nor seen the address. if i look at it, and then say i did not look at it, the sultan will order my tongue to be cut off from the roof of my mouth. "and further, o consul! o stranger! were our lord to agree with your society, and abolish the traffic in slaves throughout his dominions, all the people would rise up against him in revolt, and the sultan would be the first to have his head cut off. "therefore, as a good and wise man, o stranger--which you must be, or you would not be entrusted with this mission--comply with the orders of the sultan's message, given to you by me and your consul. "any thing which you want for yourself or your private use, i will give it you, even to the whole of this city of mogador. but for myself i cannot comply with the prayers of the address, or receive it from your own or the consul's hands." the message of the sultan alluded to, was in substance to give up the attempt of abolishing slavery in morocco, and not to think of going to the south, but to return at once to england. the governor was greatly pleased with the sound of his own voice, and the skill of his argumentations, and has the character of being a loquacious and reasoning diplomatist. this was the public or day side of the mission; there was also the night side; for where the curiosity of the moor is excited, it must be gratified, by fair or other means. it was not surprising, therefore, that the wily shereef should wish to know what this address of an english society was, or could be; and if possible to obtain a copy, although for the sake of the people it was found necessary to repudiate altogether its acceptance. accordingly, the next day, cohen told me a friend of the emperor's was anxious to have some conversation with me, and he begged me to take with me the address. it was past ten at night, when alone, with my moorish guide, i found myself treading the long narrow streets of mogador. the wind howled and the watch-dogs barked; it was so dark that we could scarcely grope our way, no human being was about; we went up one street and down another, stealing along our way; as if on some house-breaking expedition; and i began to feel suspicious, fearing a trap might be laid for me. still, i had confidence in the honour of the moors, i said to my guide. "when shall we reach your master's?" _guide_.--"god knows; be quiet!" we continued going through street after street. it was now bitter cold, and a few drops of rain fell from the cutting wing of the north wind. to my guide again. "where is the house?" _guide_.--"follow me, don't talk!" after we had passed other streets, "is this the street?" _guide_.--"eskut! (hold your tongue)." we now entered a low dilapidated gateway, with a broken panelled door, groaning on its hinges. again i questioned my guide. "who lives here?" _guide_.--"mahboul ingleez (mad englishman) hold your tongue! do you think we mussulmans will eat you?" we passed through several court-yards, by the aid of a lantern, which the guide found in a corner, and then entered a corridor. here he grasped me by the arm, in such wise as made me believe i was about to have my head thrust through a bowstring. i ejaculated; "allah akbar! mercy upon us!" blending arabic and english in my fright, and struggling, fell with the guide against the door at the end of the passage with a considerable crash. a voice was heard from within. "_ashbeek_ (what's the matter?)" my guide returned, "_hale_ (open)." a huge negro now laid hold of me, and pulled me up a pair of narrow stairs which led to a species of loft, in a detached portion of the house. the case containing the address fell out of my hands, and was picked up by the guide. another apartment within the loft was now opened, shewing, through a dim and indistinct light, a venerable old moor, sitting in the midst of heaps of papers and books, like a midnight astrologer, or a secret magician. on our entrance, the solitary moor raised his eyes, quietly, and said faintly, "where is it?" my guide now rushed in, began talking volubly, and made this harangue, thinking, however, i could not understand him from the rapidity with which he declaimed. "sidi," he said, "this christian is a frightened fool--and a _baheen_ (ass)--i had the greatest trouble to get him here--he was frightened out of himself--and now allah! allah! i have to take him back again." i received the compliment in silence, and endeavoured to recover my tranquillity. but i could not help remarking the contrast between my noisy and agitated guide, and the grave manner and immoveable quietness of the recluse. the guide then handed him "the address," and the cid opened the box or case with extreme caution, as if it had contained some mysterious spell. the cid now looked up for a moment at the big negro, who decamped instantly and returned with a teapot and two cups. the two cups were then filled with tea, one of which was presented to me, but i had some hesitation about drinking it. the cid, looked up at me with a quiet smile, and gently muttered "_eshrub_! (drink,") i drank the tea and then waited anxiously to know what was coming next. the cid continued to unroll the address. when this was done, he rolled it up and again unrolled it, and stared at its roman characters. he eyed the seal and ejaculated, "_haram_!" to himself! alluding, i suppose, to the figure of the slave in chains, it being prohibited to make figures. the cid now paused a moment, then looked at me again, and finally turning to the guide said, "_imshee el-ghudwah_ (go to-morrow, i'll see.)" the guide now grasped me again by the hand, scarcely allowing me to bow a good night to the cid, and led me back to my lodgings, where i arrived at midnight. when i awoke in the morning, i really imagined i had been dreaming an ugly dream, until one of the english jews called, and said he was making a translation of the address to be dispatched to the emperor at morocco, and afterwards he would bring the address back. the address was returned to me about a week afterwards, but whether an arabic translation was ever sent to the sultan, i know no more than the reader. mr. phillips has applied to the british vice-consul to know whether, in case of his going up to morocco to carry a present for the belgium merchants, here, phillips, being a jew, will be obliged to pull off his shoes, which would be depriving him of the rights of british-born subjects, who stand with their shoes on in the shereefian presence. the consul says he cannot answer the question, and must send a dispatch to mr. hay. mr. willshire complimented phillips: "ah phillips, you are always proposing to me some knotty question. you profoundly perplex the mind of mr. consul-general hay." this leads me to notice the affecting case of the israelite, darmon, at one time the french vice-consul at mazagran. this young darmon was fond of moorish women, and always intriguing with them. hay mousa, governor of mazagran, reported him to the emperor, and his highness sent orders to have him decapitated. it was said afterwards by the maroquine government, that "the order was merely to bring him to morocco, and that, when being conveyed as prisoner, and after attempting to run away, the soldiers of his escort shot him." the moorish government also pretend that darmon attempted first to shoot the guards who shot him, in self-defence. with regard to his being a french consul, it is said by the french government, that he was not their consul at the time, having resigned. it appears besides that members of his family are french, and others moorish subjects. indeed, these mauro-european jews give great troubles to the consuls; the various persons of a single family being often under the protection of three or four consuls. it will thus be seen how full of difficulties was this darmon affair, and what a door it opened to tedious moorish diplomacy. the french government arranged ultimately with the sultan a compromise, a sum of money being paid to the murdered man's family, and the governor of mazagran was dismissed. when young darmon fell into disgrace, his father, one of the imperial merchants, was at morocco. the father inquired of the minister whether the sultan would receive his present now his son had fallen into disgrace. the cruelly avaricious tyrant deigned to accept it of the father it is said, at the very moment when the order to decapitate his son had been sent to mazagran. no doubt it was a barbarous action, but the extreme imprudence of the young man provoked the government to extremities. the court was so irritated at the time, that it even issued an order to place all jews, natives, foreigners, or europeans upon the same level of exposure to moorish insult and oppression. speaking to mr. willshire about this order, he smilingly observed: "say nothing, it will soon be forgotten." the government never intended to carry it out. years ago, the emperor gave orders that jews coming from european countries should be placed on the same footing as native jews, but the imperial edicts were unnoticed. a curious order was given about smoking some time ago in this city. it was represented to the governor that during ramadan, kafer-nazarenes went about smoking, occasioning the faithful to sniff up the smoke, and so break the holy fast. the christians were likewise accused of going near the mosques to fill them with filthy smoke. the governor, in a circular, begged of the consuls to prohibit their countrymen, or "subjects," from smoking in the streets. the french consul considering this a police regulation, summoned together the french subjects, and begged of them to comply with the non-smoking order. mr. willshire took no notice of the affair, knowing it would soon pass over. mr, willshire is a veteran in morocco, and understands the genius of its government. he considers the _laissez faire_ system the very best, and this is all very well, provided the sultan respects the heads of her majesty's subjects. haj mousa, governor of mazagran, who was mixed up with the darmon affair, deserves notice from his brutal ferocity towards europeans. with great difficulty and damage to their lives, europeans reside in mazagran, and it is not therefore surprising that the imprudent darmon fell into the clutches of this provincial tyrant, who probably ensnared him as a prey. up to the time of this affair, haj mousa had been an irremoveable governor. the sultan himself never attempted to displace him, although he had committed, from time to time, the greatest enormities. other governors had been bled, fleeced, and impaled over and over again; but the caitiff, haj, always remained in possession of the fruits of his tyranny. the reason for this tolerant conduct of the emperor towards him is, that when muley abd errahman was in difficulties and obliged to fly for his life, in the convulsions previous to his reign, haj mousa sent the young prince a mule and thirty ducats; with this, the prince was enabled to escape, and he saved his life to be afterwards proclaimed meer-el-moumeneen. on receiving the mule and money, he exclaimed in a transport of gratitude to the governor of mazagran, "i will never forget you!" it is unfortunate the good faith of the emperor's word has been so deplorably abused by this tyrant, for it is considered certain, that though temporarily removed from mazagran, he will return, or be made governor of another city. a sous jew called upon me one day, who is well acquainted with the shelouh or, berber of the south. on asking if he would make a translation of the book of genesis from hebrew into shelouh, he replied: "no, i cannot. in the first place, the emperor would cut off my head for doing such a thing; and, again, it would be a sin to convert the holy hebrew character into such a language of infidels." we continued our discussion on a more practical subject. _traveller_ (to the jew)--"i am told that among you, jews of morocco, it is a merit to rob us christians and the moors. your young children are even praised by their mothers if they commit a theft without being found out: [ ] is this right?" _the jew_.--"you are all _goyeem_ [ ] (gentiles), but it is not true that we rob you, christians. if we rob mussulmen, it's because they rob us first." the case really is, the jews are literally being robbed every day by the moors one way or the other, and, if the people do not rob them, the constituted authorities continue to make exactions under every pretence. i am inclined, nevertheless, to think, without prejudice, that it is a received maxim with _all native_ barbary jews, "to rob unbelievers, moors and christians, when you can do so _safely_." this was the opinion which a very respectable european jew, resident in tunis, entertained of his brethren. at the same time, ihere are numerous exceptions. many of the lower classes of moors likewise, think there is little or no harm in robbing jews and blacks, that is, all who are infidels and christians. i may mention, in connection with the above, the system of false-weights, which is an enormous scandal to this great commercial city. it appears that almost every tradesman, and every imperial merchant have two sets of weights, one to buy and another to sell with. a merchant once had the impudence to cry out to his clerk when weighing, "oh, you are wrong, these are my _selling_ weights; bring me my _buying_ weights. am i not buying?" a jew, once purchasing oil from a poor arab, carried his villainy so far as actually to make his tare and tret weigh more than the skin-bag when full of oil, and coolly told the amazed arab he had no money to give him for the value received. "give me back my oil!" cried the arab. at this the audacious jew retorted, "there is none!" a european merchant interfered, and saved the jew from the bastinado he so richly deserved. a kady hearing of these abominations, took upon himself to begin a reform, and went about examining weights. for his honest pains, and, in the midst of his work of reform, the officious functionary received an order from the sultan, enjoining him to cease his interference, and condemning him, as a punishment for his over-righteousness, "_to teach twelve little boys to read every day, and not to sit at his own door for the space of one year_." so unthankful, so odious is the task of reforming in morocco and many other countries. this account of the abominable system of two kinds of weights, i derived from most unquestionable authority, otherwise i could not have given credit to the statement. there were incessant rumours of war from the north. the emperor had got himself into difficulties with spain and france. orders had been sent down to reinforce this garrison and that of aghadir. the day before, the governor, calling his troops before him, did not shew his usual good sense and prudence. he thus harangued them:--"now, let those who want new arms come and take them, and bring back the old ones. let all have courage, and fear not the christians; fear not, women and children!" the movement of troops was part of a general measure, extending to all the coasts, and was, in fact, a review _en masse_ of the disposable forces throughout the empire. eighty thousand men were expected in this city or the suburbs. the sultan was reported to be on the march towards the north with an army of , men. the sultan did not expect to make use of his new levies, but the policy of the thing was good. his highness is evidently a pacific ruler, he has but few regular troops, and he pays them badly. his predecessor had a large army and paid them well. great discontent prevailed among the soldiers, and the emperor never feels himself secure on his throne. this apparent crusade against the infidels has no doubt tended to make him popular, and to consolidate his power. true, it excited the tribes of the interior against the christians, but it was better to inflame them against the christians than to lose his own throne. the french consul waited upon the governor for explanations about the movements of the troops. his excellency observed, "i am ordered by my sultan to defend this city against all assailants, and i shall do so till i am buried beneath its ruins. though all the coast-cities were captured, mogador should never be surrendered." some of the credulous moors said, "the shereefs will come from tafilet, led on by our lord mahomet, and destroy all the cursed nazarenes. the sheerefs will fire against the french leaden balls, and silver balls." another observed to me, "if a fleet should come here, it will be immediately sunk, because our sultan has ordered every ball to hit, and none to miss." this is not unlike what a turk of tripoli once said to me about the grand signor and his late reforms. "the turks will soon be civilized, because the sultan has given an order for all the turks to be civilized." the large guns of the forts were practised, and the guns of the grand battery loaded. the infantry continued to practise on the beach of the port: their manoeuvres were very uncouth and disorderly, they merely moved backwards and forwards in lines of two deep. the french consul, monsieur jorelle, discontinued his usual promenade, to prevent his being insulted, and so to avoid the the painful necessity of demanding satisfaction. mr. willshire, being well known to the mogador population, had not so much to fear. here is the advantage of a long residence in a country. the french government lose by the frequent changing of their consuls. still, m. jorelle was right in not exposing himself to the mob, or the wild levies who had come from their mountains. the fault of the governor was, in exciting the warlike fanaticism of the tribes of the interior against the christians, which he ought to have known the city authorities might have extreme difficulty in keeping within bounds. no european could pass the gates of the city without being spat upon, and cursed by the barbarous berbers. i paid a visit to m. authoris, the belgium merchant, and the only european trader carrying on business independently of the emperor. he represented the commerce of the country to be in a most deplorable condition. "there is now nothing to buy or sell on which there is a gain of one per cent. the improvidence of the people is so great that, should one harvest fail, inevitable famine would be the result, there not being a single bushel of grain more in the country than is required for daily consumption. nor will the people avail themselves of any opportunity of purchasing a thing cheap when it is cheap; they simply provide for their hourly wants. they act in the literal sense of 'take no thought for the morrow, but let the morrow take care of itself.' as to the jews, they feast one day and fast the next." with regard to the excitement then existing, m. authoris observed. "this government, on hearing rumours of spanish and french expeditions against the country, must naturally make use of what power it has, the holy war power, to excite the people in their own defence. the moors cannot discriminate gazette intelligence. when a worthless newspaper mentions an expedition being fitted out against morocco, the emperor immediately sees a fleet of ships within sight of his ports, and hears the reports of bombarding cannon." the raw levies of shedmah and hhaha continued to enter the town, but only a small number at a time, lest they should alarm the inhabitants. they went about, peeping into houses, and wherever a door was open they would walk in, staring with a wild curiosity. i had some conversation with my moorish friends respecting the abolition of slavery. an old doctor observed, "the english are not more humane than other nations, but god has decreed that they should destroy the slave-trade among the christians. this, however, is no praise to them, for they could not resist acting according to the will and mind of god. as for the mussulmen, what they do is for the benefit of slaves, especially females, who, one and all, are doomed to death; [ ] but, when purchased by the slave-dealers, their lives are spared, and they are made true believers. still, the mussulmen would assist the english in destroying the ships which carry slaves;" (as if the moors had any fleet). the number of slaves in this city is from eight hundred to one thousand. it is difficult to ascertain any thing like the exact number, the opulent moors having many negress slaves, with whom they live in a state of concubinage. young, rich, and fashionable moors, i was told for the first time in a mahommedan country, have become disgusted with the old habit of managing and taking a wife early, and adopt the immoral practice of buying female slaves, by which they avoid, as they say, the trouble and expense of marrying females of their own rank in moorish society. a good mussulman must however, marry once in his life. slaves are imported viâ wadnoun from timbuctoo and soudan, and even from the western coast. negroes of the timbuctoo market are more esteemed than those of guinea, being a stronger and more laborious race. the common price of a slave in mogador is from to ducats; one day a beautiful african girl, freshly exported from the interior, was sold for ducats, or about £ sterling. this is considered an extraordinary high price. slaves are sold by criers about the streets in morocco, and most towns, and not in bazaars, as in the east. but the most remarkable feature of slavery in this part of the world, is the christian or european slavery carried further south, in the regions extending on the line of coast below wadnoun, and the adjacent sahara. something like a regular system of christian slavery is there going on, whilst its head-quarters are not more than five or six days' journey from this residence of the european consuls. this white slavery consists in seizing shipwrecked sailors, numbers being fishermen from the canary islands. we know little about these poor captives, although we are so near wadnoun, and are continually trading with sous and this country. mr. davidson casually mentions them in his journal. it is a settled and religious practice of merchants to keep europeans ignorant of the south and the desert; we only hear of these captives now and then, when one escapes, and after being bought and sold by a hundred different masters, is fortunate enough to be redeemed; of his companions in shipwreck, the escaped captive rarely knows anything. they are gone: they are either drowned near the coast, plundered and massacred, or carried far away into the desert, and perhaps for ever. formerly vessels navigated through the channel (if it may be so called) of the canary islands and the wadnoun coast, by which they often got on shoal water, and were cast away; in this manner, whites were enslaved. happily now, masters of vessels have become acquainted with this dangerous coast. they pass to the east of the canaries, and fewer vessels are shipwrecked hereabouts. the spanish fishermen of the canaries are chiefly now made captives. these poor people are either seized when becalmed near the coast, or captured on being cast on shore by the furious trade-winds, which sweep these desolate shores (often nine months out of twelve) and carry utter destruction with them. the wild and wandering bedouins in bad weather, with the true storm scent of the wrecker, patiently watch the coasts, pouncing on their prey, with the voracity of the vulture, as it is thrown up from the deep, along the inhospitable shore. having got the shipwrecked men in their possession, they act with the cunning and avarice of slave-dealers, and are aided by the still craftier jews, who always render it very difficult for the consular agents to redeem these unhappy captives. for although a jew, by the mahometan law, cannot purchase slaves, yet by buying them-through mussulmen, who share in the profits, from the arabs who first seized the captives, the slaves are frequently kept back months in the desert, being parted from one another before they can be ransomed. sometimes the arabs alluringly question their captives to see if they understand any mechanical arts, which are greatly esteemed, being very useful in these almost tenantless regions; and should they discover that they do, they carry them away into hopeless captivity, through the wilds of the desert, refusing to sell them at any price or offer of ransom. but those who cannot, or will not make themselves useful, are generally redeemed by the mogador consuls, should they escape being massacred in the quarrels of the arabs for the booty when they are first captured. there is, at the present time, a spanish fisherman near wadnoun, waiting to be redeemed. the arab sheikh who holds him, demands two hundred dollars for his redemption. mr. wiltshire objects to the price, as being too much. besides this, he is afraid to advance any money for a spanish captive's release, lest it should never be refunded. the spanish government, representing a people so chivalrous in bygone times, and so proud of their ancient exploits over the moors of this very country, are not now-a-days over zealous in redeeming their countrymen held in bondage by these people. mr. willshire ransomed a spanish boy, and waited several years before he could get this imbecile government to refund the money. espartero at last, however, interfered authoritatively for the repayment to our generous consul. in the present case of the poor fisherman, the captive spaniard lingers between hope and fear, his only protection being the avarice of his master, who, like all slave-dealers, is willing to take care of him as he takes care of his horse. he is one out of four, the other three having been massacred by the arabs, or perished on the coast. but, at present, we know nothing certain of this, although but a few days' journey from the scene where the disaster took place--so miserable are our means of information for enabling us to put an end to this system of christian slavery. certainly some representations should be made to the emperor, who pretends to have jurisdiction over wadnoun, and the adjacent countries, that these captives may be delivered up to the consuls of mogador. a fair remuneration might be given to the persons bringing them safely to this town. i am told, the ironmongers' company of london have at their disposal funds for the liberation of such british captives as are enslaved in southern morocco. this money was left by a merchant who himself was made a slave there; and since that time, owing to the few british captives redeemed, it has increased to an enormous amount. not knowing what to do with the money, the company, it is said, are about to petition parliament to build a school with a portion; but i should suggest that it would be more in accordance with the original object, and declared intention of the benevolent, donor, were this large surplus fund devoted to the redemption of all other christian captives, of whatever nation or country. because two hundred dollars are not forthcoming which could easily be supplied from the ironmongers' company's funds, a poor spaniard is condemned to a cruel and hopeless slavery, wandering in the wilds of the great african wilderness. it is impossible to tell the number of christian slaves who perish in the south of morocco. many of the consular agents of this city are as ignorant of the country as persons residing in london. this subject absolutely demands the attention of the governments of europe. our humanity and civilization are in question. the opinions of the jews here, are the same as those of american slave-holders, with this slight difference, that they consider it right to make slaves of white men and europeans, as well as of black men, negroes, and africans, in which idea they are more consistent than their yankee men-selling brethren. as there are many barbary jews at mogador, more or less under british protection, i took the liberty of reminding them of their liabilities as british subjects, by circulating among them copies of lord brougham's act. i had some conversation with rabbi-el melek and other jews about the question of abolition, _traveller_.--"what is the opinion of the jews of this country on the matter of slavery?" _rabbi-el-melek._--"i will show you," (taking the hebrew bible he read) "'cursed be canaan; a servant of servants shall he be unto his brethren.'" _traveller._--"admitting the curse pronounced here was right, that ham and canaan were the progenitors of the african negroes, and that the curse was to be extended to all generations of africa--are these reasons why the all-merciful deity will hold man guiltless who enslaves and maltreats poor africans? now, the jews have been dispersed all over the world, and maltreated, if not enslaved, by both christians and mahometans (as now) according to prophecy, but will god hold us guiltless for persecuting or maltreating you, jews?" _the rabbi_.--"but we are the slaves of god, not of you christians, and besides, we are commanded to treat well our slaves in the scriptures." here he quoted many passages from the pentateuch. then followed a desultory conversation, some asserting "that inasmuch as the slavery of the whites was permitted by god, how much more right had they to enslave blacks who were the servants of servants!" others even added, "if we were sovereigns of morocco, we should make slaves of both mahometans and christians." this indeed is the genuine feeling of barbary jews; oppression begets oppression, and wrong begets revenge. another observed, "if you ask me what i think as a british subject, and not as a jew, i will give you my opinion against slavery." such distinctions in morals are not easily admissable, but the jews there are acute enough to make them, and are as good jesuits as those of rome. some cited the cavtivity of joseph us, as a reason for carrying on the slave-trade. on another occasion, i had a conversation with hassan yousef, the high priest, or archbishop, as captain phillips calls him. the chief priest acknowledged that he who stole a man, whether white or black, was condemned to death, according to the fair interpretation of the mosaic law. he and all jews were much astonished at the tenor of lord brougham's act, and got not a little frightened; for all the merchants of mogador, christians and jews, more or less aid and abet the slave-trade, all having connections with slave-dealers. at length, our jewish archbishop opined. "well, well, it is better now, since the christians have put down slavery in most of their countries, that we jews should follow their example." it would be useful, and might subserve the cause of civilization, were the jews of europe to take some means of enlightening their brethren of north africa on the question of slavery. the israelites, who have suffered so much from slavery and oppression, after becoming free themselves, should endeavour to emancipate those who are still in the chains of bondage. the hhaha levies were about to return to their country; the disposable force of this province is about , . the troops from shedma were to come in after the departure of those of hhaha. government were afraid to bring both together, lest they should fight among themselves. alluding to the quarrel of their sultan with the french, these hostile tribes mutter to each other, "we must kill our own french first;" that is to say their own "hereditary enemies." i went out to see the two levies. these tribes had a singularly wild and savage aspect, with only a blanket to cover them, which they wrap round and round their bodies, having neither caps on their heads, nor shoes on their feet. they were greatly excited against the christians, owing to the foolish conduct of the moorish authorities. the lawless bands spat at me, and every european passing by them, screaming with threatening gestures, "god curse you! infidels." these semi-savages, called out for the defence of the empire, were merely armed with a bad gun or matchlock; some had only knives and clubs. such levies are certainly more fit to pillage the emperor's coast-towns than to defend his territory against the foreign enemy. these poor tribes bring their own provisions, a little barley meal, and olive or argan-oil, or liquid butter; on this being exhausted, they could stay no longer, for government supplies them with nothing but bad matchlocks. they were loud in their complaint on not receiving any nations, and threatened to join the french nazarenes when they arrived. his excellency the governor was very anxious to get rid of them, which was not at all surprising. so avaricious is the emperor, that when he can, he makes the rich moors supply arms for their poorer brethren, instead of furnishing them from government depôts. and this he insists upon as a point of religion. the governor called upon rich moors to supply the poor with arms. a friend of mine who understands shelouh as well as arabic, overheard a characteristic quarrel between a shedma man and a hhaha man. the shedma people, or inhabitants of the plains, mostly speak arabic, those of the mountains, shelouh, which difference of language embitters their quarrels, and alienates them from one another. shedma man.--"dog! you have put your hands of the devil into my bag of barley." hhaha man.--"dog and jew, you lie!" shedma man.--"jew and frenchman! there's some one now in your wife's tent." hhaha man.--"religion of the frenchman! your mother has been dishonoured a thousand times." the maternal honour is the dearest of things amongst these semi-barbarians. at the mention of this libel on his mother, the shedma fellow rushed at the hhaha man, seizing him by the throat, and unsheathed a dirk to plunge into his bowels. the scuffle fortunately excited the instant attention of a group of arabs close by, who, securing both, carried them before the shiekh; who, without hearing the subject of the quarrel, bastinadoed them both with his own hand. but he was the hhaha sheikh, and the shedma sheikh complained to the governor of his man having been bastinadoed by the other sheikh. the governor dismissed them, each threatening the other with due vengeance. it is time to give some account of mogador. we sometimes spell the name with an e, mogadore, the inhabitants call their town _shweerah_. square, [ ] in allusion to its beauty, for it is the only town constructed altogether on geometrical principles throughout morocco. its form, however, is really a triangle. mogador is a modern city, having been built in the year of our era, by the sultan sidi mohammed, under the direction of a french engineer of the name of cornut, who was assisted by spanish renegades. the object of sidi mahommed was to found a central emporium of the commerce of the empire, and a port for the southern capital (morocco). this town belongs to the province of hhaha, whose berber tribes are its natural defenders. the site is a sandy beach with a rocky foundation or a base on the sea, forming a peninsula, and is supposed to be the ancient erythraea. the houses are regularly built, with streets in direct lines, extremely convenient though somewhat narrow. the residences of the consuls and european merchants are elegant and spacious. there is a large market-place, which, on days when the market is not held, furnishes a splendid parade, or "corso" for exercising cavalry. the city is divided into two parts; one division contains the citadel, the public offices, the residence of the governor, and several houses occupied by european consuls and merchants, which are all the property of the sultan; and the other is the space occupied by the houses of the moors and jews. the jews have a quarter or _willah_ to themselves, which is locked up during the night, the key being kept by the police. nevertheless, several jews, especially imperial traders, are allowed to occupy houses in the moorish quarter or citadel portion of mogador, with the christian merchants. both quarters are surrounded by walls, not very thick or high, but which are a sufficient protection, against the depredations of the mountaineers, or arabs of the plain. the port is formed by a curve in the land and the isle of mogador, which is about two miles from the mainland. this isle, on the verge of the ocean, contains some little forts and a mosque, and its marabout shrines sparkle in the sun. it is a place of exile for political offenders. when the french landed, at the bombardment of mogador, they released fifty or sixty state prisoners, some of whom had been bashaws, or ministers of this and former reigns. the isle, however, is finely situate off the atlantic, fanned and swept by healthy gales, and the prisoners suffer only seclusion from the continent. the exiles never attempt to escape, but quietly submit to their destiny. in the port, there are only ten or twelve feet of water at ebb tide, so that large vessels cannot enter, but must lie at anchor a mile and a half off the western battery, which extends along the north-western side of the port. such vessels do not lie there except in the summer months, and then with extreme caution, being, as they are, right off in the atlantic, on one of its most dangerous coasts. there are some tolerable batteries, but they cannot long resist a european bombardment, which was demonstrated by the french. colonel keating says, "as far as parapets, ramparts, embrasures, cavaliers, batteries, and casemates constitute a fortress, this town is one; but the walls are flimsy, the cavaliers do not command, the batteries do not flash, and the casemates are not bomb-proof. the embrasures are so close that not one in three upon the ramparts could be worked, if they were mounted, which they are not. all their guns, which have been only twelve months here, are already in very bad order, from exposure to the climate and surf. the casemates are so damp, that their interior is covered constantly with a thick nitrous incrustation." nevertheless, the moors have such a superstitious veneration for fortifications built by a parcel of renegades, that they will not permit christians to walk on these ramparts. but what is most unfortunate for the defence of mogador, the water could be instantly cut off by destroying its aqueduct. the population is between thirteen and fifteen thousand souls, including four thousand jews, and fifty christians, who carry on an important commerce, principally with london and marseilles. excepting tangier, it is now the only port which carries on uninterrupted commercial relations with europe. mogador is situate in the midst of shifting sand-hills, that separate it from the cultivated parts of the country, which are distant from four to tweleve miles. these sands have an extraordinary appearance on returning from the interior; they look like huge pyramidal batteries raised round the suburbs of the city for its defence. the inhabitants are supplied with water by means of an aqueduct, fed by the little river, or rill of wai elghored, two miles distant south. the climate hereabouts is extremely salubrious, the rocky sandy site of the city being removed from all marshes or low lands, which produce pestiferous miasma or fever-exhaling vegetation. rarely does it rain, but the whole tract of the adjoining country, between the atlas and the sea, is tempered on the one side by the loftiest ranges of that mountain, and on the other, by the north-east trade winds, blowing continually. mogador is in lat. ° ' " n., and long. ° ' " w. the environs offer nothing but desolate sands, except some gardens for growing a few vegetables, and a sprinkling of flowers, which, by dint of perseverance, have been planted in the sand of the sea-shore. this is a remarkable instance of human culture turning the most hopelessly sterile portions of the world to account. these sands of mogador are only a portion of a vast and almost interminable link, which girdles the north-western coast of the african continent, and is only broken in upon at short intervals, from morocco to senegal, like a shifting, heaving, and ever-varying rampart against the aggressions of the ocean. both wind and sea have probably equally contributed to the formation of this vast belt of shifting sands. the distance from tangier to mogador, by ordinary courier, is twelve days, but no traveller could be expected to perform the journey in less than twenty days. other courier distances are as follows: tangier to rabat days rabat to fez days fez to mickas hours rabat to morocco days mogador to morocco ½ days mogador to santa cruz days mogador to wadnoun days santa cruz to teradant ½ days a notice of the interesting, though now abandoned part of aghadir, may not be out place here. aghadir, (called also agheer and by the portuguese, santa cruz) means in berber "walls." it is the gurt luessem of leo africanus. the town is small, but strong, and well fortified, and is situate upon the top of a high and abrupt rock, not far from the promontory of gheer, which is the western termination of the atlas, and where it dips into or strikes the ocean. on the south, close by, is the river sous, and formerly aghadir was the capital of this province. aghadir has a spacious and most secure port, which is the last port southwards on the atlantic. indeed, this bay is the finest roadstead in the whole empire. mr. jackson says, that during his residence at aghadir of three years, not a single ship was lost or injured. the principal battery of aghadir, a place equally strong by nature and art, is half way down the western declivity of the mountain, and was originally intended to protect a fine spring of water close to the sea. this fort also commands the approaches to the town, both from the north and the south, and the shipping in the bay. santa cruz was converted from a fisherman's settlement into a city, and was fortified by the portuguese in . muley hamed el-hassan besieged it in with an army of fifty thousand men, and owing to the accident of a powder-magazine blowing up and making a breach, the sultan forced an entrance, to the astonishment of the portuguese, who were all slaughtered. in the reign of muley ismail, santa cruz was the centre of an extensive commerce carried on between europe and the remotest regions of africa, which obtained for it the name of bab-el-soudan, (gate of soudan.) the inhabitants became rich and powerful, and, as a consequence which so frequently happens to both the civilized and the barbarian, insolent and rebellious. in , sidi mohammed was obliged to march out against the town to crush a rebellion; and this done with great slaughter, he ordered all the european merchants to quit the place and establish themselves at mogador. the father of this prince had sworn vengeance against the haughty city, but died without accomplishing his sanguinary threats. the son, however, did the work of blood, so faithful to vows of evil and violence is man. since that period, aghadir has dwindled down to nothing, six hundred inhabitants, and others say only one hundred and fifty. the greater part of these are jews, who have the finest women in all the country. mr. davidson says the population of aghadir is forty-seven mohammedans, and sixty-two jews. at fonte, the port, are about two hundred moors. were any european power to conquer morocco, aghadir would certainy be re-established as the centre of the commerce in the south. to a maritime nation like england, the repair and re-opening of its fine port would be the rst consideration, and doubtless a lucrative and extensive commerce could be established between aghadir and timbuctoo. the city is seven leagues south of cape gheer, in latitude ° '. i shall now give some further details illustrative of the state of negro slavery. the fniperor has an entire quarter of the city of morocco appropriated for his own slaves, the number of whom, in different parts of the empire, amounts to upwards of sixty thousand. this is his, the lion's share. his imperial highness, who was accepting presents from various governors, lately received five hundred slaves from the sheikh of taradant. the trading moors, believing me to be sent by the british government to purchase and liberate all their slaves, have calculated the whole of the slaves in morocco to be worth twenty-seven millions of dollars. a moor observed, "i hope to see any calamity befall the country rather than that of the slaves being liberated," he observed: "god shews his approbation of slavery by not permitting slaves to rise against their masters, or the free negroes to invade morocco, who are infinitely more numerous. the reason why the english abolished slavery is because the queen of england has a good heart, but mussulmen treat their slaves well, and do not fear the anger of god." when i mentioned that the bey of tunis and the imaum of muscat had entered into treaties for the suppression of slavery, the traders observed, "amongst the mohammetans are four sects, but the only orthodox sect is that of morocco." there is, however, one class of abolitionists in this country--the women, or mooresses. the rumour that a christian had come to purchase all the slaves of mogador soon penetrated the harems. the wife of one of the most distinguished moors of mogador informed a jewess of her acquaintance, that she was very happy to hear a christian was come to purchase all her husband's slaves, for she was tired of her life with them. the truth is, respectable moorish females detest this system of domestic slavery, and wish to see it abolished, notwithstanding that they are bred in it, and are themselves little better than slaves. they see themselves gradually abandoned by the husbands of their youth for the most ignorant and degraded negress slaves, whom their husbands purchase one after another as their caprice or passion excites them, until their houses are filled with these slaves. the artful negress absorbs all the affection of her master, whilst the legitimate wife is left as a widow, and is obliged to wait upon these pampered slaves, whose insolence knows no bounds. the negress slaves besides, when they bear sons, are treated with great respect; their children are free by the law, and cannot be disposed of, although the moors do sell them when hard pressed for money. yet even these negresses are beginning to chatter and clatter about the anti-slavery mission, expressing their satisfaction to our jewish neighbours. a negress slave on hearing that a person had come from england to liberate all the slaves, jumped up and called on god to bless the english nation. this excitement in the domestic circles of mogador raises the bile of the slave-dealers. a fellow of this sort beckoned me to come to him as i was passing in the street, and thus began: "christian, if you dare attempt to go to the south, we shall cut you up into ten thousand little pieces." traveller.--"you will not lay a finger upon me, nor throw a handful of sand in my face unless it please god." slave-dealer.--(taken aback at this reply, he drew in his horns), "well, how much will you give us apiece for our slaves." _traveller_.--"i shall give you nothing; you have no right to sell a man, a brother, like yourself." _slave-dealer_.--"it's our religion." _traveller_.--"it's not your religion to sell mussulman; you sell the children of your own slaves, born in your houses, and who are mussulmen?" the slave-dealer, puzzled and angry, was silent a few minutes, and then said, "ah, well, all's right, all's from god." i received a visit from a hajee under peculiar circumstances. passing through tunis on his return from mecca last year, his slave, hearing that all the slaves were liberated in the country, ran away. in vain his master attempted to catch him. there were no christians in the country of the mecca impostor, who kept _manhunting hounds_. this is the peculiar glory of christian lands. tunis is not so "go a-head" as yankee freedom-land. the consequence was the pilgrim left without his slave. he then, strange to say, applied to me to procure him back his slave. thinking this a good opportunity to agitate the authorities here or the question, i recommended him to apply to the governor, who should write to the emperor, and also to the bey of tunis, and so forth. i had visitors daily who asked me when i should be ready to purchase the slaves and liberate them. arabs from the remotest districts came to me; and i was told that there is not a town or district of the empire, but has heard of the english going to liberate all the slaves of morocco. i have studiously avoided giving details of the cruelties and hard bondage of slavery in and around morocco. on the contrary, i have stated it to be the opinion of the europeans and consuls in tangier, that slaves are well treated in this country. such an opinion ought to weigh with all. [ ] at the same time, in self-defence, as an abolitionist, and occupied with a mission for the extinction of slavery in this country, i must partly uplift the veil, however disgusting it may be to my readers. a portion of the dark side of the picture must be exhibited. of the march of slave-caravans over the sahara, i shall say nothing--that is fully reported in my previous publication. when the slaves arrive in morocco, they are inarched about in different directions of the country for sale. during their passage through a populous district like this, where the females are exposed to the brutal violence of ten thousand casual visitors, or agents of police and government, it is the ordinary and revolting practice to adopt means one cannot describe for the purpose of preserving their honour. private punishments are frequent; to my certain knowledge, a female slave was tied up by the heela, head downwards, and, after being cruelly flagellated, was left for dead by her, pitiless master. she was at last cut down at the intercession of her mistress whose humanity got the better of her hatred and jealousy. while i was at mogador, a negress had two of her children torn away from her to be sold at morocco, to pay the debts of her master, who was a moor. the children were sons of the man who sold them into bondage! the mother was inconsolable, ran about distracted, and probably will never recover from the blow. these facts are enough, and with any human man they will out-weigh all other instances, however numerous, of alleged good treatment on the part of moorish slave masters. [ ] i took a ride with mr. elton on the sandy beach. there is a fort in ruins, at about half an hour's distance, illustrating most emphatically the parable of the man who built his house upon the sands. this fort, which was to command the southern entrance of the harbour, is supposed to be of spanish construction, and built about the same time as the city. it was once of considerable size and height, but is now a fallen and ruined mass, its foundations "upon the sands" having given way. storms along this shore are often terribly destructive, we passed a portion of the hulk of a vessel completely buried in the sand. [ ] notwithstanding the sober and taciturn character of the moor, he can sometimes indulge himself in pleasantry and caricature. the moors have made caricatures of the three last emperors, assisted by some spanish renegade artist: these princes are yezid, suleiman, and abd errahman. yezid is represented as throwing away money with one hand, and cutting off heads with the other, depicting his ferocity in destroying his enemies, and his generosity in heaping favours on his friends. suleiman is represented as reading the koran, in the character of a devout and good man. the present sultan is hit off capitally, with one hand holding a bag of money behind him, and with the other stretched out before him, begging for more. h b could not have better caricatured the three shereefian sultans. the moors affirmed that muley abd errahman will keep faith with no one where his avarice is concerned, and, when he can, he will sell a monopoly twice or thrice, receiving money from each party. of his meanness and avarice, i adduce two anecdotes. four years ago, muley-abd errahman ordered some blond for his harem from mr. willshire. just when i was leaving mogador, his imperial highness graciously returned it to our merchant with the message--"it's too dear." not long before, a man was murdered upon the neutral land of two adjacent provinces, and a thousand dollars were taken from his baggage. in such cases, the governor of the district is mulcted both for the murder and robbery. the emperor claimed two thousand dollars from one of the provinces, for the father of the murdered man. this province escaped upon the plea that the murder had not been committed within its territory. the other province refused to satisfy the demand for the same reason. his imperial highness then made both provinces pay , dollars each, keeping one two thousand for himself, for the trouble he had of enforcing payment. the people of sous not long ago had a quarrel, which the emperor fomented. its sheikhs fought; his imperial highness sent troops to turn the balance of the fray, and to pacify the country. then, he made the belligerents pay each , dollars, as pacification-money, the value of which he levied on slaves. in this politic way, the imperial miser replenishes his coffers, and "eats up" his loving subjects. i made the acquaintance of mr. treppass, the austrian consul, and chancellor of the french consulate. mr. treppass has been upwards of twenty years in this country, and was himself once an imperial merchant, but sold his business, preferring a small stipend and his liberty, to being a vassal of the emperor, fed in luxury and lodged in a fine house. we had a long conversation upon the various topics connected with this country. mr. treppass says, the present system of the court is resistance to all innovation, to all strangers. but the pressure of the french on the algerine frontier is agitating the internal state of this country. money, which in other countries goes a long way, will almost do every thing with the government of morocco. it will also effect much with the people. some fifty years ago, a geneose merchant, resident in mogador, had the two provinces of hhaha and shedma under his control, and could have made himself sultan over them; this he effected solely by the distribution of money. the sultan of the time was in open war with a pretender; his imperial highness begged for the assistance of the all-powerful merchant. the merchant bought the affections and allegiance of the people, and firmly established the sultan on his throne. the influence of the merchant was now prodigious, and the sultan himself became alarmed. not being able to rest, and being in hourly dread of the genoese, the sultan ordered his officers to seize the merchant secretly, and put him on board a vessel then weighing anchor for europe. when the merchant was placed on board, this message was delivered to him--"our sultan is extremely obliged to you, sir, for the great services you rendered him, by establishing him on his throne! but our sultan says, 'if you could place him on the throne, you could also pull him off again.' therefore you must leave our country. our sultan graciously gives you a portion of your wealth to carry away with you!" the officers then shipped several chests of money, jewels, and other valuables to be placed to the account of the merchant, and the sultan-making genoese quitted morocco for ever. the moors reported to me that the french were building some factories, with a fort, upon some unclaimed land along the coast, equidistant between aghadir and wadnoun. it is probably near fort hillsboro of the maps, and which mr. davidson calls isgueder. a moor was accused by the authorities of mogador of being mixed up with the transaction, and immediately sent to the south, where he has not been heard of since. another report is that the french are only building a factory. the spot of land has near it a small port and a good spring of water; quantities of bricks and lime have been deposited there; french vessels of war from the senegal have been coasting and surveying up and down, touching at the place. the new port is called yedoueesai. i inquired particularly respecting this project; but mr. treppass stated positively, that the french had wholly abandoned the idea of establishing commercial relations with the sheikh of wadnoun, or any tribes thereabouts, whatever might have been their original intentions. vessels of war have frequently visited the coast of wadnoun, finding it the worst in all africa. they, however, now maintain friendly relations with the sheikh, in the event of shipwrecks or other disasters, happening to french vessels. nevertheless, it was at the particular request of the french consul of mogador, that his government broke off all communications with the sheikh, the emperor having repeatedly complained to the consul against this intercourse assuming a commercial or diplomatic character. [ ] the whole coast, from the port of mogador to the river senegal, has been, within the last few years, surveyed by the french vessels of war, particularly by captain e. bouet; and there is sufficient evidence in the reports of the people, and the remonstrances of the maroquine government, to prove that the french did attempt a settlement on the part of the coast above stated, but that it failed. the french took the idea of the undertaking from davidson, who proposed to lord palmerston to enter into communication with the sheikh of wadnoun, and establish a factory on the coast, somewhere about the river noun, just below cape noun. a british vessel of war was sent down with presents for the sheikh, and to ascertain the whereabout of the fine harbour reported to exist there by the sheikh and his people. this attempt of our government was as fruitless as that of the french afterwards. indeed, at the very time an english brig of war was searching about for this port, and seeking an interview with the sheikh of wadnoun on the coast, davidson was murdered on the southern frontier just as he was penetrating the sahara. it is not improbable, however, that the knowledge of this recommendation of davidson, which, from the sheikh's people themselves, would naturally reach the court of morocco, might have excited that jealous court to compass in some way his death, or at any rate thwart his expedition to timbuctoo, for the emperor is exceedingly jealous of any european holding communication with the south. the sheikh barook is, in spite of all this, very anxious to begin an intercourse with europeans; and not long ago, a messenger arrived with a bag of money for the jew, cohen, telling him to take some out of it, and to go to the sheikh who wished to see him. but cohen would not expose himself to the displeasure of the emperor, although he has english protection. wadnoun is a quasi-independent sheikhdom of the empire. the sheikh of wadnoun pays no tithes nor other imposts, and only sends an annual present as a mark of vassal-homage to the emperor. sous, which adjoins this province, is more immediately under the power of the sultan of the shereefs, but the tithes are not so easily collected in the south as in the north. much depends on the ability of the governor, who rules the whole of the district in the name of the emperor. the imperial authority is maintained principally by prompting disunion amongst the sheikhs; sous being divided into numerous districts, each district having an independent sheikh. by confusion and divisions among themselves, the emperor rules all as paramount-lord. when will people learn to be united, so that by union they may win their freedom and independence? alas! never. wadnoun is treated, however, very tenderly; for if the emperor were to attempt the subjugation of this country, the malcontents of sous would join the sheikh, and his authority would probably be overthrown in all the south. sous is the richest of these provinces, and equal to any other of the northern districts. its trade in dates, ostrich feathers, wax, wool, and hides, particularly in gums, almonds, and slaves, is very great. all the saharan caravans must pass through this country, except those proceeding _viâ_ tafilett to fez. teroudant, its capital, is a very ancient city, and was built by the ancient berbers. it has a circumference of walls capable of containing eighty thousand people, but the actual population does not exceed twenty thousand. its inhabitants are very industrious, and the moors excel in the art of dyeing. noun, or wadnoun, as this country and its capital are sometimes called, mr, davidson briefly describes as a large district, having many clusters of inhabitants. the town where the sheikh resides, is of good size, and has a millah, or jew's quarter, besides a good market. it stands on the river (such as it is) distant twenty two miles from the sea. the river noun rises in the mountains above souk aisa or assa, and is there called wad-el-aisa; and, passing through the district of wadnoun, it takes the name of assaka. the ancient name of this river was daradus. the territory around is not very fertile on account of the neighbourhood of the desert, but produces gum, wax, and ostrich feathers in abundance. the inhabitants are mostly arabs with a sprinkling of shelouh, estimated by gräberg [ ] at , . the population is somewhat thickly scattered; there are at least twenty villages between the district of stuka and wadnoun. the annexed is a sketch of wadnoun after the design left by mr. davidson. [illustration] wadnoun is an important rendezvous of caravans. many timbuctoo caravans break up here, and some saharan. several saharan merchants come no further north, disposing of their slaves and goods to maroquine merchants, who meet them in this place. it is safe travelling through these countries, provided no extraordinary plot be laid for taking away a traveller's life, as in the case of european explorers attempting to penetrate the interior. mr. treppass thinks that, notwithstanding the ill-will of the moorish government, davidson could have succeeded in his attempted journey to timbuctoo had he been more circumspect. he gave out to all persons whom he met that he was going to timbuctoo. this insured his being stopped and murdered _en route_ by some party or other, more especially as he at last abandonod the idea of protecting himself by a caravan-party, and started alone. but i am not altogether of this opinion. too much publicity is certainly injurious to a journey of discovery, and far and near awakens attention and suspicion; but a too sudden and unexpected appearance in the towns of the desert, equally excites distrust and suspicion, if not hostile feelings. mr. robertson, whilst at morocco, heard one of the numerous versions of the death of mr. davidson. he is said to have been killed by the mere freak of a young arab, who wished to have the pleasure of killing a christian, and who called out to his companions, "come, let us go and have a shot at the christian." the party of arabs to whom this mischievous young man belonged, was afterwards extremely grieved at what had been done. one of the arabs, in plundering the baggage, lost his hand by breaking a bottle containing aqua fortis. the glass cut a large gash, and the aqua fortis entering immediately, consumed the hand. the people cried out, "the devils of the christian are in the water!" from all i have heard, the great fault of davidson appears to have been his wishing to travel as like "a fine gentleman." this prejudiced all his travelling-companions against him, and could not fail to render him unpopular wherever he went. it is of no use for a man to cry out in the desert, "i am an englishman!" he must exclaim, "i am an arab, and will do and suffer like an arab." if any one were to ask me, "what would carry a roan to timbuctoo through the desert? is it courage, or money, or prudence?" i would reply, "the first thing is suffering, the second is suffering, and the last is suffering." [ ] i consulted an old man on this journey to timbuctoo. he could not undertake a voyage being too old. he mentioned names of places _en route_, and said they travelled by the stars, which star-travelling is all stuff. he recommended going by sea as much nearer. very little satisfactory information can be obtained from maroquine moors, who would rather mislead than direct you. i endeavoured to open a correspondence with the south on the anti-slavery question. at first, i thought of going to wadnoun on receiving an invitation from the sheikh, but when i proposed this to mr. wiltshire, he insisted on my relinquishing such a project, inasmuch as having placed myself at the direction of the consul-general, as recommended by the earl of aberdeen, i was not at liberty to differ from the advice, which mr. hay and himself might tender me. i saw there was some reason in this, and submitted though with great reluctance. however, i wrote two letters to sheikh barook of wadnoun, stating the views and objects of the anti-slavery society. i had some difficulty in finding a courier, who would undertake the delicate mission of conveying the letters. but mr. treppass and the french consul, m. jorelle, felt themselves more at liberty in the matter than our consul, and determined to assist me, m. jorelle very justly observing, "we will sow the seeds of liberty, if we can do nothing more." indeed, i am greatly obliged to that gentleman for the interest he took in my mission, and the assistance he rendered me on this and other occasions. after my return to england, i received two letters from the sheikh in answer to those i had written to him. the sheikh, afraid lest his letter might fall into the hands of government, after many compliments, begs me to get the emperor first to move in the question, adding, "what he makes free, we will make free;" for he says in another place, "we act as he acts, according to the _treek_ (ordinance) of god and his prophet." sheikh barook also protests that he has but little power in these matters, living as he does in the desert. as i did not seek for any thing beyond an answer to my letters, and was only anxious that he should know the sentiments of the anti-slavery society, i was not all disappointed. i knew too much of the pro-slavery feeling once existing in a strong party in england, and the mighty struggles which we had passed through to obtain british abolition, to expect anything more than a respectful answer to antislavery letters from a prince of the desert, whose revenues were raised chiefly from the duties levied upon slave-caravans passing through his territory. i only attempted to scatter the seeds of liberty over the slave-tracks of the desert, leaving the budding forth and the growth to the irrigating influences of that merciful and wise god, who has made all men of one flesh and blood. i visited the families of jewish merchants during the passover, in company with mr. and mrs. elton. christians here visit the jews twice a year, at the feast of the passover and tabernacles. in return, jews visit christians on new year's day. this laudable practice promotes social harmony between the jews and christians. in the house of one of our jewish friends (mr. levi's) i assisted at the celebration of the evening of the passover. there is nothing very particular in this ceremony, except a great deal of reading. the drinking of the four cups [ ] of wine, and the eating of the bitter herbs, emblems of the joys and the sorrows attending the deliverance from egyptian bondage, are the more difficult parts of the ceremony. the children naturally feel most the disagreeableness of eating the bitter herbs, and several times, as soon as they put them into their mouths, they spat them out again under the table. the drinking of an excessive quantity of wine, is also attended with not a little inconvenience, and one would think bacchus was the deity worshipped, and not the god of the jews and christians. when will mankind learn that violation of the physical economy of their nature can never be acceptable to the great creator? i do not say that european israelites indulge so much in these excesses as barbary jews, but i imagine that the germ of the debauch is found in the talmudical religion of both classes. but, since i should be very sorry were a jew to hold up to me the mummeries of popery or of the greek church, as the mirror of my own religion, i am not disposed to animadvert upon the generally decorous worship of european israelites. it requires three full days to get through this business of visiting. in truth, it is a very serious affair, for we were obliged to eat cake, and sip sherbet, or white brandy, at every house we went to, otherwise we should confer an affront upon our friends. at all times, a great quantity of white brandy, which the jews distil themselves, is drunk, but especially on these occasions. the governor of mogador gave orders, not long ago, that no mussulman should enter the jewish quarter, to prevent the faithful from being seduced into drinking this insidious spirit. i shall just mention what a christian is obliged to conform to, whilst visiting the barbary jews on these high days and holidays. st. you must eat a piece of cake, at least of _one_ sort, if not of several kinds, and drink a little brandy, wine somets, or boiled juice of the grape, or sherbet. in many of the houses, they give nothing but brandy, which is tastefully placed out on small round tables, as at a pastrycook's shop. nd. you must admire the new dresses of the ladies, who are radiantly and sumptuously attired "in flaming purple and refulgent gold," their ornaments likewise of gold, silver, and all manner of precious stones; for the daughters of israel are, as on bridal days, all begemmed, bejewelled, and diamonded, stuck over with gems as thick as stars "seen in the galaxy or milky-way." on these festivals, it is absolutely a matter of orthodox observance that the jews and jewesses should wear something new. some have entirely new dresses. rd. any thing new or remarkable in the house, or household furniture, must be noticed or admired. th. you must carry with you in your memorandum-book, or at the tip of your tongue, a good assortment of first-rate compliments of the season. if these are spiced with a little scandal of your neighbours, or the party you have just left, so much the better; they are more relished. now you are obliged to visit twenty or thirty families per diem; and you are literally passing through doors, square-courts, and corridors, crossing patios and quadrangles, walking up and down stairs, getting up and sitting down from morning to night, during these three mortal days. it will be seen then, that these passover and tabernacle visits are tremendous affairs, and require herculean strength to get through their polite duties. they may be days of jovial festivity to jews, but certainly they are days of labour and annoyance to gentiles. but i must now give an account of one or two remarkable personages whom we visited. the first was madame bousac, a jewess of this country. her father was a grandee at court in the days of former emperors, and the greatest merchant of his time, and she represented as an aristocrat among her people, a modern esther, standing and pleading between the sultan and her nation. this lady is the only native woman in the country, mooress or jewess, who has tact or courage enough to go and speak to the emperor, and state her request with an unfaltering voice beneath the awful shadow of the shereefian presence! madame bousac accompanied the merchants to morocco, to pay her respects to the emperor. among other modest or confidential demands which the lady made on the imperial benevolence, was that of an advance to her husband of ten thousand dollars. his imperial highness was immediately obliged to give a formal assent before his court. she then visited the harem, and felt herself quite at home. all the ladies, wives or concubines of the emperor, waited upon her; and served her with tea and bread, and butter. the presentation of bread and butter and cups of tea, is said to be the highest honour conferred on visitors, but why or wherefore i have not heard. madame bousac gave us some account of the morocco harem, which we may suppose is like that of fez and miknas. the number of these ladies was some two hundred. they are all attired alike, except the four wives, who dress a little more in the style of sultanas. i am sorry to be obliged to disabuse the reader of the romance and oriental colouring attached to our ideas of the harem, by giving madame bousac's simile of those angelic houries. this lady said, "they are like a string of charity-school girls going to church on a sunday morning." their penurious lord keeps down their pin-money to the lowest point, and is not more liberal to his ladies than to his other subjects. former sultans were accustomed to allow their ladies half a dollar a day, but these have but twopence, or at least fourpence. muley abd errahman even traffics in his beauties, and will now and then make a present of one to a governor, in consideration of receiving an adequate return of money, or presents. sometimes, the moors pay their shereefian sultan a similar compliment, by presenting him with slaves from their harem. [ ] madame bousac is, of course, a perfect lady according to moorish ideas, but her fascinations on the mind of the emperor, arise more from her wit and ability than her feminine grace and delicacy. she is anything but a beauty, according to our ideas, being of a dark complexion, of middle height, of large and powerful muscular proportions, very upright, as if bending backwards, and with a hoarse and masculine voice. like most women in this part of the world, she is married to a man old enough to be her father, or even grandfather, being even more than double her age. she herself may be about thirty, at which age the beauty of barbary women is gone for ever. such is the court-dame who has courage enough to speak to the emperor of morocco in public. she conversed with us about her affairs, telling us the emperor had not yet advanced to her husband the loan of , dollars as promised, nor did she expect it, for she knew his avarice. "rather would he sell one of his sultanas." but he had sent her a present of four haiks, which she shewed us; they were extremely fine and white. "these," she observed, "are the ten thousand dollars paid in private, but which the sultan could not refuse me in public." another character whom we visited, was the distinguished rabbi, coriante. the priest entertained us with dissertations upon various subjects. first of slavery. "it is unlawful to steal blacks, the mosaic law denouncing such theft with the punishment of death. nevertheless, if the jews of this country had the power, they would enslave the mussulman, and well castigate them." this latter remark, coriante uttered with an emphasis, denoting the revenge which his countrymen would inflict upon their mahometan oppressors, who had kept them in chains for a series of ages. he remarked, however, that the sultan might give way on the question of negro slavery, after the first shock to his prejudices. the rabbi treated us with wine, but one of us, moved by curiosity, having touched the bottle, he remarked to his daughter in an under-tone; "it's all gone," (the rest of the wine is spoiled). among these extremely superstitious barbary rabbies, it is a pollution to their wine if a christian touch even the bottle containing the juice of the grape, and they will not drink it afterwards. we asked the reason of his not being able to drink, and found it was, first, because women work in the vineyards, and the second, because the pope pronounces his blessing upon the vintage. after these jews have eaten meat, they are obliged to wait some time before they can eat butter, or drink milk; in fact, their superstitions are numberless. the rabbi read to us portions of the proverbs of solomon, and told us solomon was well acquainted with steam engines and railways, "only they were of no use in the holy land when god was always with his people." he then gave us his blessing, and me this solemn warning. "take care the emperor does not cut off your head, as he has cut off the head of our young darmon." [ ] end of vol. i. [ ] according to xavier darrieu. [ ] it has always been the policy of mahometan states to send their troublesome subjects, such as were not considered rebel enough to decapitate or to imprison, on a pilgrimage to mecca. instead of expiating the sins of a buoyant patriotism at the galleys or the bermudas, they are sent to slake their patriotic ardour at the holy wells of el-kaaba. [ ] the late emperor of morocco. [ ] "our lord jesus," the name by which the moors, always mention our saviour. [ ] moors entertain the lowest opinion possible of spaniards. in an intercepted correspondence of the emperor of morocco, found at the battle of isly, spaniards are called, "the most degraded of the human race." [ ] the climate of north africa is remarkable for rusting everything which can contract rust. this may be the reason of the moors representing spain and other european countries as free from rust, because there it is not so soon contracted. [ ] lord palmerston proceeded in the same determined way with the schah of persia (see parliamentary papers on the slave trade, class d, presented ). but colonel shiel was fortunate in obtaining several opinions of mahomet that--"the worst of men is the seller of men"--was a powerful auxiliary. the perseverance of the minister and his agents in persia has been crowned with complete success; the schah has issued a firman prohibiting the slave trade in his territories. this firman will complete our command over the persian gulf and the arabian seas, and enable our cruisers to intercept the slavers from the eastern shore of africa. [ ] no people understand better than the moors the noble feeling of gratitude, contained in the words "non nobis, domine," &c. [ ] although _sultana_, i.e., "sultanness or princess," is a frequent name for a woman in this country, i hare never heard of a man being called sultan; and, indeed, i imagine the jealousy of the reigning sovereign would never permit the use of such a name. but even in this country, where women are treated as so many household chattels, moorish gallantry is sufficient to overlook these trivial or serious pretensions. [ ] "souvenir d'un voyage du maroc," par m. rey, paris. [ ] the value of this ducat is about half-a-crown english money. [ ] count qrabert gives the following account of maroquine blacks: "the blacks who form a very numerous part of the population are most of them slaves, and as it is customary in barbarous countries, become an object of trade, though not to be compared with that carried on in other parts of barbary. the black is generally of a soft and kind disposition, bears fatigue with patience, and shows a serene and lively temper, totally different in that respect from the moor, who is taciturn and sullen. some of them have become men of prosperity and note, after having recovered their liberty. they are renowned for their fidelity, and form the most numerous part of the body-guards of the sultan; that body-guard makes about the half of the army, which on an average compose a total of ten thousand men. the greater part of those blacks comes from senegambia, guinea, and the dominions of the fellah or fellani." (_specchio geografico e statistico dell' impero di marocco. geneva._) [ ] some time since, when the french government were anxious to get supplies of grain from the levant, for the north of france, they sent steamers to the straits, to be ready to tow the vessels through, an example worthy of imitation, in other times besides seasons of famine. [ ] this conduct of roman catholic sailors has often been noticed. mahometans do the same, and resign themselves to fate, _i.e._, make no effort to save themselves; the only difference is, they are less noisy, and more sullen in their spiritless resignation. [ ] the entrance to the port of mogador, however, is difficult to all seamen. we were besides in the depth of winter. the prince de joinville describes his mishaps during the height of summer, or in august, when placing his vessels in position before the town. he says in his report of the bombardment: "new difficulties, and of more than one kind awaited us. for four days, the violence of the wind and the roughness of the sea prevented us from communicating with one another. anchored upon a rocky bottom, our anchors and cables broke, and the loss of them deprived us of resources which were indispensable in order to obtain our object. some vessels had only one chain and one anchor. we could not think of maintaining ourselves before mogador under sail. the violence of the currents and of the gale, would probably have carried us too far, and we should have lost the opportunity of acting. besides, in causing the steamers to get to proceed with us, they would have consumed their fuel, and in leaving them by themselves they would be exposed to run short of provisions and water. it was therefore necessary to remain at anchor. at last, the wind abated, and there remained of the hurricane of the preceding days, a considerable swell from n.n.w. then the vessels were tormented by the swell, and became ungovernable." [ ] the ancient numidians rode without saddle or bridle they were celebrated as the "reinless" numidians-- "numidæ infraeni."--(Ænaid, iv., .) we are aware that another meaning to _infraeni_ has been given, that of "indomitable;" but the peculiarity of these horsemen riding without reins is the usual rendering. but ordinarily, the modern moorish cavalry is very comfortably mounted. their saddles, with high backs, are as commodious as a chair. the large, broad, shovel-stirrups enable the rider to stand upright as on terra firma, whilst the sharp iron edges of the stirrups goring the ribs of the poor animal, serve as spurs. these lacerating stirrups are tied up short to the saddle, and the knees of the rider are bent forwards in a very ungainly manner. nevertheless, the barb delights in the "powder play" as much as his master, and-- "each generous steed to meet the play aspires, and seconds, with his own, his master's fires; he neighs, he foams, he paws the ground beneath, and smoke and flame his swelling nostrils breathe." [ ] the fire of the barbary horse is generally known, but few reflect upon the power of endurance which this animal possesses. i have known them to go without water for two or three days when crossing the desert, during which time they will only receive a small measure of corn or a few dates. on the coast, they are driven hard a long day, sweating, and covered with foam, their sides bleeding from the huge sharp-edged stirrups. without the slightest covering, they are left out the whole night, and their only evening meal is a little chopped barley-straw. our european horses would perish under such circumstances, and the french have lost the greater part of the horses they imported from france for the cavalry. but this hard fare keeps down the fiery spirit of these stallion barbs, otherwise they would be unmanageable. when turned out to grass, they soon become wild. crossing a field one day, mounted, i was set upon by a troop of these wild, grazing horses, and was instantly knocked to the ground, where i lay stunned. a cavalry officer, who was riding with me, had only just time to escape, and saved himself by dismounting, and letting his horse go. it was some hours before we could rescue the horses of our party from their wild mates, sporting and bounding furiously over the plains. the barb horses being all stallions (for the moors consider it a crime to geld so noble an animal), the fiercest and most terrific battles ensue on a stud breaking loose from their pickets. these battles are always between strangers, for the barb is the most affectionate of horses, and if he is known to another, and become his mate, he will, as the arabs say, "die to be with him." [ ] these trained bands of negroes call themselves _abeed-sidi-bokhari_, from the patron saint whom they adopted on settling in morocco, the celebrated sidi-bokhari, commentator on the koran, and a native of bokhara, as his name implies. his commentary is almost as much venerated as the koran itself. [ ] the _lex talion_ is frequently enforced in north africa. [ ] maroquine moors drench you with tea! they guzzle sweet tea all day long, as the affghans gulp down their tea, with butter in it, from morning to night. [ ] native jews manage most of the business of the interior, and farm the greater part of the monopolies. but the emperor must have some european merchants connected with these jews to maintain the commercial relations of his country with europe. the jewish high priest of mogador is a merchant, it being considered no interference with his sacred functions. [ ] see appendix at end of vol. ii. [ ] muley abd errahman is averse to treating his governors with extreme rigour. mr. hay gives an appalling account of private individuals arrested on suspicion of possessing great wealth--"the most horrible tortures are freely resorted to for forcing confessions of hidden wealth. the victim is put in a slow oven, or kept standing for weeks in a wooden dress; splinters are forced between the flesh and the nail of the fingers; two fierce cats are put alive into his wide trousers, and the breasts of his women are twisted with pincers. young children have sometimes been squeezed to death under the arms of a powerful man, before the eyes of their parents." a wealthy merchant at tangier, whose _auri sacra fames_ had led him to resist for a long time the cruel tortures that had been, employed against him, yielded at length to the following trial. "he was placed in a corner of the room, wherein a hungry lion was chained in such a manner as to be able to reach him with his claws, unless he held himself in a most unnatural position." this reads very much like a description of the torments of the inquisition. the moors may have imported this system of torture from spain. similar barbarities were said to have been inflicted by king otho on prisoners in greece, even on british ionian subjects! i recollect particularly the sewing up of fierce cats in the petticoats of women. my experience in morocco does not permit me to authenticate mr. hay's horrible picture. [ ] "to his imperial majesty the emperor of morocco, sidi muley abd errahman. "may it please your majesty, "a society in england, having for its object the abolition of slavery and the slave trade throughout the world, and denominated the british and foreign anti-slavery society, being informed of the pacific intentions and friendly disposition of your majesty towards our sovereign queen and government, and being informed likewise, that your majesty, in diplomatic relations with other foreign princes and states, has universally manifested the greatest desire to preserve peace amongst nations, and, of necessary consequence, the happiness of the human race, are encouraged to approach your majesty, and to plead on behalf of a numerous and important class of your subjects, the negro and other black slaves. "these are a people always faithful to their friends and protectors (a most conspicuous and immediate proof of which is seen in your majesty's imperial guard, formed principally of this class of your faithful subjects,) and exhibiting under suffering and oppression the greatest patience and fortitude, yet, during the long course of bygone centuries, they have been subjected to horrid cruelties and barbarities, in order to pander to the vices and to satiate the avarice of their oppressors. "now we, the society in england aforesaid, address your majesty for the succour and protection of this cruelly oppressed portion of the human race, and in order that you may be graciously pleased to remove the chain of bondage from off these unfortunate victims of the violence and cupidity of wicked men, who, in defiance of all justice and mercy, claim them as their property, and buy and sell them as cattle. "we further entreat that your majesty would be graciously pleased to place the slaves in your imperial dominions upon a footing of equality with the rest of your faithful subjects, and to make them free men, having the rightful possession of their own persons, and being at liberty to travel whithersoever they will. "for your majesty rightly understands and knows as well as we do, that god the almighty maker of us and you, has made all men equal, and has not permitted man to have property in his fellow man, which reduces them to the level of brutes; therefore, to make slaves of our fellows, our brothers and sisters, is to sin against the will and mind of god, and to provoke his wrath and indignation against us, and against our children after us. "consequently, we, the society in england, aforesaid, in common with some of your own mussulman sovereigns and people, hold slavery, and the slave trade in extreme abhorrence, because it kills and destroys our brothers whom we ought to love and cherish, because it makes them like brutes, whom we ought to esteem as reasonable beings, because it hardens our own hearts and makes us cruel towards our fellows, whom we ought to treat with kindness and compassion, and because it deforms god's creatures, in whom we ought to revere his spiritual likeness, man being made after the likeness of god, in possessing a spiritual reasoning soul; these evils, however, are the direct and inevitable consequences of the accursed slave trade, and for such reasons we, the people of england in general, abhor it, and seek, in every legitimate and righteous way, to persuade men of every nation in the world to abandon this inhuman and wicked traffic. "finally, we implore your majesty to be pleased to follow out that great act of confidence which you have exercised towards the negro race, in appointing them the life-guards of your imperial person, by graciously liberating them from the cruel yoke of slavery. from our hearts we believe that your majesty will find such a spontaneous act of compassion towards the desolate african slaves to be the wisest worldly policy, and most agreeable to the will of the eternal creator of us all. your loyal subjects will love the goodness of your heart the more, and serve you the better, while all africa, of which the immense dominions of your majesty form so large a part, will catch new life and vigour, under the blessing of the almighty, and grow happy and prosperous in the ages to come. "signed and sealed on behalf of the society in england for abolishing slavery and the slave trade throughout the world. "(signed) thomas clarkson. (l.s.)" [ ] this is not exact. the vizier is often the author of certain lines of policy. [ ] all the moorish sultans are spoken of by the people as _seedna_, "our lord," and departed saints are addressed by the same title. [ ] it is curious to see the spartan principle of theft developing itself under such different circumstances. [ ] [transcriber's note: in our print copy, the text of this footnote is missing.] [ ] this is the old story of the abettors of the slave-trade in all parts of the world; i very much doubt if there be any truth in it. none of the slave-dealers of the desert whom i conversed with, had ever seen or heard of prisoners of war being put to death. [ ] the european name of mogador, is supposed to be derived from mugdul, or modogul, a moorish saiut. [ ] the governor of mogador told me to go to look at his slaves, and see that they were well fed and well clothed. but every rich man's horses and dogs are well-fed and well-housed. [ ] mr. davidson did not visit morocco as an abolitionist. head what impression this maroquine slavery made upon his mind. "my heart sickens at the sight of this horrid picture. in another lot of these unfortunate beings were six women, one of whom had given birth to a child on the road, which was thrown into the bargain. there was an old wretch who had come from saweirah to purchase female slaves; his examination was carried on in the most disgusting manner, i could not refrain from calling down the curse of heaven on these inhuman wretches. in many, but little feeling is shewn for the poor blacks; and they seemed to think less of their own fate than i did, who was merely a looker-on. one poor creature, however, who was a finer woman, and less black than the rest, shed tears. i could have given her my dagger to have plunged it in the breast of the villain who was examining her. and yet these people pray four times a day, and think themselves superior to all god's creatures! more than ever do i wish to get away from, this den of hell-hounds. each of the grown persons was in the prime of life, and had once a home, and was more to be pitied than the children, who had never known the liberty of thought and act. to each of the ten slaves was given a lunch of bread; while both the inhuman buyers and sellers, after chuckling over their bargains, went to offer up their prayers to heaven, before they took their daily meal. can such unhallowed doings be permitted to endure longer! oh, spirit of civilization, hither turn your eyes, and punish the purchasers who ought to know better, for thus only will the sale be stopped." [ ] i asked a moor, "who built this castle on the sands?" he replied pertly, "iskander!" whenever the moors see anything marvellous or ancient, they ascribe it to alexander the great, to pharaoh, to solomon, or even to nimrod, as caprice leads them, believing that these three or four personages created all the wondrous and monstrous things in the world. but we have an instance here, how soon through ignorance, or the want of records, a modern thing may become ancient in the minds of the vulgar. this fort was built after mogador, which town is not yet a century old. [ ] certainly, to establish relations with the southern provinces of morocco, that is, sous and wadnoun, would greatly injure the trade of mogador, and, therefore, the consuls, as well as the moorish authorities, set their faces against any direct intercourse being opened with the south. [ ] gräberg says noun means the "river of eels," davidson derives the name from a portuguese queen called nounah; but his editor says the name is properly nul, was so written when the arabs possessed portugal, and that queen nunah is a modern invention. [ ] whatever may have been mr. davidson's faults, i scarcely doubt that the first impressions of mr. consul-general hay were correct. he says, "i _fear, however, that i am not to expect much assistance from him_," (mr. hay); and hints, in other parts of his journal, that mr. hay was rather disposed to throw difficulties in his way, than to render him efficient aid. mr. hay's son (which is very natural) attempts to exculpate his father in an appendix to his "western barbary," and some will, perhaps, think he has done so successfully. my experience of the diplomatic skill of the late consul, does not permit me to coincide with this favourable opinion. the greater probability is, that if mr. davidson had been left to his own "inspirations," and allowed complete liberty of action, he would have succeeded in reaching timbuctoo; but his health doss not appear to have been sufficiently robust, or himself acclimated, to have brought him back from his perilous adventure. [ ] these cups hold at least a pint each, and every adult male is expected to empty four, if not six. of course, they get beastly intoxicated, and suffer a day or two of illness afterwards, a very just punishment. [ ] but i do not think it reaches the point of complaisance, noticed by monsieur chenier, when he was french consul in . he says, "the veneration of the moors is so great for this prince, that they deem themselves happy whenever one; of their daughters is admitted to share his couch." on the other hand, many of the beauties presented by the sultan to his ministers, although brought out of his harems, are virgins. the poor ladies in the royal harems are only so much stock, from which their lord and tyrant picks and chooses. [ ] friend phillips is always wrestling with these prejudices of barbary jews. when his wife was delivered of a daughter, he was determined to have as much "fuss" made of the child as if it had been a son, to spite the prejudices of his brethren. so, when he went out for a walk with his wife, he would walk always arm-in-arm with her, although she was a jewess of this country, which caused great annoyance to his woman-oppressing brethren. [transcriber's notes: in this electronic edition, footnotes have been numbered and relocated to the end of the work. in footnote , the spellings nouna and nunah both occur. in chapter , the word "convey" was corrected to "conveying."] by the bibliotheque nationale de france (bnf/gallica) at http://gallica.bnf.fr. [illustration] travels in morocco, by the late james richardson, author of "a mission to central africa," "travels in the desert of sahara," &c. edited by his widow. [illustration] in two volumes. vol. ii. contents of the second volume. chapter i. the mogador jewesses.--disputes between the jew and the moor.--melancholy scenes.--the jews of the atlas.--their religion.--beautiful women.--the four wives.--statues discovered.--discrepancy of age of married people.-- young and frail fair ones.--superstition respecting salt.--white brandy.--ludicrous anecdote. chapter ii. the maroquine dynasties.--family of the shereefian monarchs.--personal appearances and character of muley abd errahman.--refutation of the charge of human sacrifices against the moorish princes.--genealogy of the reigning dynasty of morocco.--the tyraufc yezeed, (half irish).--muley suleiman, the "the shereeff of shereefs."--diplomatic relations of the emperor of morocco with european powers.--muley ismael enamoured with the french princess de conti.--rival diplomacy of france and england near the maroquine court.--mr. hay's correspondence with this court on the slave-trade.--treaties between great britain and morocco; how defective and requiring amendment.--unwritten engagements. chapter iii. the two different aspects by which the strength and resources of the empire of morocco may be viewed or estimated.--native appellation of morocco.--geographical limits of this country.--historical review of the inhabitants of north africa, and the manner in which this region was successively peopled and conquered.--the distinct varieties of the human race, as found in morocco.--nature of the soil and climate of this country.--derem, or the atlas chain of mountains.--natural products.--the shebbel, or barbary salmon; different characters of exports of the northern and southern provinces.--the elæonderron argan.--various trees and plants.--mines.--the sherb-errech, or desert-horse. chapter iv. division of morocco into kingdoms or states, and zones or regions.-- description of the towns and cities on the maroquine coasts of the mediterranean and atlantic waters.--the zafarine isles.--melilla.-- alhucemas.--penon de velez.--tegaza.--provinces of rif and garet.-- tetouan.--ceuta.--arzila.--el araish.--mehedia.--salee.--rabat.-- fidallah.--dar-el-beidah.--azamour.--mazagran.--saffee.--waladia. chapter v. description of the imperial cities or capitals of the empire.-- el-kesar.--mequinez.--fez.--morocco.--the province of tafilett, the birth-place of the present dynasty of the shereefs. chapter vi. description of the towns and cities of the interior, and those of the kingdom of fez.--seisouan.--wazen.--zawiat.--muley dris.--sofru.-- dubdu.--taza.--oushdah.--agla.--nakbila.--meshra.--khaluf.--the places distinguished in. morocco, including sous, draka, and tafilett.--tefza. --pitideb.--ghuer.--tyijet.--bulawan.--soubeit--meramer.--el-medina.-- tagodast.--dimenet.--aghmat.--fronga.--tedmest.--tekonlet.--tesegdelt.-- tagawost.--tedsi beneali.--beni sabih.--tatta and akka.--mesah or assah.--talent.--shtouka.--general observations on the statistics of population.--the maroquine sahara. chapter vii. london jew-boys.--excursion to the emperor's garden, and the argan forests.--another interview with the governor of mogador on the anti-slavery address.--opinion of the moors on the abolition of slavery. chapter viii. el-jereed, the country of dates.--its hard soil.--salt lake. its vast extent.--beautiful palm-trees.--the dates, a staple article of food.-- some account of the date-palm.--made of culture.--delicious beverage.-- tapping the palm.--meal formed from the dates.--baskets made of the branches of the tree.--poetry of the palm.--its irrigation.-- palm-groves.--collection of tribute by the "bey of the camp." chapter ix. tour in the jereed of captain balfour and mr. reade.--sidi mohammed.-- plain of manouba.--tunis.--tfeefleeah.--the bastinado.--turkish infantry.--kairwan.--sidi amour abeda.--saints.--a french spy-- administration of justice.--the bey's presents.--the hobara.--ghafsa. hot streams containing fish.--snakes.--incantation.--moorish village. chapter x. toser.--the bey's palace.--blue doves.--the town described.--industry of the people.--sheikh tahid imprisoned and punished.--leghorn.--the boo-habeeba.--a domestic picture.--the bey's diversions.--the bastinado.-- concealed treasure.--nefta.--the two saints.--departure of santa maria.-- snake-charmers.--wedyen.--deer stalking.--splendid view of the sahara.-- revolting acts.--qhortabah.--ghafsa.--byrlafee.--mortality among the camels--aqueduct.--remains of udina.--arrival at tunis.--the boab's wives.--curiosities.--tribute collected.--author takes leave of the governor of mogador, and embarks for england.--rough weather.--arrival in london. appendix. travels in morocco. chapter i. the mogador jewesses.--disputes between the jew and the moor.--melancholy scenes.--the jews of the atlas.--their religion.--beautiful women.--the four wives.--statues discovered.--discrepancy of age of married people.-- young and frail fair ones.--superstition respecting salt.--white brandy.--ludicrous anecdote. notwithstanding the imbecile prejudices of the native barbary jews, such of them who adopt european habits, or who mix with european merchants, are tolerably good members of society, always endeavouring to restrain their own peculiarities. the european jewesses settled in mogador, are indeed the belles of society, and attend all the balls (such as they are). the jewess sooner forgets religious differences than the jew, and i was told by a christian lady, it would be a dangerous matter for a christian gentleman to make an offer of marriage to a mogador jewess, unless in downright earnest; as it would be sure to be accepted. monsieur delaport, consul of france, was the first official person who brought prominently forward the native and other jews into the european society of this place, and since then, these jews have improved in their manners, and increased their respectability. the principal european jews are from london, gibraltar, and marseilles. many native jews have attempted to wear european clothes; and a european hat, or coat, is now the rage among native jewesses, who all aspire to get a husband wearing either. such are elements of the progress of the jewess population in this part of the world, and there is no doubt their position has been greatly ameliorated within the last half century, or since the time of ali bey, who thus describes their wretched condition in his days. "continual disputes arise between the jew and the moor; when the jew is wrong, the moor takes his own satisfaction, and if the jew be right, he lodges a complaint with the judge, who always decides in favour of the mussulman. i have seen the mahometan children amuse themselves by beating little jews, who durst not defend themselves. when a jew passes a mosque, he is obliged to take off his slippers, or shoes; he must do the same when he passes the house of the kaëd, the kady, or any mussulman of distinction. at fez, and in some other towns, they are obliged to walk barefooted." ali bey mentions other vexations and oppressions, and adds, "when i saw the jews were so ill-treated and vexed in every way, i asked them why they did not go to another country. they answered that they could not do so, because they were slaves of the sultan." again he says, "as the jews have a particular skill in thieving, they indemnify themselves for the ill-treatment they receive from the moors, by cheating them daily." jewesses are exempt from taking off their slippers, or sandals, when passing the mosques. the late emperor, muley suleiman, [ ] professed to be a rigidly exact mussulman, and considered it very indecent, and a great scandal that jewesses, some of them, like most women of this country, of enormous dimensions, should be allowed to disturb the decent frame of mind of pious mussulmen, whilst entering the threshold of the house of prayer, by the sad exhibitions of these good ladies stooping down and shewing their tremendous calves, when in the act of taking off their shoes before passing the mosques. for such reasons, jewesses are now privileged and exempted from the painful necessity of walking barefoot in the streets. the policy of the court in relation to the jews continually fluctuates. sometimes, the emperor thinks they ought to be treated like the rest of his subjects; at other times, he seems anxious to renew in all its vigour the system described by ali bey. hearing that the jews of tangier, on returning from gibraltar, would often adopt the european dress, and so, by disguising themselves, be treated like christians and europeans, he ordered all these would-be europeans forthwith to be undressed, and to resume their black turban. alas, how were all these passover, tabernacle and wedding festivals, these happy and joyous days of the jewish society of mogador, changed on the bombardment of that city! what became of the rich and powerful merchants, the imperial vassals of commerce with their gorgeous wives bending under the weight of diamonds, pearls, and precious gems, during that sad and unexpected period? the newspapers of the day recorded the melancholy story. many of the jews were massacred, or buried underneath the ruins of the city; their wives subjected to plunder; the rest were left wandering naked and starving on the desolate sandy coast of the atlantic, or hidden in the mountains, obtaining a momentary respite from the rapacious fury of the savage berbers and arabs. it is well known that, while the french bombarded tangier and mogador from without, the berber and arab tribes, aided by the _canaille_ of the moors, plundered the city from within. several of the moorish rabble declared publicly, and with the greatest cowardice and villainous effrontery, "when the french come to destroy mogador, we shall go and pillage the jews' houses, strip the women of their ornaments, and then escape to the mountains from the pursuit of the christians." these threats they faithfully executed; but, by a just vengeance, they were pillaged in turn, for the berbers not only plundered the jews themselves, but the moors who had escaped from the city laden with their booty. it is to be hoped that a better day is dawning for north african jews. the governments of france and england can do much for them in morocco. the jews of the atlas formed the subject of some of mr. davidson's literary labours; i have made further inquiries and shall give the reader some account of them, adding that portion of mr. davidson's information which was borne out by further investigation. the atlas jews are physically, if not morally, superior to their brethren who reside among the moors. they are dispersed over the atlas ranges, and have all the characteristics of mountaineers. they enjoy, like their neighbours, the berbers and shelouhs, a species of quasi-independence of the imperial authority, but they usually attach themselves to certain berber chieftains who protect them, and whose standards they follow. these are the only jews in mahometan countries of whom i have heard as bearing arms. they have, however, their own sheiks, to whose jurisdiction all domestic matters are referred. they wear the same attire as the mountaineers, and are not distinguishable from them, they do not address the moors by the term of respect and title "sidi," but in the same way as the moors and arabs when they accost each other. they speak the shelouh language. mr. davidson mentions some curious circumstances about these jews, and of their having a city beyond the atlas, where three or four thousand are living in perfect freedom, and cultivating the soil, which they have possessed since the time of solomon. the probability is that mr. davidson's informant refers to the jews of the oasis of sahara, where there certainly are some families of jews living in comparative freedom and independence. as to the peculiarities of the religion of the atlas jews, they are said not to have the pentateuch and the law in the same order as jews generally. they are unacquainted with ezra, or christ; they did not go to babylon at the captivity, but were dispersed over africa at that period. they are a species of caraaites, or jewish protestants. shadai is the name which they apply to the supreme being, when speaking of him. their written law begins by stating that the world was many thousand years old when the present race of men was formed, which, curiously enough, agrees with the researches of modern geology. the present race of men are the joint offspring of different and distinct human species. the deluge is not mentioned by them. god, it is said, appeared to ishmael in a dream, and told him he must separate from isaac, and go to the desert, where he would make him a great nation. there would ever after be enmity between the two races, as at this day there is the greatest animosity between the jews and mahometans. the great nucleus of these shelouh jews is in _jebel melge_, or the vast ridge of the atlas capped with eternal snows; and they hold communications with the jews of ait mousa, frouga or misfuvâ. they rarely descend to the plains or cities of the empire, and look upon the rest of the jews of this country as heretics. isolation thus begets enmity and mistrust, as in other cases. a few years ago, a number came to mogador, and were not at all pleased with their visit, finding fault with everything among their brethren. these jewish mountaineers are supposed to be very numerous. in their homes, they are inaccessible. so they live in a wild independence, professing a creed as free as their own mountain airs. god, who made the hills, made likewise man's freedom to abide therein. before taking leave of the maroquine israelites, i must say something of their personal appearance. both in tangier and mogador, i was fortunate enough to be acquainted with families, who could boast of the most perfect and classic types of jewish female loveliness. alas, that these beauties should be only charming _animals_, their minds and affections being left uncultivated, or converted into caves of unclean and tormenting passions. the jewesses, in general, until they become enormously stout and weighed down with obesity, are of extreme beauty. most of them have fair complexions; their rose and jasmine faces, their pure wax-like delicate features, and their exceedingly expressive and bewitching eyes, would fascinate the most fastidious of european connoisseurs of female beauty. but these israelitish ladies, recalling the fair image of rachel in the patriarchal times of holy writ, and worthy to serve as models for a grecian sculptor, are treated with savage disdain by the churlish moors, and sometimes are obliged to walk barefoot and prostrate themselves before their ugly negress concubines. the male infants of jews are engaging and goodlooking when young; but, as they grow up, they become ordinary; and jews of a certain age, are decidedly and most disgustingly ugly. it is possible that the degrading slavery in which they usually live, their continued habits of cringing servility, by which the countenance acquires a sinister air and fiendishly cunning smirk, may cause this change in their appearance. but what contrasts we had of the beauty of countenance and form in the jewish society of mogador! you frequently see a youthful woman, nay a girl of exquisite beauty and delicacy of features, married to an old wretched ill-looking fellow of some sixty or seventy years of age, tottering over the grave, or an incurable invalid. to render them worse-looking, whilst the women may dress in any and the gayest colours, the men wear a dark blue and black turban and dress, and though this is prescribed as a badge of oppression, they will often assume it when they may attire themselves in white and other livelier colours. however, men get used to their misery, and hug their chains. the jews, at times, though but very rarely, avail themselves of their privilege of four wives granted them in mahometan countries, and a nice mess they make of it. i knew a jew of this description in tunis. he was a lively, jocose fellow, with a libidinous countenance, singing always some catch of a song. he was a silk-mercer, and pretty well off. his house was small, and besides a common _salle-à-manger_, divided into four compartments for his four wives, each defending her room with the ferocity of a tigress. two of them were of his own age, about fifty, and two not more than twenty. the two elder ones, i was told by his neighbours, were entirely abandoned by the husband, and the two younger ones were always bickering and quarrelling, as to which of them should have the greater favour of their common tyrant; the house a scene of tumult, disorder and indecency. amongst the whole of the wives, there was only one child, a boy, of course an immense pet, a little surly wretch; his growth smothered, his health nearly ruined, by the overattentions of the four women, whom he kicked and pelted when out of humour. this little imp was the fit type, or interpretation of the presiding genius of polygamy. i once visited this happy family, this biting satire on domestic bliss and the beauty of the harem of the east. the women were all sour, and busy at work, weaving or spinning cotton, "do you work for your husband?" i asked, _the women_.--"thank rabbi, no." _traveller_.--"what do you do with your money?" _the women_.--"spend it ourselves." _traveller_.--"how do you like to have only one husband among you four?" _the women_.--"pooh! is it not the will of god?" _traveller_.--"whose boy is that?" _the women_.--"it belongs to us all." _traveller_.--"have you no other children?" _the women_.--"our husband is good for no more than that." whilst i was talking to these angelic creatures, their beloved lord was quietly stuffing capons, without hearing our polite discourse. a european jew who knew the native society of jews well, represents domestic bliss to be a mere phantom, and scarcely ever thought of, or sought after. poor human nature! i took a walk round the suburbs one morning, whilst a strong wind was bringing the locusts towards the coast, which fell upon us like hailstones. young locusts frequently crowd upon the neighbouring hills in thousands and tens of thousands. they are little green things. no one knows whence they come and whither they go. these are not destructive. indeed, unless swarms of locusts appear darkening the sky, and full grown ones, they do not permanently damage the country. the wind usually disperses them; they rarely take a long flight, except impelled by a violent gale. arabs attempt to destroy locusts by digging pits into which they may fall. this is merely playing with them. jews fry them in oil and salt, and sell them as we sell shrimps, the taste of which they resemble. on my return, i passed a mooress, or rather a mauritanian venus, who was so stout that she had fallen down, and could not get up. a mule was fetched to carry her home. but the moor highly relishes these enormous lumps of fat, according to the standard beauty laid down by the talebs--"four things in a woman should be ample, the lower part of the back, the thighs, the calves of the legs and the knees." some time ago, there were discovered at malta various rude statues of women very ample in the lower part of the "back," supposed to be of libyan origin, so that stout ladies have been the choicest of the fashion for ages past; the fattening of women, like so many capons and turkeys, begins when they are betrothed. they then swallow three times a day regular boluses of paste, and are not allowed to take exercise. by the time marriage takes place, they are in a tolerable good condition, not unlike smithfield fattened heifers. the lady of one of the european merchants being very thin, the moors frequently asked her husband how it was, and whether she had enough to eat, hinting broadly that he starved her. on the other hand, two or three of the merchant's wives were exceedingly stout, and of course great favourites with the men folks of this city. the discrepancies of age, in married people, is most unnatural and disgusting; whilst the merchants were at morocco, a little girl of nine years of age was married to a man upwards of fifty. ten and eleven is a common age for girls to be married. much has been said of the reverence of children for their parents in the east, and tribes of people migrating therefrom, and the fifth commandment embodies the sentiment of the eastern world. but there is little of this in mogador; a european jewess, who knows all the respectable jewish and many of the moorish families, assured me that children make their aged parents work for them, as long as the poor creatures can. "honour thy father and thy mother," is quite as much neglected here as in europe. however, there is some difference. the indigent moors and jews maintain their aged parents in their own homes, and we english christian shut up ours in the union bastiles. to continue this domestic picture, the marriage settlements, especially among the jews, are ticklish and brittle things, as to money or other mercenary arrangements. a match is often broken off, because a lamp of the value of four dollars has been substituted for one of the value of twenty dollars, which was first promised on the happy day of betrothal. indeed, nearly all marriages here are matters of sale and barter. love is out of the question, he never flutters his purple wings over the bridal bed of mogador. a jewish or moorish girl having placed before her a rich, old ugly man, of mean and villanous character, of three score years and upwards, and by his side, a handsome youth of blameless character and amiable manners, will not hesitate a moment to prefer the former. as affairs of intrigue and simple animal enjoyment are the great business of life, the ways and means, in spite of moorish and mahometan jealousy, as strong as death, by which these young and frail beauties indulge in forbidden conversations, are innumerable. although the moors frequently relate romantic legends of lovely innocent brides, who had never seen any other than the faces of their father, or of married ladies, who never raised the veil from off their faces, except to receive their own husbands, and seem to extol such chastity and seclusion; they are too frequently found indulging in obscene imaginations, tempting and seducing the weaker sex from the path of virtue and honour. so that, if women are unchaste here, or elsewhere, men are the more to blame: if woman goes one step wrong, men drag her two more. men corrupt women, and then punish her for being corrupt, depriving them of their natural and unalienable rights. salt in africa as in europe is a domestic superstition. a jewess, one morning, in bidding adieu to her friends, put her fingers into a salt-cellar, and took from it a large pinch of salt, which her friend told me afterwards was to preserve her from the evil one. salt is also used for a similar important purpose, when, during the night, a person is obliged to pass from one room into another in the dark. it would be an entertaining task to collect the manifold superstitions in different parts of the world, respecting this essential ingredient of human food. the habit of drinking white brandy, stimulates the immorality of this maroquine society. the jews are the great factors of this _acqua ardiente_, its spanish and general name. government frequently severely punishes them for making it; but they still persevere in producing this incentive to intoxication and crime. in all parts of the world, the most degraded classes are the factors of the means of vice for the higher orders of society. moors drink it under protest, that it is not the juice of the grape. on the sabbath, the jewish families are all flushed, excited, and tormented by this evil spirit; but when the highest enjoyments of intellect are denied to men, they must and will seek the lower and beastly gratifications. friend cohen came in one afternoon, and related several anecdotes of the maroquine court. when dr. brown was attending the sultan, the vizier managed to get hold of his cocked hat, and placing it upon his head, strutted about in the royal gardens. whilst performing this feat before several attendants, the sultan suddenly made his appearance in the midst of them. the minister seeing him, fell down in a fright and a fit. his imperial highness beckoned to the minister in such woful plight, to pacify himself, and put his cloak before his mouth to prevent any one from seeing him laugh at the minister, which he did most immoderately. cohen, who is a quack, was once consulted on a case of the harem. cohen pleaded ignorance, god had not given him the wit; he could do nothing for the patient of his imperial highness. this was very politic of cohen, for another quack, a moor, had just been consulted, and had had his head taken off, for not being successful in the remedies he prescribed. there would not be quite so much medicine administered among us, weak, cracky, crazy mortals, in this cold damp clime, if such an alternative was proposed to our practitioners. chapter ii. the maroquine dynasties.--family of the shereefian monarchs.--personal appearances and character of muley abd errahman.--refutation of the charge of human sacrifices against the moorish princes.--genealogy of the reigning dynasty of morocco.--the tyraufc yezeed, (half irish).--muley suleiman, the "the shereeff of shereefs."--diplomatic relations of the emperor of morocco with european powers.--muley ismael enamoured with the french princess de conti.--rival diplomacy of france and england near the maroquine court.--mr. hay's correspondence with this court on the slave-trade.--treaties between great britain and morocco; how defective and requiring amendment.--unwritten engagements. morocco, an immense and unwieldly remnant of the monarchies formed by the saracens, or first arabian conquerors of africa, has had a series of dynasties terminating in that of the shereefs. st. the edristees (pure saracens,) their capital was fez, founded by their great progenitor, edrio. the dynasty began in a.d. , and continued to . nd. the fatamites (also saracens.) these conquered egypt, and were the faction of or lineal descendants of the daughter of the prophet, the beautiful pearl-like fatima, succeeding to the above: this dynasty continued to . rd. the zuheirites (zeirities, or zereids) were usurpers of the former conquerors; their dynasty terminated in . th. moravedi (or marabouteen,) that is to say, marabouts, [ ] who rose into consequence about , and their first prince was aberbekr omer el lamethounx, a native of sous. their dynasty terminated in . th. the almohades. these are supposed to be sprung from the berber tribes. they conquered all north western morocco, and reigned about one hundred years, the dynasty terminated in . th. the merinites. these in subjugated the kingdoms of fez and morocco; and in their dynasty terminated with the shereef. th. the oatagi (or ouatasi) [ ] were a tribe of obscure origin. in their time, the portuguese established themselves on the coast of morocco; their dynasty ended in . th. the shereefs (oulad ali) of the present dynasty, whose founder was hasein, have now occupied the imperial throne more than three centuries. this family of shereefs came from the neighbourhood of medina in arabia, and succeeded to the empire of morocco by a series of usurpations. they are divided into two branches, the sherfah hoseinee, so named from the founder of the dynasty, who began to reign at taroudant and morocco in , and over all the empire in , and the sherfah el fileli, or tafilett, whose ancestor was muley shereef ben ali-el-hoseinee, and assumed sovereign power at tafilett in , from which country he extended his authority over all the provinces of that empire. thus the shereefs began their reign in the middle of the seventeenth century, and have now wielded the sword of the prophet as caliph of the west these last two hundred years. i have not heard that there is anywhere a dynasty of shereefs except in this country. they are, therefore, profoundly venerated by all true mussulmen. it was a great error to suppose that abd-el-kader could have succeeded in dethroning the emperor during the hostilities of the emir against the lineal representative of the prophet. abd-el-kader is a marabout warrior, greatly revered and idolized by all enthusiastic mussulmen throughout north africa, more especially in morocco, the _terre classique_ of holy-fighting men; but though the maroquines were disaffected, groaning under the avarice of their shereefian lord, and occasionally do revolt, nevertheless they would not deliberately set aside the dynasty of the shereefs, the veritable root and branch of the prophet of god, for an adventurer of other blood, however powerful in arms and in sanctity. morocco is the only independent mussulman kingdom remaining, founded by the saracens when they conquered north africa. tunis and tripoli are regencies of the port of tunis, having an hereditary bey, while tripoli is a simple pasha, removable at pleasure. algeria has now become an integral portion of france by the republic. muley abd errahman was nominated to the throne by the solemn and dying request of his uncle, muley suleiman, to the detriment of his own children. he belonged to one of the most illustrious branches of the reigning dynasty. in the natural order of succession, he ought to have taken possession of the shereefian crown at the end of the last age; but, being a child, his uncle was preferred; for mahometan sovereigns and empire are exposed to convulsions enough, without the additional dangers and elements of strife attendant on regencies. in transmitting the sceptre to him, muley suleiman, therefore, only performed an act of justice. muley abd errahman, during his long reign, rendered the imperial authority more solid than formerly, and established a species of conservative government in a semi-barbarous country, and exposed to continual commotions, like all asiatic and african states. in governing the multitudinous and heterogeneous tribes of his empire, his grand maxim has ever been, like austria, with her various states and hostile interests of different people, "divide et empera." when will sovereigns learn to govern their people upon principles of homogenity of interests, natural good will, and fraternal feeling? alas! we have reason to fear, never. it seems nations are to be governed always by setting up one portion of the people against the other. muley abd errahman was chosen by his uncle, on account of his pacific and frugal habits, educated as he was by being made in early life the administrator of the customs in mogador, and as a prince likely to preserve and consolidate the empire. the anticipations of the uncle have been abundantly realized by the nephew, for muley abd errahman, with the exception of the short period of the french hostilities, (which was not his own work and happened in spite of him), has preserved the intact without, and quiet during the many years he has occupied the throne. his moorish majesty, who is advanced in life, is a man of middle stature. he has dark and expressive eyes, and, as already observed, is a mulatto of a fifth caste. colour excites no prejudices either in the sovereign or in the subject. this emperor is so simple in his habits and dress, that he can only be distinguished from his officers and governors of provinces by the _thall_, or parasol, the shereefian emblem of royalty. the emperor's son, when out on a military expedition, is also honoured by the presence of the imperial parasol, which was found in sidi mohammed's tent at the battle of isly. muley abd errahman is not given to excesses of any kind, (unless avarice is so considered), though his three harems of fas, miknas, and morocco may be _stocked_, or more politely, adorned, with a thousand ladies or so, and the treasures of the empire are at his disposal. he is not a man of blood; [ ] he rarely decapitates a minister or a governor, notwithstanding that he frequently confiscates their property, and sometimes imprisons them to discover their treasures, and drain them of their last farthing. the emperor lives on good terms with the rest of his family. he has one son, governor of fez (sidi mohammed), and another son, governor of rabat. the greater part of the royal family reside at tafilett, the ancient country of the _sherfah_, or shereefs, and is still especially appropriated for their residence. ali bey reported as the information of his time, that there were at tafilett no less than two thousand shereefs, who all pretended to have a right to the throne of morocco, and who, for that reasons enjoyed certain gratifications paid them by the reigning sultan. he adds that, during an interregnum, many of them took up arms and threw the empire into anarchy. this state of things is happily past, and, as to the number of the shereefs at tafilett, all that we know is, there is a small fortified town, inhabited entirely by shereefs, living in moderate, if not impoverished circumstances. the shereefian sultans of morocco are not only the successors of the arabian sovereigns of spain, but may justly dispute the caliphat with the osmanlis, or turkish sultans. their right to be the chiefs of islamism is better founded than the pretended apostolic successors at rome, who, in matters of religion, they in some points resemble. i introduce here, with some unimportant variations, a translation from gräberg de hëmso of the imperial shereefian pedigree, to correspond with the genealogical tableaux, which the reader will find in succeeding pages, of the moorish dynasties of tunis and tripoli. genealogy of the reigning dynasty of morocco. . ali-ben-abou-thaleb; died in of the christian era; surnamed "the accepted of god," of the most ancient tribe of hashem, and husband of fatima, styled ey-zarah, or, "the pearl," only daughter of mahomet. . hosein, or el-hosein-es-sebet, _i.e._ "the nephew;" died in ; from him was derived the patronymic el-hoseinee, which all the shereefs bear, . hasan-el-muthna, _i.e._ "the striker;" died in ; brother of mohammed, from whom pretended to descend, in the th degree, mohammed ben tumert, founder of the dynasty of the almohadi, in . . abdullah-el-kamel, _i.e._ "the perfect;" in , father of edris, the progenitor or founder of the dynasty of the edristi in morocco, and who had six brothers. . mohammed, surnamed "the pious and just soul;" in , had five children who were the branches of a numerous family. (between mohammed and el-hasem who follows, some assert that three gererations succeeded). . el-kasem, in ; brother of abdullah, from whom it is said the caliphs of egypt and morocco are descended. . ismail; about . . ahmed; in . . el-hasan; in . . ali; in , (excluded from the genealogy published by ali bey, but noted by several good authorities). . abubekr; . . el-husan, in . . abubekr el-arfat, _i.e._ "the knower," in . . mohammed, in . . abdullah, in . . hasan, in ; brother of a mohammed, who emigrated to morocco. . mohammed, in . . abou-el-kasem abd errahman, in . . mohammed, in . . el-kaseru, in , brother of ahmed, who also emigrated into africa, and was father of eight children, one of whom was: . el-hasan, who, in , upon the demand of a tribe of berbers of moghrawa, was sent by his father into the kingdom of segelmesa (now tafilett) and draha, where, through his descendants, he became the common progenitor of the maroquine shereefs. . mohammed, in . . el-hasan, in , by his son, mohammed, he became grandfather of hosem, who, during , founded the first dynasty of the hoseinee shereefs in segelmesa, and the extreme south of morocco, which dynasty, after twelve years, made itself master of the kingdom of morocco. . ali-es-shereef, _i.e._ "the noble," died in , was the first to assume this name, and had, after forty years elapsed, two sons, the first, muley mahommed, by a concubine, and the second: . yousef, by a legitimate wife; he retired into arabia, where he died in . it was said of yousef, that no child was born to him until his eightieth year, when he had five children, the first born of which was, . ali, who died in , and had at least, eighty male children. . mohammed, in , brother of muley meherrez, a famous brigand, and afterwards a king of tafilett: this mohammed was father of many children, and among the rest-- . ali, who was called by his uncle from zambo (?) into moghrele-el-aksa morocco about the year , and died in , after having founded the second, and present, dynasty of the hoseinee shereefs, surnamed the _filei_, . muley shereeff, died in ; he had eighty sons, and a hundred and twenty-four daughters. . muley ismail, in . . muley abdullah, in . . sidi mohammed, in . . muley yezeed, who assumed the surname of el-mahdee _i.e._ "the director," in . . muley hisham, in . . muley suleiman, in . . muley abd errahman, nephew of muley suleiman and eldest son of muley hisham, the reigning shereefian prince. [ ] in the shereefian lineage of muley suleiman, copied for ali bey by the emperor himself, and which is very meagre and unsatisfactory, we miss the names of the two brothers, the princes yezeed and hisham, who disputed the succession on the death of their father, sidi mohammed which happened in april or , when the emperor was on a military expedition to quell the rebellion of his son, yezeed--the tyrant whose bad fame and detestable cruelties filled with horror all the north african world. the emperor suleiman evidently suppressed these names, as disfiguring the lustre of the holy pedigree; although yezeed was the hereditary prince, and succeeded his father three days after his death, being proclaimed sultan at salee with accustomed pomp and magnificence. this monster in human shape, having excited a civil war against himself by his horrid barbarities, was mortally wounded by a poisoned arrow, shot from a secret hand, and died in february , the nd month of his reign, and th year of his age. on being struck with the fatal weapon, he was carried to his palace at dar-el-beida, where he only survived a single day; but yet during this brief period, and whilst in the agony of dissolution, it is said, the tyrant committed more crimes and outrages, and caused more people to be sacrificed, than in his whole lifetime, determining with the vengeance of a pure fiend, that if his people would not weep for his death they should mourn for the loss of their friends and relations, like the old tyrant herod. how instinctively imitative is crime! yezeed was of course, not buried at the cross-roads, (heaven forefend!) or in a cemetery for criminals and infidels, for being a shereef, and divine (not royal) blood running in his veins, he was interred with great solemnities at the mosque of _kobah sherfah_ (tombs of the shereefs), beside the mausoleums wherein repose the awful ashes of the princes and kings, who, in ages gone by, have devastated the empire of morocco, and inflicted incalculable miseries on its unfortunate inhabitants, whilst plenarily exercising their divine right, to do wrong as sovereigns, or as invested with inviolable shereefian privileges as lineal successors of the prophets of god! [ ] a civil war still followed this monster's death, and the empire was rent and partitioned into three portions, in each of which a pretender disputed for the possession of the shereefian throne. the poor people had now three tyrants for one. the two grand competitors, however, were muley hisham, who was proclaimed sultan in the south at morrocco and sous, and muley suleiman, who was saluted as emperor in the north at fez. in , hisham retired to a sanctuary where he soon died, and then muley suleimau was proclaimed in the southern provinces emir-el-monmeneen, and sultan of the whole empire. muley suleiman proved to be a good and patriotic prince, "the shereef of shereefs," whilst he maintained, by a just administration, tranquility in his own state, and cultivated peace with europe. during his long reign of a quarter of a century, at a period when all the christian powers were convulsed with war, he wisely remained neutral, and his subjects were happy in the enjoyment of peace and prosperity. he died on the th march , about the th year of his age, after having, with his last breath declared his nephew, muley abd errahman, the legitimate and hereditary successor of the shereefs, and so restoring the lineal descent of these celebrated mussulman sovereigns. the most glorious as well as the most beneficent and acceptable act of the reign of muley suleiman, so far as european nations were concerned, was the abolition of christian slavery in his states. in former times, the maroquine moors, smarting under the ills inflicted upon them by spain and breathing revenge, subjected their christian captives to more cruel bondage, than, ever were experienced by the same victims of the corsairs in algeria, the stronghold of this nefarious trade. the shereefs have been accustomed to wrap themselves up in their sublime indifference, as to the fate and fortunes of europe. during late centuries, their diplomatic intercourse with european princes has been scarcely relieved by a single interesting event, beyond their piratical wars and our complaisant redemptions of their prisoners. but, in the reign of louis xiv., muley ismail having heard an extremely seductive account of the princesse de conti (mademoiselle de blois), natural daughter of the grand monarch and mademoiselle de la valliere, by means of his ambassador, abdullah ben aissa, had the chivalrous temerity to demand her in marriage. "our sultan," said the ambassador, "will marry her according to the law of god and the prophet, but she shall not be forced to abandon her religion, or manner of living; and she will be able to find all that her heart desires in the palace of my sovereign--if it please god." this request, of course, could not be granted, but the "king of christian kings" replied very graciously, "that the difference alone of religion prevented the consummation of the happiness of the shereef of shereefs." this humble demand of the hand of the princess mightily amused "the court of courts," and its hireling poets taxed their wit to the utmost in chanting the praises of the royal virgin, who had attacked the regards (or the growls) of the numidian tiger, as muley ismail was politely designated. take this as a specimen,-- "votre beauté, grande princesse, porte les traits dont elle blesse jusques aux plus sauvages lieux: l'afrique avec vous capitule, et les conquêtes de vos yeux vont plus loin que celles d'hercule." the maroquine ambassador, who was also grand admiral of the moorish navy, witnessing all the wonders of paris at the epoch of the great monarch, was dazzled with its beauty and magnificence; nevertheless, he remained a good mussulman. he was besides a grateful man, for he saw our james ii. in exile, who had given the admiral liberty without ransom when he had been captured by english cruisers, and heartily thanked the fallen prince for his own freedom whilst he condoled with him in his misfortunes. but the moorish envoy, in spite of his great influence, was unable to conclude the treaty of peace, which was desired by france. on his return to morocco, the ambassador had so advanced in european ideas of convenience, or civilization, that he attempted to introduce a taste for parisian luxury among his own countrymen. as in many other parts of the mediterranean, france and england have incessantly contended for influence at the court of morocco. various irregular missions to this court have been undertaken by european powers, from the first establishment of the moorish empire of the west. the french entered regularly into relations with the western moors shortly after us; their flag, indeed, began to appear at their ports in , under francis i. they succeeded in gaining the favour of the moors whilst we occupied tangier, and louis xiv. encouraged them in their efforts to attack or harass our garrison. the nature of our struggles with the moors of morocco can be at once conjectured from the titles of the pamphlets published in those times, viz. "_great_ and _bloody_ news of tangier," (london ), and "the moors _blasted_, being a discourse concerning tangier, especially when it was under the earl of teviot," (london, ). but, after the peace of utrecht, conceding gibraltar to england, and which more than compensated us for the loss of tangier, the influence of france in morocco began to wane, and the trade of this empire was absorbed by the british during the th century. then, in the beginning of our own age, the battle of trafalgar, and the fall of napoleon, established the supremacy of british influence over the minds of the shereefs, which has not been yet entirely effaced. our diplomatic intercouse has been more frequent and interesting with the western moors since the french occupation of algeria, and we have exerted our utmost to neutralize the spirit of the war party in fez, seconding the naturally pacific mind of muley abd errahman, in order to remove every pretext of the french for invading this country. how we succeeded in a critical period will be mentioned at the close of the present work. [ ] but this port, and our influence receiving thereby a great shock, i am happy to state that the latest account from this most interesting moorish country, represents muley abd errahman as steadily pursuing, by the assistance of his new vizier, bouseilam, the most pacific policy. this minister, being very rich, is enabled to consolidate his power by frequent presents to his royal master, thus gratifying the most darling passion of muley abd errahman, and vizier and sultan amuse themselves by undertaking plundering expeditions against insurrectionary tribes, whose sedition they first stimulate, and then quell, that is to say, by receiving from the unlucky rebels a handsome gratification. the late mr. hay entered into a correspondence with the shereefian court for the purpose of drawing its attention to the subject of the slave-trade, and i shall make an extract or two from the letters, bearing as they do on my present mission. from three letters addressed by the sultan to mr. hay, i extract the following passages. "be it known to you, that the traffic in slaves is a matter on which all sects and nations have agreed from the time of the sons of adam, (on whom be the peace of god up to this day). and we are not yet aware of its being prohibited by the laws of any sect, and no one need ask this question, the same being manifest to both high and low, and requires no more demonstration than the light of the day." the apostle of god is quoted as enforcing upon the master to give his slave the same clothing as himself, and not to exact more labour from him than he can perform. another letter. "it has been prohibited to sell a muslem, the sacred _misshaf_, and a young person to an unbeliever," that is to any one who does not profess the faith of islam, whether christian, jew, or majousy. to make a present, or to give as in alms is held in the same light as a sale. the said sheikh khalil also says, "a slave is emancipated by the law if ill-treated, that is, whether he intends or does actually ill-treat him. but whether a slave can take with him what he possesses of property or no, is a matter yet undecided by the doctors of the law." another. "be it known to you, that the religion of islam--may god exalt it! has a solid foundation, of which the corner stones are well secured, and the perfection whereof has been made known to us by god, to whom belongs all praise in his book, the forkam (or koran,) which admits neither of addition nor diminution. as regards the making of slaves and trading therewith, it is confirmed by our book, as also of the _sunnat_ (or traditions) of our prophet. there is no controversy among the _oulamma_ (doctors) on the subject. no one can allow what is prohibited or prohibit that which is lawful." these extracts shew the _animus_ of the shereefian correspondence. to attack the shereefs on this point of slavery, is to besiege the citadel of their religion, or that is the interpretation which they are pleased to put upon the matter; but all forms of bigotry and false principles will ultimately succumb to the force of truth. it is necessary to persevere, to persevere always, and the end will be obtained. i shall add a word or two on our treaties, or capitulations, as they are disgracefully called, with the empire of morocco, intimating, as they do, our former submission to the arrogant, piratical demands of the barbary powers in the days of their corsair glory. our political relations with morocco officially commenced in the times of elizabeth, or charles i; but the formal treaty of peace was not concluded until the last year of the reign of george i, which was ratified in by george ii, and by the sultan muley ahmed-elt-thabceby "the golden." then followed various other treaties for the security of persons and trade, and against piracy. all, however, of any value, are embodied in the treaty between great britain and morocco, signed at fez, th june , and confirmed, th january by the sultan muley suleiman, which is considered as still in force, and from which i shall extract two or three articles, appending observations, for the purpose of shewing its spirit and bearing on european commerce and civilization. common sense tells us that trade can only flourish where there is security for life and property. we have to examine, whether this security is fully guaranteed to british subjects, residing in and trading with the empire to morocco, by the treaty of and . this treaty begins with consuls, and sufficiently provides for their honour and safety. it then states the privilege of british subjects, and more particulary of merchants, residing in, and wishing to engage in commercial speculations in morocco. these privileges are, on the whole, also explicitly stated. afterwards follows two articles on "disputes," which clauses were amended and explained in january , when the treaty was confirmed. these are:-- "vii. disputes between moorish subjects and english subjects, shall be decided in the presence of the english consuls, provided the decision be comformable to the moorish law, in which case the english subject shall not go before the kady or hakem, as the consul's decision shall suffice. "viii. should any dispute occur between english subjects and moors, and that dispute should occasion a complaint from either of the parties, the emperor of morocco shall only decide the matter. if the english subject be guilty, he shall not be punished with more severity than a moor would be; should he escape, no other subject of the english nation shall be arrested in his stead, and if the escape be made after the decision, in order to avoid punishment, he shall be sentenced as a moor would be who had committed the same crime. should any dispute occur in the english territories, between a moor and an english subject, it shall be decided by an equal number of the moors residing there and of christians, according to the custom of the place, if not contrary to the moorish law." in the amended clause of article viii. we have for any complaint, substituted serious personal injury, and i cannot but observe that the making of the emperor the final judge, in such case, is a stretch of too great confidence in moorish justice. not that a sultan of morocco is necessarily bad or worse than an european sovereign, but because a personage of such power and character, armed with unbounded attributes of despotism over his own subjects, who are considered his abeed, or slaves, whilst feebly aided by the perception of the common rights of men, and imperfectly acquainted with european civilization, can never, unless, indeed by accident or miracle, justly decide upon the case of an englishman, or upon a dispute between his own and a foreign subject; for besides the ideas and education of the emperor, there is the necessity which his imperial highness feels, despot as he is, of exhibiting himself before his people as their undoubted friend and partial judge. so strongly have sultans of morocco felt this, that many anecdotes might be cited where the emperor has indemnified the foreigner for injury done to him by his own subjects, whilst he has represented to them that he has decided the case against the stranger. it is surprising how a british government could surrender the settlement of the dispute of their subjects to the final appeal of the court of morocco in the nineteenth century, and, moreover, allow them to be decided, according to the maxims of the mohammedan code, or comformable to the moorish law! it is not long ago since, indeed just before my arrival in morocco, that the emperor decided a dispute in rather a summary manner, without even the usual moorish forms of judicial proceedure by decapitating, a quasi--european jew, under french protection, and who once acted as the consul of france. there is something singularly deficient and wrong, although to persons unacquainted with barbary, it looks sufficiently fair and just, in the provision--"he (the english guilty subject) shall not be punished with more severity than a moor could be," fairly made? in the first place, although this does not come under the idea of "serious personal injury," would the english people approve of their countrymen suffering the same punishment as the moors for theft, by cutting off their right hand? moors and arabs have been so maimed for life, on being convicted of stealing property to the value of a single shilling! who will take upon himself to enumerate the punishments, which may be, and are inflicted for grave offences? it may be replied that this stipulation of punishing british subjects, like moorish, is only on paper, and we have no examples of its being put into execution. i rejoin, without attempting to cite proof, that, whilst such an article exists in a treaty, said to be binding on the government of england as well as morocco, there can be no real security for british subjects in this country; for in the event of the maroquines acting strictly upon the articles of this treaty, what mode of inculpation, or what colour of right, can the british government adopt or shew against them? and what are treaties made for, if they do not bind both parties? in illustration of the way in which british subjects have their disputes sometimes settled, according to articles vii and viii, i take the liberty of introducing the case of mr. saferty, a respectable gibraltar merchant, settled at mogador. a few months before my arrival in that place, this gentleman was adjudged, in the presence of his consul, mr. willshire, and the governor of mogador, for repelling an insult offered to him by a moor, and sentenced to be imprisoned with felons and cut-throats in a horrible dungeon. however, mr. saferty was attended by a numerous body of his friends; so when the sentence was given, a cry of indignation arose, a scuffle ensued, and the prisoner was rescued from the moorish police-officers. mr. willshire found the means of patching up the business with the moorish authorities, and the case was soon forgotten. "all's well that ends well." i do not say that the moors are determinedly vindictive, or seek quarrels with europeans; on the contrary, i believe the cause of the dispute frequently rests with the european, and the bonâ-fide agressor, some adventurer whose conduct was so bad in his own country, that he sought barbary as a refuge from the pursuit of the minister of justice. what i wish to lay stress on is, the enormous power given to the emperor, by a solemn treaty, in making him the final judge, and the imminent exposure of british subjects to the barbarous punishments of a semi-civilized people. article x is a most singular one. "renegades from the english nation, or subjects who change their religion to embrace the moorish, they being of unsound mind at the time of turning moors, shall not be admitted as moors, and may again return to their former religion; but if they afterwards resolve to be moors, they must abide by their own decision, and their excuses will not be accepted." it was a wonderful discovery of our modern morale, that a renegade, being a madman, should not be considered a renegade in earnest, or responsible for his actions. nevertheless, these unfortunate beings, should they have better thoughts, or as mad-doctors have it, "a lucid interval," and leave the profession of the mahometan faith, and afterwards again relapse into madness, and turn mahometans once more, are doomed to irretrievable slavery, or if they relapse, to death itself; the mahometan law, punishes relapsing renegades with death. this curious clause says, "that though being madmen, they must abide their decision (of unreason) and their excuses will not be accepted." this said article was confirmed as late as the year by the plenipotentiary of a nation, which boasts of being the most free and civilized of europe, and whose people spend annually millions for the conversion of the heathen, and the extinction of the slave-trade. the last clause of article iv also demands our attention, viz. "and if any english merchant should happen to have a vessel in or outside the port, he may go on board himself, or any of his people, without being liable to pay anything whatever." now in spite of this (but of course forgotten) stipulation, the merchants of mogador are not permitted to visit their own vessels, nor those of other persons which may happen to be in or outside the port. it is true, the authorities plead the reason of their refusal to be, "the merchants are indebted to the emperor:" neither will the authorities take any security, and arbitrarily, and insolently prohibit, under any circumstances, the merchants from visiting their vessels. i have said enough to shew that our treaties (i beg the reader's pardon, "capitulations") with the emperor of morocco, require immediate revision, and to be amended with articles more suited to the spirit of the age, and european civilization, as likewise more consistent with the dignity of great britian. the treaty for the supply of provisions, especially cattle, to the garrison of gibraltar is either a verbal one, or a secret arrangement, for no mention is made of it in the published state paper documents. it is probably a mere verbal unwritten understanding, but, neverthelesss is more potent in its working than the written treaties. this is not the first time that the unwritten has proved stronger than the written engagement. chapter iii. the two different aspects by which the strength and resources of the empire of morocco may be viewed or estimated.--native appellation of morocco.--geographical limits of this country.--historical review of the inhabitants of north africa, and the manner in which this region was successively peopled and conquered.--the distinct varieties of the human race, as found in morocco.--nature of the soil and climate of this country.--derem, or the atlas chain of mountains.--natural products.--the shebbel, or barbary salmon; different characters of exports of the northern and southern provinces.--the elæonderron argan.--various trees and plants.--mines.--the sherb-errech, or desert-horse. the empire of morocco may be considered under two aspects, as to its extent, and as to its influence. it may be greatly circumscribed or expanded to an almost indefinite extent, according to the feelings, or imagination, of the writer, or speaker. a resident here gave me a meagre _tableau_, something like this, the city of morocco , souls. " fez , " " mequinez , " ------- , " the maritime cities contain little more than , inhabitants, making altogether about , . over the provinces of the south, sous and wadnoun, the sultan has no real power; so the south is cut off as an integral portion of the empire. over the rif, or the northern berber provinces, the sultan exercises a precarious sovereignty, every man's gun or knife is there his law and authority. fez contains a disaffected population, teeming some years since with the adherents of abd-el-kader. then the atlas is full of quasi-independent berber tribes, who detest equally the arabs and the moorish government; finally, tafilett and the provinces on the eastern side of the atlas, are too remote to feel the influence of the central government. as to military force, the emperor's standing army does not amount to more than or , nigritian troops, and all cavalry. the irregular and contingent cavalry and infantry can never be depended upon, even under such a chief as abd-el-kader was. they must always be fed, but they will not, at any summons, leave the cultivation of their fields, or their wives and children defenceless. as to the commerce of the empire, with fifty ships visiting mogador and other maritime cities, the amount, per annum, does not exceed forty millions of francs, or about a million and a half sterling including imports and exports. such is the view of the empire on the depreciating side. another resident of this country gives the opposite or more favourable view. the sultan is the head of the orthodox religion of the mussulmen of the west, and more firmly established on his throne than the sultan of the ottomans. his influence, as a sovereign shereef, spreads throughout western barbary and central africa, wherever there is a mussulman to be found. in the event of an enemy appearing in the shape of a christian, or infidel, all would unite, including the most disjointed and hostile tribes against the common foe of islamism. the sultan, upon an emergency or insurrection in his own empire, by the politic distribution of titles of _marabout_ (often used as a species of degree of d.d.) and other honours attached to the shereefian parasol, can likewise easily excite one chief against another, and consolidate his power over their intestine divisions. his moorish majesty, at any rate, has always actual possession in his favour; and, whether he really governs the whole empire or not, or to the extent which he has presumed to mark out its boundaries, he can always proclaim to his disjointed provinces that he does so govern it and exercise authority; and, in general, he does succeed in making both his own people and foreign nations believe in his pretensions, and acknowledge his power. the truth lies, perhaps, between these extremes. the shereefs once pretended to exercise authority over all western sahara as far as timbuctoo, that is to say, all that region of the great desert lying west of the touaricks. the account of the expedition of the shereef mohammed, who penetrated as far as wadnoun, and which took place more than three centuries ago, as related by marmol, leaves no doubt of the ancient ambition of the sovereign of morocco. and although this pretension has now been given up, they still claim sovereignty over the oases of touat, a month's journey in the sahara. formerly, indeed, the authority of the maroquine sultans over touat and the south appears to have been more real and effective. diego de torres relates that, in his time, the shereefs maintained a force of ten thousand cavalry in the provinces of draha, tafilett and jaguriri, and monsieur mouette counts touat as one of the provinces of the empire. the sheikh haj kasem, in the itinerary which he dictated to monsieur delaporte, says that, about forty years ago, agobli and taoudeni depended on morocco. this, however, is what the people of ghadames told me, whilst they admitted that the oases neither did contain a single officer of the emperor, nor did the people pay his shereefian highness the smallest impost. the sultan's authority is now indeed purely nominal, and the french look forward to the time when these fine and centrally placed oases will form "une dependance de l'algérie." the only countries in the south which now pay a regular impost to the emperor, are tafilett, limited to the valley of fez, wad-draha as far as the lake ed-debaia, and sous. the countries of sidi, hashem, and wadnoun nominally acknowledge the emperor, and occasionally send a present; but the most mountainous, between sous and wad-draha, which has been called guezoula or gouzoula, and is said to be peopled by a berber race, sprang from the ancient gelulir, is entirely independent. in the north and west are also many quasi-independent tribes, but still the emperor keeps up a sort of authority over them; and, if nothing more, is content simply with being called their sultan. maroquine moors call their country el-gharb, "the west," and sometimes mogrel-el-aksa, that is "the far west:" [ ] the name seems to have originated something in the same way among the saracenic conquerors, as the "far west" with the anglo-americans, arising from an apprehensive feeling of indefinite extent of unexplored country. among the moors generally, morocco is now often called, "blad muley abd errahman", or "country of the sultan muley abd errahman." the northwestern portion of morocco was first conquered; morocco proper, sous and tafilett were added with the progress of conquest. but scarcely a century has elapsed since their union under one common sultan, whilst the diverse population of the four states are solely kept together by the interests and feelings of a common religion. the maroquine empire, with its present limits, is bounded on the north by the mediterranean sea and the straits of gibraltar, on the west by the atlantic ocean and the canary and madeira islands, on the south by the deserts of noun draha and the sahara, on the east by algeria, the atlas, and tafilett, on the borders of sahara beyond their eastern slopes. the greatest length from north to south is about five hundred miles, with a breadth from east to west varying considerably at an average of two hundred, containing an available or really _dependent_ territory of some , square miles, or nearly as large as spain; and the whole is situate between the ° and ° n. latitude. monsieur benou, in his "description géographique de l'empire de maroc" says morocco "comprend une superficie d'environ , myriamètres carrés, un peu plus grande, par conséquant, que celle de la france, qui équivaut à , ." this then is the available and immediate territory of morocco, not comprising distant dependencies, where the shereefs exercise a precarious or nominal sovereignty. previously to particularizing the population of morocco, i shall take the liberty of introducing some general observations on the whole of the inhabitants of north africa, and the manner in which this country was successively peopled and conquered. greek and roman classics contain only meagre and confused notions of the aborigines of north africa, although they have left us a mass of details on the punic wars, and the struggles which ensued between the romans and the ancient libyans, before the domination of the latin republic could be firmly established. herodotus cites the names of a number of people who inhabited north africa, mostly confining himself to repeat the fables or the more interesting facts, of which they were the object. the nomenclature of strabo is neither so extensive, nor does it contain more precise or correct information. he mentions the celebrated oasis of ammonium and the nation of the nasamones. farther west, behind carthage and the numidians, he also notices the getulians, and after them the garamantes, a people who appear to have colonized both the oasis of ghadames and the oases of fezzan. ptolemy makes the whole of the mauritania, including algeria and morocco, to be bounded on the south by tribes, called gaetuliae and melanogaeluti, on the south the latter evidently having contracted alliance of blood with the negroes. according to sallust, who supports himself upon the authority of heimpsal, the carthaginian historian, "north africa was first occupied by libyans and getulians, who were a barbarous people, a heterogeneous mass, or agglomeration of people of different races, without any form of religion or government, nourishing themselves on herbs, or devouring the raw flesh of animals killed in the chase; for first amongst these were found blacks, probably some from the interior of africa, and belonging to the great negro family; then whites, issue of the semitic stock, who apparently constituted, even at that early period, the dominant race or caste. later, but at an epoch absolutely unknown, a new horde of asiatics," says sallust, "of medes, persians, and armenians, invaded the countries of the atlas, and, led on by hercules, pushed their conquests as far as spain." [ ] the persians, mixing themselves with the former inhabitants of the coast, formed the tribes called numides, or numidians (which embrace the provinces of tunis and constantina), whilst the medes and the armenians, allying themselves with the libyans, nearer to spain, it is pretended, gave existence to a race of moors, the term medes being changed into that of moors. [ ] as to the getulians confined in the valleys of the atlas, they resisted all alliance with the new immigrants, and formed the principal nucleus of those tribes who have ever remained in north africa, rebels to a foreign civilization, or rather determined champions of national freedom, and whom, imitating the romans and arabs, we are pleased to call barbarians or berbers (barbari brâber [ ]), and whence is derived the name of the barbary states. but the romans likewise called the aboriginal tribes of north africa, moors, or mauri, and some contend that moors and berbers are but two different names for the aboriginal tribes, the former being of greek and the latter of african origin. the romans might, however, confound the african term berber with barbari, which latter they applied, like the greeks, to all strangers and foreigners. the revolutions of africa cast a new tribe of emigrants upon the north african coast, who, if we are to believe the byzantine historian, procopius, of the sixth century, were no other than canaanites, expelled from palestine by the victorious arms of joshua, when he established the israelites in that country. procopius affirms that, in his time, there was a column standing at tigisis, on which was this inscription:--"we are those who fled from the robber joshua, son of nun." [ ] now whether tigisis was in algeria, or was modern tangier, as some suppose, it is certain there are several traditions among the berber tribes of morocco, which relate that their ancestors were driven out of palestine. also, the berber historian, ebn-khal-doun, who flourished in the fourteenth century, makes all the berbers descend from one bar, the son of mayigh, son of canaan. however, what may be the truths of these traditions of sallust or procopius, there is no difficulty in believing that north africa was peopled by fugitive and roving tribes, and that the first settlers should be exposed to be plundered by succeeding hordes; for such has been the history of the migrations of all the tribes of the human race. but the most ancient historical fact on which we can depend is, the invasion, or more properly, the successive invasions of north africa by the phoenicians. their definite establishment on these shores took place towards the foundation of carthage, about years before our era. yet we know little of their intercourse or relations with the aboriginal tribes. when the romans, a century and a half before christ, received, or wrested, the rule of africa from the phoenicians, or carthaginians, they found before them an indigenous people, whom they indifferently called moors, berbers, or barbarians. a part of these people were called also nudides, which is perhaps considered the same term as nomades. some ages later, the romans, too weak to resist a vigorous invasion of other conquerors, were subjugated by the vandals, who, during a century, held possession of north africa; but, after this time, the romans again raised their heads, and completely expelled or extirpated the vandals, so that, as before, there were found only two people or races in africa: the romans and the moors, or aborigines. towards the middle of the seventh century after christ, and a few years after the death of mahomet, the romans, in the decline of their power, had to meet the shock of the victorious arms of the arabians, who poured in upon them triumphant from the east; but, too weak to resist this new tide of invasion, they opposed to them the aborigines, which latter were soon obliged to continue alone the struggle. the arabian historians, who recount these wars, speak of _roumi_ or romans (of the byzantine empire) and the brâber--evidently the aboriginal tribes--who promptly submitted to the arabs to rid themselves of the yoke of the romans; but, after the retreat of their ancient masters, they revolted and remained a long time in arms against their new conquerors--a rule of action which all subjugated nations have been wont to follow. were we english now to attempt to expel the french from algeria, we, undoubtedly, should be joined by the arabs; but who would, most probably, soon also revolt against us, were we to attempt to consolidate our dominion over them. in the first years of the eighth century, and at the end of the first century of the hegira, the conquering arabs passed over to spain, and, inasmuch as they came from mauritania, the people of spain gave them the name of moors (that of the aborigines of north africa), although they had, perhaps, nothing in common with them, if we except their asiatic origin. another and most singular name was also given to these arab warriors in france and other parts of europe--that of saracens--whose etymology is extremely obscure. [ ] from this time the spaniards have always given the names of moors (_los moros_), not only to the arabs of spain, but to all the arabs; and, confounding farther these two denominations, they have bestowed the name of _moros_ upon the arabs of morocco and those in the environs of senegal. the arabs who invaded northern africa about , were all natives of asia, belonging to various provinces of arabia, and were divided into ismaelites, amalekites, koushites, &c. they were all warriors; and it is considered a title of nobility to have belonged to their first irruption of the enthusiastic sons of the prophet. a second invasion took place towards the end of the ninth century--an epoch full of wars--during which, the caliph kaïm transported the seat of his government from kairwan to cairo, ending in the complete submission of morocco to the power of yousef ben tashfin. one cannnot now distinguish which tribe of arabs belong to the first or the second invasion, but all who can shew the slightest proof, claim to belong to the first, as ranking among a band of noble and triumphant warriors. after eight centuries of rule, the arabs being expelled from spain, took refuge in barbary, but instead of finding the hospitality and protection of their brethren, the greater part of them were pillaged or massacred. the remnant of these wretched fugitives settled along the coast; and it is to their industry and intelligence that we owe the increase, or the foundation of many of the maritime cities. here, considered as strangers and enemies by the natives, whom they detested, the new colonists sought for, and formed relations with turks and renegades of all nations, whilst they kept themselves separate from the arabs and berbers. this, then, is the _bonâ-fide_ origin of the people whom we now generally call moors. history furnishes us with a striking example of how the expelled arabs of spain united with various adventurers against the berber and north african arabs. in the year , a thousand andalusian cavaliers, who had emigrated to algiers, formed an alliance with the barbarossas and their fleet of pirates; and, after expelling the native prince, built the modern city of algiers. and such was the origin of the algerine corsairs. the general result of these observations would, therefore, lead us to consider the moors of the romans, as the berbers or aborigines of north africa, and the moors of the spaniards, as pure arabians; and if, indeed, these arabian cavaliers marshalled with them berbers, as auxiliaries, for the conquest of spain, this fact does not militate against the broad assumption. the so-called moors of senegal and the sahara, as well as those of morocco, are chiefly a mixture of berbers, arabs and negroes; but the present moors located in the northern coast of africa, are rather the descendants from the various conquering nations, and especially from renegades and christian slaves. the term moors is not known to the natives themselves. the people speak definitely enough of arabs and of various berber tribes. the population of the towns and cities are called generally after the names of these towns and cities, whilst tuniseen and tripoline is applied to all the inhabitants of the great towns of tunis and tripoli. europeans resident in barbary, as a general rule, call all the inhabitants of towns--moors, and the peasants or people residents in tents--arabs. but, in tripoli, i found whole villages inhabited by arabs, and these i thought might be distinguished as town arabs. then the mountains of tripoli are covered with arab villages, and some few considerable towns are inhabited by people who are _bonâ-fide_ arabs. finally, the capitals of north africa are filled with every class of people found in the country. the question is then where shall we draw the line of distinction in the case of nationalities? or can we, with any degree of precision, define the limits which distinguish the various races in north africa? with regard to the blacks or negro tribes, there can be no great difficulty. the jews are also easily distinguished from the rest of the people as well by their national features as by their dress and habits or customs of living. but, when we come to the berbers, arabs, moors and turks, we can only distinguish them in their usual and ordinary occupations and manners of life. whenever they are intermixed, or whenever they change their position, that is to say, whenever the arab or berber comes to dwell in a town, or a moor or a turk goes to reside in the country, adopting the arab or berber dress and mode of living, it is no longer possible to distinguish the one from the other, or mark the limitation of races. and since it is seen that the aborigines of northern africa consisted, with the exception of the negro tribes, of the asiatics of the caucasian race or variety, many of whom, like the phoenicians, have peopled various cities and provinces of europe, it is therefore not astonishing we should find all the large towns and cities of north africa, where the human being becomes _policed_, refined and civilized sooner than in remote and thinly-inhabited districts, teeming with a population, which at once challenges an european type, and a corresponding origin with the great european family of nations. north africa is wonderfully homogeneous in the matter of religion. the people, indeed, have but one religion. even the extraneous judaism is the same in its deism--depression of the female--circumcision and many of the religious customs, festivals and traditions. and this has a surprising effect in assimilating the opposite character and sharpest peculiarities of various races of otherwise distinct and independant origin. the population of morocco presents five distant races and classes of people; berbers, arabs, moors, jews and negroes. turks are not found in morocco, and do not come so far west; but sons of turks by moorish women in kouroglies are included among the moors, that have emigrated from algeria. maroquine berbers, include the varieties of the amayeegh [ ] and the shelouh, who mostly are located in the mountains, while the arabs are settled on the plains. the moors are the inhabitants of towns and cities, consisting of a mixture of nearly all races, a great proportion of them being of the descendants of the moors expelled from spain. all these races have been, and will still be, farther noticed in the progress of the work. the proximate amount of this population is six millions. the greater number of the towns and cities are situate on the coast, excepting the three or four capitals, or imperial cities. the other towns of the interior should be considered rather as forts to awe neighbouring tribes, or as market villages (_souks_), where the people collect together for the disposal and exchange of their produce. numerous tribes, located in the atlas, escape the notice of the imposts of imperial authority. their varieties and amount of population are equally unknown. in the immense group of gibel thelge (snowy mountains), some of the tribes are said to have their faces shaved, like christians, and to wear boots. we can understand why a people inhabiting a cold region of rain and mists and perpetual snow should wear boots; but as to their shaving like christians, this is rather vague. but it is not impossible the atlas contains the descendants of some european refugees. the nature of the soil and climate of morocco are not unlike those of spain and portugal; and though morocco does not materially differ from other parts of barbary, its greater extent of coast on the atlantic, along which the tradewind of the north coast blows nine months out of twelve, and its loftier ridges of the atlas, so temper its varied surface of hill and plain and vast declivities that, together with the absence of those marshy districts which in hot climates engender fatal disease, this country may be pronounced, excepting perhaps tunis, the most healthy in all africa. in the northern provinces, the climate is nearly the same as that of spain; in the southern there is less rain and more of the desert heat, but this is compensated for by the greater fertility in the production of valuable staple articles of commerce. nevertheless, morocco has its extremes of heat and cold, like all the north african coast. the most striking object of this portion of the crust of the globe, is the vast atlas chain of mountains [ ], which traverses morocco from north-east to south-west, whose present ascertained culminating point, miltsin, is upwards of , feet above the level of the sea, or equal to the highest peaks of the pyrenees. the maroquine portion of the atlas contains its highest peaks, which stretch from the east of tripoli to the atlantic ocean, at santa cruz; and we find no mountains of equal height, except in the tenth degree of north latitude, or , miles south, or , south, south-east. the rif coast has a mountainous chain of some considerable height, but the atlantic coast offers chiefly ridges of hills. the coasts of morocco are not much indented, and consequently have few ports, and these offer poor protection from the ocean. the general surface of morocco presents a large ridge or lock, with two immense declivities, one sloping n.w. to the ocean, with various rivers and streams descending from this enormous back-bone of the atlas, and the other fulling towards the sahara, s.e., feeding the streams and affluents of wad draha, and other rivers, which are lost in the sands of the desert. this shape of the country prevents the formation of those vast _sebhahas_, or salt lakes, so frequent in algeria and the south of tunis. we are acquainted only with two lakes of fresh or sweet water--that of debaia, traversed by wad draha,--and that of gibel-akhder, which leo compares to lake bolsena. the height of the mountains, and the uniformity of their slopes, produce large and numerous rivers; indeed, the most considerable of all north africa. these rivers of the north are shortest, but have the largest volume of water; those of the south are larger, but are nearly dry the greater part of the year. none of them are navigable far inland. some abound with fish, particularly the shebbel, or barbary salmon. it is neither so rich nor so large as our salmon, and is whitefleshed; it tastes something like herring, but is of a finer and more delicate flavour. they are abundant in the market of mogudor. the shebbel, converted by the spaniards sabalo, is found in the guadalquivir. the products of the soil are nearly the same as in other parts of barbary. on the plains, or in the open country, the great cultivation is wheat and barley; in suburban districts, vegetables and fruits are propagated. in a commercial point of view, the north exports cattle, grain, bark, leeches, and skins; and the south exports gums, almonds, ostrich-feathers, wax, wool, and skins, as principle staple produce. when the rains cease or fail, the cultivation is kept up by irrigation, and an excellent variety of fruits and esculent vegetables are produced; indeed, nearly all the vegetables and fruit-trees of southern europe are here abundantly and successfully cultivated, besides those peculiar to an african clime and soil. in the south, grows a tree peculiar to this country, the eloeondenron argan, so called from its arabic name argan. this tree produces fruit resembling the olive, whose egg-shaped, brown, smooth and very hard stone, encloses a flat almond, of a white colour, and of a very disagreeable taste, which, when crushed, produces a rancid oil, used commonly as a substitute for olive-oil. the tree itself is bushy and large, and sometimes grows of the size to a wide-spreading oak. not far from mogador are several argan forests. the level country of the north is covered with forests of dwarfish oak; some bear sweet, and others bitter acorns, and also the cork-tree, whose bark is a considerable object of commerce. in the atlas, has been found the magnificent cedar of lebanon. this tree has also been met with in algeria, but only on the mountains, some forty thousand feet above the level of the sea. in the south there is, of course, growing in all its saharan vigour, the noble date-palm, and by its side, squats the palmetto, or dwarf-palm (in arabic _dauma_). of trees and plants, the usual tinzah, and snouber or pine of aleppo, are used for preparing the fine leathers of morocco. many plants are also deleteriously employed for exciting intoxication, or inflaming the passions. morocco has its mines of gold, silver, lead, iron, tin, sulphur, mineral, salt, and antimony; but nearly all are neglected, or unworked. government will not encourage the industry of the people, for fear of exciting the cupidity of foreigners. a frenchman, a short time ago, reported a silver mine in the south, and government immediately bribed him to make another statement that there was no such mine. at elala and stouka, in the province of sous, are several rich silver mines. gold is found in the atlas and the lower sous. but this country is especially rich in copper mines. a great number of ancient and modern authors speak of these mines, which are situate in the mountainous country comprised between aghadir, morocco, talda, tamkrout, and akka. the mines most worked, are those of tedsi and afran. at the foot of the atlas, near taroudant, is a great quantity of sulphur. in the neighbourhood of morocco, saltpetre is found. in the province of abda is an extensive salt lake, and salt has been exported from this country to timbuctoo. of precious stones, some fine specimens of amethyst have been discovered. there are scarcely any animals peculiar to morocco, or which are not found in other parts of north africa. davidson mentions some curious facts relative to the desert horse; "_sherb-errech_, wind-bibber, or drinker of the wind," a variety of this animal, which is not to be met with in the saharan regions of tunis, or tripoli. this horse is fed only on camel's milk, and is principally used for hunting ostriches, which are run down by it, and then captured. [ ] the _sherb-errech_ will continue running three or four days together without any food. it is a slight and spare-formed animal, mostly in wretched condition, with ugly thick legs, and devoid of beauty as a horse. chapter iv. division of morocco into kingdoms or states, and zones or regions.-- description of the towns and cities on the maroquine coasts of the mediterranean and atlantic waters.--the zafarine isles.--melilla.-- alhucemas.--penon de velez.--tegaza.--provinces of rif and garet.-- tetouan.--ceuta.--arzila.--el araish.--mehedia.--salee.--rabat.-- fidallah.--dar-el-beidah.--azamour.--mazagran.--saffee.--waladia. morocco has been divided into states, or kingdoms by europeans, although such divisions scarcely exist in the administration of the native princes. the ancient division mentioned by leo was that of two large provinces of morocco and fez, separated by the river bouragrag, which empties itself into the sea between rabat and salee; and, indeed, for several centuries, these districts were separated and governed by independent princes. tafilett always, and sous occasionally, were united to morocco, while fez itself formed a powerful kingdom, extending itself eastward as far as the gates of tlemsen. the modern division adopted by several authors, is-- northern, or the kingdom of fez. central, or the kingdom of morocco. eastern, or the province of tafilett. southern, or the province of sous. some add to this latter, the province of draha. then, a great number of districts are enumerated as comprehended in these large and general divisions; but the true division of all mussulman states is into tribes. there is besides another, which more approaches to european government, viz, into kaidats, or jurisdictions. the name of a district is usually that of its chief tribe, and mountains are denominated after the tribes that inhabit them. there is, of course, a natural division, sometimes called a dividing into zones or specific regions, which has already been alluded to in enumerating the natural resources of morocco, and which besides corresponds with the present political divisions. i. the north of the atlas: coming first, the rif, or mountainous region, which borders the mediterranean from the river moulwia to tangier, comprising the districts of hashbat west, and gharet and aklaia east. then the intermediate zone of plains and hills, which extends from the middle course of the moulwia to tangier on one coast, and to mogador on the other. ii. the central region, or the great chain of the atlas. the deren [ ] of the natives, from the frontiers of algeria east to cape gheer, on the south-west. this includes the various districts of the gharb, temsna, beni hasan, shawia, fez, todla, dukala, shragno, abda, haha, shedma, khamna, morocco, &c. iii. south of the atlas: or quasi-saharan region, comprising the various provinces and districts of sous, sidi hisham, wadnoun, guezoula, draha (drâa), tafilett, and a large portion of the sahara, south-east of the atlas. as to statistics of population i am inclined fully to admit the statement of signor balbi that, the term of african statistics ought to be rejected as absurd. count hemo de gräberg, who was a long time consul at tangier, and wrote a statistical and geographical account of the empire of morocco, states the number of the inhabitants of the town of mazagran to be two thousand. mr. elton who resided there several months, assured me it does not contain more than one hundred. another gentleman who dwelt there says, three hundred. this case is a fair sample of the style in which the statistics of population in morocco are and have been calculated. before the occupation of algeria by the french, all the cities were vulgarly calculated at double, or treble their amount of population. this has also been the case even in india, where we could obtain, with care, tolerably correct statistics. the prejudices of oriental and africo-eastern people are wholly set against statistics, or numbering the population. no mother knows the age of her own child. it is ill-omened, if not an affront, to ask a man how many children he has; and to demand the amount of the population of a city, is either constructed as an infringement upon the prerogative of the omnipotent creator, who knows how many people he creates, and how to take care of them, or it is the question of a spy, who is seeking to ascertain the strength or weakness of the country. europeans can, therefore, rarely obtain any correct statistical information in morocco: all is proximate and conjectural. [ ] i am anxious, nevertheless, to give some particulars respecting the population, in order that we may really have a proximate idea of the strength and resources of this important country. in describing the towns and cities of the various provinces, i shall divide them into, . towns and cities of the coast. . capital or royal cities. . other towns and remarkable places in the interior [ ]. the towns and ports, on the mediterranean, are of considerable interest, but our information is very scanty, except as far as relates to the _praesidios_ of spain, or the well-known and much frequented towns of tetuan and tangier. near the mouth of the malwia (or fifteen miles distant), is the little town of kalat-el-wad, with a castle in which the governor resides. whether the river is navigable up to this place, i have not been able to discover. the water-communication of the interior of north africa is not worth the name. zaffarinds or jafarines, are three isles lying off the west of the river mulweeah, at a short distance, or near its mouth. these belong to spain, and have recently been additionally fortified, but why, or for what reason, is not so obvious. opposite to them, there is said to be a small town, situate on the mainland. the spaniards, in the utter feebleness and decadence of their power, have lately dubbed some one or other "captain-general of the spanish possessions, &c. in north africa." melilla or melilah is a very ancient city, founded by the carthaginians, built near a cape called by the romans, _rusadir_ (now tres-forcas) the name afterwards given to the city, and which it still retains in the form of ras-ed-dir, (head of the mountain). this town is the capital of the province of garet, and is said to contain , souls. it is situate amidst a vast tract of fine country, abounding in minerals, and most delicious honey, from which it is pretended the place receives its name. on an isle near, and joined to the mainland by a draw-bridge, is the spanish _praesidio_, or convict-settlement called also melilla, containing a population of , according to the spanish, but rabbi and gräberg do not give it more than a thousand. at a short distance, towards the east, is an exceedingly spacious bay, of twenty-two miles in circumference, where, they say, a thousand ships of war could be anchored in perfect safety, and where the ancient galleys of venice carried on a lucrative trade with fez. within the bay, three miles inland, are the ruins of the ancient city of eazaza, once a celebrated place. alhucemos, is another small island and _praesidio_ of the spaniards, containing five or six hundred inhabitants; it commands the bay of the same name, and is situate at the mouth of the river wad nechor, where there is also the islet of ed-housh. near the bay, is the ancient capital, mezemma, now in ruins; it had, however, some commercial importance in the times of louis xiv., and carried on trade with france. peñon de velez is the third _praesidio_-island, a convict settlement of the spaniards on this coast, and a very strong position, situate opposite the mouths of the river gomera, which disembogues in the mediterranean. the garrison contains some nine hundred inhabitants. so far as natural resources are concerned, peñon de velez is a mere rock, and a part of the year is obliged to be supplied with fresh water from the mainland. immediately opposite to the continent is the city of gomera (or badis), the ancient parientina, or perhaps the acra of ptolemy, afterwards called belis, and by the spaniards, velez de la gomera. the name gomera, according to j.a. conde, is derived from the celebrated arab tribe of the gomeres, who flourished in africa and spain until the last moorish kings of granada. count graberg pretends gomera now contains three thousand inhabitants! whilst other writers, and of later date, represent this ancient city, which has flourished and played an important part through many ages, as entirely abandoned, and the abode of serpents and hyaenas. gellis is a small port, six miles east of velez de gomera. tegaza is a small town and port, at two miles or less from the sea near pescadores point, inhabited mostly by fishermen, and containing a thousand souls. the provinces of rif and garet, containing these maritime towns are rich and highly cultivated, but inhabited by a warlike and semi-barbarous race of berbers, over whom the emperor exercises an extremely precarious authority. among these tribes, abd-el-kader sought refuge and support when he was obliged to retire from algeria, and, where he defied all the power of the imperial government for several months. had the emir chosen, he could have remained in rif till this time; but he determined to try his strength with the sultan in a pitch battle, which should decide his fate. the savage rifians assemble for barter and trade on market-days, which are occasions of fierce and incessant quarrels among themselves, when it is not unusual for two or three persons to be left dead on the spot. should any unfortunate vessel strike on these coasts, the crew find themselves in the hands of inhuman wreckers. no european traveller has ever visited these provinces, and we may state positively that journeying here is more dangerous than in the farthest wastes of the sahara. spanish renegades, however, are found among them, who have escaped from the _praesidios_, or penal settlements. the rif country is full of mines, and is bounded south by one of the lesser chains of the atlas running parallel with the coast. forests of cork clothe the mountain-slopes; the berbers graze their herds and flocks in the deep green valleys, and export quantities of skins. tetuan, the yagath of the romans, situate at the opening of the straits of gibraltar, four or five miles from the sea, upon the declivity of a hill and within two small ranges of mountains, is a fine, large, rich and mercantile city of the province of hasbat. it has a resident governor of considerable power and consequence, the name of the present functionary being hash-hash, who has long held the appointment, and enjoys great influence near the sultan. half a mile east of the city passes from the south wad marteen, (the cus of marmol) which disembogues into the sea; on its banks is the little port of marteen or marteel, not quite two miles distant from the coast, and about three from the city, where a good deal of commerce is carried on, small vessels, laden with the produce of barbary, sailing thence to spain, gibraltar, and even france and italy. the population of tetouan is from nine to twelve thousand souls, including, besides moors and arabs, four thousand jews, two thousand negroes, and eight thousand berbers. the streets are generally formed into arcades, or covered bazaars. the jews have a separate quarter; their women are celebrated for their beauty. the suburbs are adorned with fine gardens, and olive and vine plantations. orange groves, or rather orange forests, extend for miles around, yielding their golden treasures. a great export of oranges could be established here, which might be conveyed overland to india. altogether, tetuan is one of the most respectable coast-cities of morocco, though it has no port immediately adjoining it. its fortifications are only strong enough to resist the attack of hostile berbers. the town is about two-thirds of a day's journey from tangier, south-east. a fair day's journey would be, in morocco, upwards of thirty english miles, but a good deal depends upon the season of the year when you travel. ceuta is considered to be esilissa of ptolemy, and was once the capital of mauritania tingitana. the arabs call it sebât and sebta, _i.e._, "seven," after the romans, who called it _septem fratres_, and the greeks the same, apparently on account of the seven mountains, which are in the neighbourhood. ceuta, or sebta, is evidently the modern form of this classic name. it is a very ancient city and celebrated fortress, situate fourteen miles south of gibraltar, nearly opposite to it, as a species of rival stronghold, and placed upon a peninsula, which detaches itself from the continent on the east, and turns then to the north. the city extends over the tongue of land nearest the continent; the citadel occupies monte-del-acho, called formerly jibel-el-mina, a name still preserved in almina, a suburb to the south-east. in the beginning of the eighth century, ceuta, which was inhabited by the goths, passed into the hands of the arabs, who made it a point of departure for the expeditions into spain. it was conquered by the powerful arab family of the ben-hamed, one of whom, called mohammed edris, invaded spain, and, after several conquests, was proclaimed king of cordova, in a.d. , , on st of august, , the portuguese conquered it, and it was the first place which they occupied in africa. in , at the death of don sebastian, ceuta passed with portugal and the rest of the colonies into the power of spain; and when, in , the portuguese recovered their independence, the spaniards were left masters of ceuta, which continues still in their hands, but is of no utility to them except as a _praesidio_, which makes the fourth penal settlement possessed by them on this coast. ceuta contains a garrison of two or three thousand men. the free population amounts to some five or six thousand. it has a small and insecure port. here is the famed gibel zaterit, "monkey's promontory," or "ape's hill," which has occasioned the ingenious fable, that, inasmuch as there are no monkeys in any part of europe except gibraltar, directly opposite to this rock, where also monkeys are found, there must necessarily be a subterranean passage beneath the sea, by which they pass and re-pass to opposite sides of the straits, and maintain a friendly and uninterrupted intercourse between the brethren of africa and europe. anciently, the mountains hereabouts formed the african pillars of hercules opposite to gibraltar, which may be considered the european pillar of that respectable hero of antiquity. passing tangier after a day's journey, we come to arzila or asila, in the province of hasbat, which is an ancient berber city, and which, when conquered by the romans, was named first zilia and afterwards zulia, _constantia zilis_. it is placed on the naked shores of the atlantic, and has a little port. whilst possessed by the portuguese, it was a place of considerable strength, but its fortifications being, as usual, neglected by the moors, are now rapidly decaying. [ ] the population is about one thousand. the country around produces good tobacco. the next town on the atlantic, after another day's journey southwards, is el araish, _i.e._, the trellices of vines; vulgarly called laratsh. this city replaces the ancient liscas or lixus and lixa, whose ruins are near. the arabs call it el-araish beai-arous, _i.e._, the vineyards of the beni-arous, a powerful tribe, who populate the greater part of the district of azgar, of which it is the capital and the residence of the governor. it was, probably, built by this tribe about , or , , ad. el-araish contains a population of , moors, and , jews, or , souls; but others give only , for the whole amount, of which are jews. it has a garrison of troops. the town is situate upon a small promontory stretching into the sea, and along the mouth of the river cos, or luccos (loukkos), which forms a secure port, but of so difficult access, that vessels of two hundred tons can scarcely enter it. in winter, the roadstead is very bad; [ ] the houses are substantially built; and the fortifications are good, because made by the spaniards, who captured this place in , but it was re-taken by muley ishmael in . the climate is soft and delicious. in the environs, cotton is cultivated, and charcoal is made from the araish forest of cork-trees. el-araish exports cork, wool, skins, bark, beans, and grain, and receives in exchange iron, cloth, cottons, muslins, sugar and tea. the lions and panthers of the mountains of beni arasis sometimes descend to the plains to drink, or carry off a supper of a sheep or bullock. azgar, the name of this district, connects it with one of the powerful tribes of the touaricks; and, probably, a section of this tribe of berbers were resident here at a very early period (at the same time the berber term _ayghar_ corresponds to the arabic _bahira_, and signifies "plain.") the ancient lixus deserves farther mention on account of the interest attached to its coins, a few of which remain, although but very recently deciphered by archeologists. there are five classes of them, and all phoenician, although the city now under roman rule, represents the vineyard riches of this part of ancient mauritania by two bunches of grapes, so that, after nearly three thousand years, the place has retained its peculiarity of producing abundant vines, el-araish, being "the vine trellices;" others have stamped on them "two ears of corn" and "two fishes," representing the fields of corn waving on the plains of morocco, and the fish (shebbel especially) which fills its northern rivers. strabo says:--"mauritania generally, excepting a small part desert, is rich and fertile, well watered with rivers and washed with lakes; abounding in all things, and producing trees of great dimensions." another writer adds "this country produces a species of the vine whose trunk the extended arms of two men cannot embrace, and which yields grapes of a cubit's length." "at this city," says pliny, "was the palace of antaeus, and his combat with hercules and the gardens of hesperides." mehedia or mâmora, and sometimes, nuova mamora, is situate upon the north-western slope of a great hill, some four feet above the sea, upon the left bank of the mouth of the sebon, and at the edge of the celebrated plain and forest of mamora, belonging to the province of beni-hassan. according to marmol, mamora was built by jakob-el-mansour to defend the embouchure of the river. it was captured by the spaniards in , and retaken by the moors in . the corsairs formerly took refuge here. it is now a weak and miserable place, commanded by an old crumbling-down castle. there are five or six hundred fishermen, occupying one hundred and fifty cabins, who make a good trade of the shebbel salmon; it has a very small garrison. the forest of mamora, contains about sixty acres of fine trees, among which are some splendid oaks, all suitable for naval construction. salee or sala, a name which this place bore antecedently to the roman occupation, is a very ancient city, situate upon the right bank of the river bouragrag, and near its mouth. this place was captured in , by alphonso the wise, king of castille, who was a short time after dispossessed of his conquest by the king of fez; and the moorish sultans have kept it to the present time, though the city itself has often attempted to throw off the imperial yoke. the modern salee is a large commercial and well-fortified city of the province of beni-hassan. its port is sufficiently large, but, on account of the little depth of water, vessels of large burden cannot enter it. the houses and public places are tolerably well-built. the town is fortified by a battery of twenty-four pieces of cannon fronting the sea, and a redoubt at the entrance of the river. what navy the maroquines have, is still laid up here, but the dock-yard is now nearly deserted, and the few remaining ships are unserviceable. the population, all of whom are mahometans, are now, as in corsair times, the bitterest and most determined enemies of christians, and will not permit a christian or jew to reside among them. the amount of this population, and that of rabat, is thus given, _salee rabat_ gräberg , , washington , , arlett , , but it is probably greatly exaggerated. a resident of this country reduces the population of salee as low as two or three thousand. for many years, the port of salee was the rendezvous of the notorious pirates of morocco, who, together with the city of rabat, formed a species of military republic almost independent of the sultan; these salee rovers were at once the most ferocious and courageous in the world. time was, when these audacious freebooters lay under lundy island in the british channel, waiting to intercept british traders! "salee," says lemprière, "was a place of good commerce, till, addicting itself entirely to piracy, and revolting from the allegiance to its sovereign, muley zidan, that prince in the year , dispatched an embassy to king charles , of england, requesting him to send a squadron of men-of-war to lie before the town, while he attacked by land." this request being acceded to, the city was soon reduced, the fortifications demolished, and the leaders of the rebellion put to death. the year following, the emperor sent another ambassador to england, with a present of barbary horses and three hundred christian slaves. rabat, or er-rabat, and on some of the foreign maps nuova sale, is a modern city of considerable extent, densely populated, strong and well-built, belonging to the province of temsna. it is situated on the declivity of a hill, opposite to salee, on the other side of the river, or left side of the bouragrag, which is as broad as the thames at london bridge, and might be considered as a great suburb, or another quarter of the same city. it was built by the famous yakob-el-mansour, nephew of abd-el-moumen, and named by him rabat-el-fatah, _i.e._, "camp of victory," by which name it is now often mentioned. the walls of rabat enclose a large space of ground, and the town is defended on the seaside by three forts, erected some years ago by an english renegade, and furnished with ordnance from gibraltar. among the population are three or four thousand jews, some of them of great wealth and consequence. the merchants are active and intelligent, carrying on commerce with fez, and other places of the interior, as also with the foreign ports of genoa, gibraltar, and marseilles. in the middle ages, the genoese had a great trade with rabat, but this trade is now removed to mogador, many beautiful gardens and plantations adorn the suburbs, deserving even the name of "an earthly paradise." the moors of rabat are mostly from spain, expelled thence by the spaniards. the famous sultan, almanzor, intended that rabat should be his capital. his untenanted mausoleum is placed here, in a separate and sacred quarter. this prince, surnamed "the victorious," (elmansor,) was he who expelled the moravedi from spain. he is the nero of western africa, as keatinge says, their "king arthur." tradition has it that elmansor went in disguise to mecca, and returned no more. mankind love this indefinite and obscure end of their heroes. moses went up to the mountain to die there in eternal mystery. at a short distance from rabat is shella, or its ruins, a small suburb situated on the summit of a hill, which contains the tombs of the royal family of the beni-merini, and the founder of rabat, and is a place of inviolate sanctity, no infidel being permitted to enter therein. monsieur chenier supposes shella to have been the site of the metropolis of the carthaginian colonies. of these two cities, on the banks of the wad-bouragrag, salee was, according to d'anville, always a place of note as at the present time, and the farthest roman city on the coast of the atlantic, being the frontier town of the ancient mauritania tingitana. some pretend that all the civilization which has extended itself beyond this point is either moorish, or derived from european colonists. the river wad-bouragrag is somewhat a natural line of demarcation, and the products and animals of the one side differ materially from those of the other, owing to the number and less rapid descent of the streams on the side of the north, and so producing more humidity, whilst the south side, on the contrary, is of a higher and drier soil. fidallah, or seid allah, _i. e_., "grace," or "gift of god," is a maritime village of the province of temsa, founded by the sultan mohammed in . it is a strong place, and surrounded with walls. fidallah is situated on a vast plain, near the river wad millah, where there is a small port, or roadstead, to which the corsairs were wont to resort when they could not reach salee, long before the village was built, called mersa fidallah. the place contains a thousand souls, mostly in a wretched condition. sidi mohammed, before he built mogador, had the idea of building a city here; the situation is indeed delightful, surrounded with fertility. dar-el-beida (or casa-blanco, "white house,") is a small town, formerly in possession of the portuguese, who built it upon the ruins of anfa or anafa, [ ] which they destroyed in . they, however, scarcely finished it when they abandoned it in . dar-el-beida is situate on the borders of the fertile plains of the province of shawiya, and has a small port, formed by a river and a spacious bay on the atlantic. the romans are said to have built the ancient anafa, in whose time it was a considerable place, but now it scarcely contains above a thousand inhabitants, and some reduce them to two hundred. sidi mohammed attempted this place, and the present sultan endeavoured to follow up these efforts. a little commerce with europe is carried on here. the bay will admit of vessels of large burden anchoring in safety, except when the wind blows strong from the north-west. casa blanco is two days journey from rabat, and two from azamor, or azemmour, which is an ancient and fine city of the province of dukaila, built by the amazigh berbers, in whose language it signifies "olives." it is situate upon a hill, about one hundred feet above the sea, and distant half a mile from the shore, not far from the mouth of the wad-omm-er-rbia (or omm-erbegh) on its southern bank, and is everywhere surrounded by a most fertile soil. azamor contains now about eight or nine hundred inhabitants, but formerly was much more populated. the shebbel salmon is the principal commerce, and a source of immense profit to the town. the river is very deep and rapid, so that the passage with boats is both difficult and dangerous. it is frequently of a red colour, and charged with slime like the nile at the period of its inundations. the tide is felt five or six leagues up the river, according to chénier. formerly, vessels of every size entered the river, but now its mouth has a most difficult bar of sand, preventing large vessels going up, like nearly all the maroquine ports situate on the mouths, or within the rivers. azamor was taken by the portuguese under the command of the duke of braganza in who strengthened it by fortifications, the walls of which are still standing; but it was abandoned a century afterwards, the indies having opened a more lucrative field of enterprise than these barren though honourable conquests on the maroquine coast. this place is half a day's journey, or about fourteen miles from mazagran, _i. e_. the above amayeeghs, an extremely ancient and strong castle, erected on a peninsula at the bottom of a spacious and excellent bay. it was rebuilt by the portuguese in , who gave it the name of castillo real. the site has been a centre of population from the remotest period, chiefly berbers, whose name it still bears. the arabs, however, call it el-bureeja, i.e., "the citadel." the portuguese abandoned it in ; mazagran was the last stronghold which they possessed in morocco. the town is well constructed, and has a wall twelve feet thick, strengthened with bastions. there is a small port, or dock, on the north side of the town, capable of admitting small vessels, and the roadstead is good, where large vessels can anchor about two miles off the shore. its traffic is principally with rabat, but there is also some export trade to foreign parts. its population is two or three hundred. [ ] after proceeding two days south-west, you arrive at saffee, or properly asafee, called by the natives asfee, and anciently soffia or saffia, is a city of great antiquity, belonging to the province of abda, and was built by the carthaginians near cape pantin. its site lies between two hills, in a valley which is exposed to frequent inundations. the roadstead of saffee is good and safe during summer, and its shipping once enabled it to be the centre of european commerce on the atlantic coast. the population amounts to about one thousand, including a number of miserable jews. the walls of saffee are massy and high. the portuguese captured this city in , voluntarily abandoning it in . the country around is not much cultivated, and presents melancholy deserts; but there is still a quantity of corn grown. about forty miles distant, s.e., is a large salt lake. saffee is one and a half day's journey from mogador. equidistant between mazagran and saffee is the small town of el-waladia, situate on an extensive plain. persons report that near this spot is a spacious harbour, or lagune, sufficiently capacious to contain four or five hundred sail of the line; but, unfortunately, the entrance is obstructed by some rocks, which, however, it is added, might easily be blown up. the lagune is also exposed to winds direct for the ocean. the town, enclosed within a square wall, and containing very few inhabitants, is supposed to have been built in the middle of the seventeenth century by the sultan waleed. after whom it was named. this brings us to mogador, which, with aghadir, have already been described. chapter v. description of the imperial cities or capitals of the empire.-- el-kesar.--mequinez.--fez.--morocco.--the province of tafilett, the birth-place of the present dynasty of the shereefs. the royal or capitals of the interior now demand our attention, which are el-kesar, mequinez, fez, and morocco. el-kesar, or al-kesar, [ ] styled also el-kesue-kesar, is so named and distinguished because it owes its enlargement to the famous sultan of fez, almansor, who improved and beautified it about the year , and designed this city as a magazine and rendezvous of troops for the great preparations he was making at the time for the conquest of granada. el-kesar is in the province of the gharb, and situate on the southern bank of the luccos; here is a deep and rapid stream, flowing w. / n.w. the town is nearly as large as tetuan, but the streets are dirty and narrow, and many of the houses in a ruinous condition, this fortified place was once adorned by some fifteen mosques, but only two or three are now fit for service. the population does not exceed four or five thousand souls, and some think this number over-estimated. the surrounding country is flat meadowland, but flooded after the rains, and producing fatal fevers, though dry and hot enough in summer. the suburban fields are covered with gardens and orchards. it was at el-kesar, where, in a.d. , the great battle of the three kings came off, because, besides the portuguese king, don sebastian, two moorish princes perished on this fatal day. but one of them, muley moluc, died very ill in a litter, and was not killed in the fight; his death, however, was kept a secret till the close of the battle, in order that the moors might not be discouraged. with their prince, don sebastian, perished the flower of the portuguese nobility and chivalry of that time. war, indeed, was found "a dangerous game" on that woeful day: both for princes and nobles, and many a poor soul was swept away "floating in a purple tide." but the "trade of war" has been carried on ever since, and these lessons, written in blood, are as useless to mankind as those dashed off by the harmless pen of the sentimental moralist. el-kesar is placed in latitude, ° " n.; longitude, ° ' " w. mequinez, [ ] in arabic, miknas (or miknasa), is a royal residence, and city of the province of fez, situate upon a hill in the midst of a well-watered and most pleasant town, blessed with a pure and serene air. the city of miknas is both large and finely built, of considerable interest and of great antiquity. it was founded by the tribe of berbers meknâsab, a fraction of the zenatah, in the middle of the tenth century, and called miknasat, hence is derived its present name. the modern town is surrounded with a triple wall thirteen feet high and three thick, enclosing a spacious area. this wall is mounted with batteries to awe the berbers of the neighbouring mountains. the population amounts to about twenty thousand souls, (some say forty or fifty thousand) in which are included about nine thousand negro troops, constituting the greater portion of the imperial guard. two thousand of these black troops are in charge of the royal treasures, estimated at some fifty millions of dollars, and always increasing. these treasures consist of jewels, bars of gold and silver, and money in the two precious metals, the greater part being spanish and mexican dollars. the inhabitants are represented as being the most polished of the moors, kind and hospitable to strangers. the palace of the emperor is extremely simple and elegant, all the walls of which are _embroidered_ with the beautiful stucco-work of arabesque patterns, as pure and chaste as the finest lace. the marble for the pillars was furnished from the ruins adjacent, called kesar farâoun, "castle of pharoah" (a name given to most of the old ruins of morocco, of whose origin there is any doubt). during the times of piracy, there was here, as also at morocco, a spanish hospitium for the ransom and recovery of christian slaves. even before mequinez was constituted a royal city, it was a place of considerable trade and riches. nothing of any peculiar value has been discovered among the extensive and ancient ruins about a mile distant, and which have furnished materials for the building of several royal cities; they are, however, supposed to be roman. scarcely a day's journey separates mequinez from fez. it is not usual for two royal cities to be placed so near together, but which must render their fortunes inseparable. fez, or fas. according to some, the name fas, which signifies in arabia a pickaxe, was given to it because one was found in digging its foundations. others derive it from fetha, silver. it is no longer the marvellous city described by leo africanus, yet its learning, wealth, and industry place it in the first rank of the cities of morocco. during the eighth century, the arabs, masters of tunis, of all algeria, and the maritime cities of morocco, seemed to think only of invading europe and consolidating their power in spain; but at this epoch, a descendant of ali and fatima, edris ben abdalluh, quitted arabia, passed into morocco, and established himself at oualili, the capital, where he remained till his death, and where he was buried. his character was generally known and venerated for its sanctity, and drew upon him the affectionate regard of the people, and all instinctively placed themselves near him as a leader of the faithful, likely to put an end to anarchy, and establish order in the mussulman world. his son, edris-ben-edris, who inherited his virtues and influence, offering a species of ancient prototype to abd-el kader and his venerable father, mahadin, was the first _bona-fide_ mussulman sovereign of the maroquine empire, and founded fez. fez is a most ancient centre of population, and had long been a famed city, before muley edris, in the year a.d. (others in ), gave it its present form and character. from that period, however, fez [ ] dates its modern celebrity and rank among the mahometan capitals of the world, and especially as being the second city of islamism, and the "palace of the mussulmen princes of the west." that the spanish philologists should make fut, of the prophet nahum, to be the ancient capital of fez, is not remarkable, considering the numerous bands of emigrants, who, emerging from the coast, wandered as far as the pillars of hercules; and, besides, in a country like north africa, the theatre of so many revolutions, almost every noted city of the present period has had its ancient form, from which it has been successively changed. the modern capital is placed in a valley upon the gentle slope of several hills by which it is surrounded, and whose heights are crowned with lovely gardens breathing odoriferous sweets. close by is a little river, or a branch of the tebou, named wad-el-juhor, or "streamlet," which supplies the city with excellent water. the present buildings are divided into old and new fez. the streets are so narrow that two men on horseback could scarcely ride abreast; they are, besides, very dark, and often arched over. colonel scott represents some of the streets, however, as a mile in length. the houses are high, but not handsome. the shops are numerous and much frequented, though not very fine in appearance. fez contains no less than seven hundred mosques, fifty of which are superb, and ornamented with fine columns of marble; there is, besides, a hundred or more of very small and ill-built mosques, or rather, houses of prayer. the most famous of these temples of worship is el-karoubin (or el-karouïin), supported by three hundred pillars. in this is preserved the celebrated library of antiquity, where, it is pretended, ancient greek and latin authors are to be found in abundance with the lost books of titus livy. this appears to be mere conjecture. [ ] but the mosque the more frequented and venerated, is that dedicated to the founder of the city, muley edris, whose ashes repose within its sacred enclosure. so excessive is this "hero-worship" for this great sultan, that the people constantly invoke his name in their prayers instead of that of the deity. the mausoleum of this sacro-santo prince is inviolable and unapproachable. the university of fez was formally much celebrated, but little of its learning now remains. its once high-minded orthodox mulahs are now succeeded by a fanatic and ignorant race of marabouts. nevertheless, the few _hommes de lettres_ found in morocco are congregated here, and the literature of the empire is concentrated in this city. seven large public schools are in full activity, besides numbers of private seminaries of instruction. the low humour of the talebs, and the fanaticism of the people, are unitedly preserved and developed in this notorious doggerel couplet, universally diffused throughout morocco:-- _ensara fee senara elhoud fee sefoud_ "christians on the hook jews on the spit," or "let christians be hooked, and let jews be cooked." the great division of the arabic into eastern and western dialects makes little real difference in a practical point of view. the mogrebbin, or western, is well understood by all travellers, and, of course, by all scholars from the east. the palace of the sultan is not large, but is handsome. there are numerous baths, and an hospital for the mad or incurable. the population was estimated, not long ago, at , souls, of which there were , moors and arabs (the moors being chiefly immigrants from spain), , berbers, , jews, and , negroes. but this amount has been reduced to , , or even , ; and the probability is, the present population of fez does not by any means, exceed , , if it reaches that number. nearly all the jews reside in the new city, which, by its position, dominates the old one. the inhabitants of fez, in spite of their learning and commerce, are distinguished for their fanaticism; and an european, without an escort of troops, cannot walk in the streets unless disguised. it was lately the head-quarters of the fanatics who preached "the holy war," and involved the emperor in hostilities with the french. the immense trade of every kind carried on at fez gives it almost the air of an european city. in the great square, called al-kaisseriah, is exhibited all the commerce of europe and africa--nay, even of the whole world. the crowd of traffickers here assemble every day as at a fair. fez has two annual caravans; one leaves for central africa, or timbuctoo; and another for mecca, or the caravan of pilgrims. the two great stations and rendezvous points of the african caravan are tafilett and touat. the journey from fez to timbuctoo occupies about ninety days. the mecca caravan proceeds the same route as far as touat, and then turns bank north-east to ghadames, fezzan, and angelah, and thence to alexandria, which it accomplishes in four or five, to six months. all depends on the inclination of the shereef, or commandant, of the caravan; but the journey from fez to alexandria cannot, by the quickest caravan, be accomplished in much less time than three months and a half, or one hundred days. the value of the investments in this caravan has been estimated at a million of dollars; for the faithful followers of the prophet believe, with us, that godliness is profitable in the life that now is, as well as in that which is to come. fez is surrounded with a vast wall, but which is in decay. what is this decay! it applies almost to every moorish city and public building in north africa. and yet the faith of the false prophet is as strong as ever, and with time and hoary age seems to strike its roots deeper into the hearts of its simple, but enthusiastic and duped devotees! the city has seven gates, and two castles, at the east and west, form its main defence. these castles are very ancient, and are formed and supported by square walls about sixty feet in front, ali bey says, subterraneous passages are reported to exist between these castles and the city; and, whenever the people revolt against the sultan, cannon are planted on the castles with a few soldiers as their guard. the fortifications, or bastiles, of paris, we see, therefore, were no new invention of louis philippe to awe the populace. the maxims of a subtle policy are instructive in despotism of every description. the constituted authorities of fez are like those of every city of morocco. the governor is the lieutenant of the sovereign, exercising the executive power; the kady, or supreme judge, is charged with the administration of the law, and the al-motassen fixes the price of provisions, and decides all the questions of trade and customs. there are but few troops at fez, for it is not a strong military possession; on the contrary, it is commanded by accessible heights and is exposed to a _coup-de-main_. fez, indeed, could make no _bonâ-fide_ resistance to an european army. the manufactures are principally woollen haiks, silk handkerchiefs, slippers and shoes of excellent leather, and red caps of felt, commonly called the fez; the first fabrication of these red caps appears to have been in this city. the spanish moorish immigrants introduced the mode of dressing goat and sheep-skins, at first known by the name of cordovan from cordova; but, since the moorish forced immigration, they have acquired the celebrated name of morocco. the chief food of the people is the national moorish dish of _cuscasou_, a fine grained paste, cooked by steam, with melted fat, oil, or other liquids poured upon the dish, and sometimes garnished with pieces of fowl and other meat. a good deal of animal food is consumed, but few vegetables. the climate is mild in the winter, but suffocating with heat in the summer. this city is placed in latittude ° ' " n. longitude ° " 'w. morocco, or strictly in arabic, _maraksh_, which signifies "adorned," is the capital of the south, and frequently denominated the capital of the empire, but it is only a _triste_ shadow of its former greatness. it is sometimes honoured with the title of "the great city," or "country." morocco occupies an immense area of ground, being seven miles in circumference, the interior of which is covered with heaps of ruins or more pleasantly converted into gardens. morocco was built in or by the famous yousel-ben-tashfin, king of samtuna, and of the dynasty of the almoravedi, or marabouts. its site is that of an ancient city, martok, founded in the remotest periods of the primitive africans, or aboriginal berbers, in whose language it signifies a place where everything good and pleasant was to be found in abundance. bocanum hermerum of the ancients was also near the site of this capital, morocco attained its greatest prosperity shortly after its foundation, and since then it has only declined. in the twelfth century, under the reign of jâkoub almanzor, there were , houses and , souls, (if indeed we can trust their statistics); but, at the present time, there are only some forty to fifty thousand inhabitants, including , shelouhs and , jews. ali bey, in , estimates its population at only , , and captain washington in at , or , . this vast city lies at the foot of the atlas, or about fourteen miles distant, spread over a wide and most lovely plain of the province of rhamma, watered by the river tensift, six miles from the gates of the capital. the mosques are numerous and rich, the principal of which are el-kirtubeeah, of elegant architecture with an extremely lofty minaret; el-maazin, which is three hundred years old, and a magnificent building; and benious, built nearly seven hundred years ago of singular construction, uniting modern and ancient architecture. the mosque of the patron saint is sidi belabbess. nine gates open in the city-walls; these are strong and high, and flanked with towers, except on the south east where the sultan's palace stands. the streets are crooked, of uneven width, unpaved, and dirty in winter, and full of dust in summer. there are several public squares and marketplaces. the kaessaria, or commercial quarter, is extensive, exhibiting every species of manufacture and natural product. the manufactures of this, as of other large places, are principally, silks, embroidery, and leather. the merchants of mogador have magazines here; this capital has also its caravans, which trade to the interior, passing through wadnoun to the south. the imperial palace is without the city and fortified with strong walls. there are large gardens attached, in one of which the emperor receives his merchants and the diplomatic agents. the air of the country, at the foot of the atlas, is pure and salubrious. the city is well supplied with water from an aqueduct, connecting it with the river tensift, which flows from the gorges of the atlas. but the inhabitants, although they enjoy this inestimable blessing in an african climate, are not famous for their cleanliness; morocco, if possessing any particular character, still must be considered as a commercial city, for its learning is at a very low ebb. its interior wears a deeply dejected, nay a profoundly gloomy aspect. "horrendum incultumque specus." and the european merchants, when they come up here are glad to get away as soon as possible. outside the city, there is a suburb appropriated to lepers, a lazar-house of leprosy, which afflicting and loathsome disease descends from father to son through unbroken generations; the afflicted cannot enter the city, and no one dare approach their habitations. the emperor usually resides for a third portion of his time at morocco the rest at fez and mequinez. whenever his imperial highness has anything disagreeable with foreign european powers, he comes down from fez to morocco, to get out of the way. occasionally, he travels from town to town of the interior, to awe by his presence the ever restless disaflfection of the tribes, or excite their loyalty for the shereefian throne. morocco is placed in lat. ° " ' n. and long. ° " ', w. tafilett consists of a group of towns or villages, situate on the south-eastern side of the atlas, which may he added to the royal cities, being inhabited in part by the imperial family, and is the birth-place of their sovereign power--emphatically called beladesh-sherfa, "country of the shereefs." the country was anciently called sedjelmasa, and retained this name up to a.d., when the principal city acquired the apellation of tafilett, said to be derived from an arab immigrant, called filal, who improved the culture of dates, and whose name on this account, under the berber form of tafilett, was given to a plantation of dates cultivated by him, and then passed to the surrounding districts. at the present time, tafilett consists of a group of fortified or castle-built villages, environed by walls mounted with square towers, which extend on both sides of the river zig. there is also a castle, or rather small town, upon the left side of the river, called by the ordinary name of kesar, which is in the hands of the shereefs, and inhabited entirely by the family of the prophet. the principal and most flourishing place was a long time called tafilett, but is now according to callie, ghourlan, and the residence of the governor of the province of ressant, a town distinguished by a magnificent gateway surrounded with various coloured dutch tiles, symmetrically arranged in a diamond pattern. this traveller calls the district of tafilett, afile or afilel. it is probable that from the rains of the ancient sedjelmasa, some of the modern villages have been constructed. the towns and districts of tafilett once formed an independent kingdom. the present population has been estimated at some ten thousand, but this is entirely conjectural. callié mentions the four towns of ghourlan, l'eksebi, sosso and boheim as containing eleven or twelve thousand souls. the soil of tafilett is level, composed of sand of an ashy grey, productive of corn, and all sorts of european fruits and vegetables. the natives have fine sheep, with remarkably white wool. the manufactures, which are in woollen and silk, are called tafiletes. besides being a rendezvous of caravans, radiating through all parts of the sahara, tafilett is a great mart of traffic in the natural products of the surrounding countries. a fine bridge spans the zig, built by a spaniard. when the sultan of morocco finds any portion of his family inclined to be naughty, he sends them to tafilett, as we are wont to send troublesome people to "jericho." this, at any rate, is better than cutting off their heads, which, from time immemorial, has been the invariable practice of african and oriental despots. the maroquine princes may be thankful they have tafilett as a place of exile. the emperors never visit tafilett except as dethroned exiles. a journey to such a place is always attended with danger; and were the sultan to escape, he would find, on his return, the whole country in revolt. regarding these royal cities, we sum up our observations. the destinies of fez and mequinez are inseparable. united, they contain one hundred thousand inhabitants, the most polished and learned in the empire. fez is the city of arts and learning, that is of what remains of the once famous and profound moorish doctors of spain. mequinez is the strong place of the empire, an emporium of arms and imperial cretsures. fez is the rival of morocco. the two cities are the capitals of two kingdoms, never yet amalgamated. the present dynasty belongs not to fez, but to morocco; though a dynasty of shereefs, they are shereefs of the south, and african blood flows in their veins. the sultan generally is obliged to give a preference to fez for a residence, because his presence is necessary to maintain the allegiance of the north country, and to curb its powerful warparty, his son in the meanwhile being left governor during his absence. but all these royal cities are on the decline, the "sere and yellow leaf" of a well nigh defunct civilization. morocco is a huge shell of its former greatness, a monster of moresque dilapidations. france may awaken the slumbering energies of the population of these once flourishing and august cities, but left to themselves they are powerless, sinking under their own weight and uncouth encumbrances, and will rise no more till reconstructed by european hands. chapter vi. description of the towns and cities of the interior, and those of the kingdom of fez.--seisouan.--wazen.--zawiat.--muley dris.--sofru.-- dubdu.--taza.--oushdah.--agla.--nakbila.--meshra.--khaluf.--the places distinguished in. morocco, including sous, draka, and tafilett.--tefza. --pitideb.--ghuer.--tyijet.--bulawan.--soubeit--meramer.--el-medina.-- tagodast.--dimenet.--aghmat.--fronga.--tedmest.--tekonlet.--tesegdelt.-- tagawost.--tedsi beneali.--beni sabih.--tatta and akka.--mesah or assah.--talent.--shtouka.--general observations on the statistics of population.--the maroquine sahara. we have briefly to notice the remaining towns and cities of the interior, with some other remarkable places. first, these distinguished and well ascertained places in the kingdom of fez. seisouan, or sousan, is the capital of the rif province, situate also on the borders of the province of the habat, and by the sources of a little river which runs into the mediterranean, near cape mazari. the town is small, but full of artizans and merchants. the country around is fertile, being well irrigated with streams. sousan is the most beautifully picturesque of all the atlas range. sofou, or sofron, is a fine walled city, southeast of fez, situate upon the river guizo; in a vast and well-watered plain near, are rich mines of fossil salt. wazen, or wazein, in the province of azgar, and the region of the gharb, is a small city without walls, celebrated for being the residence of the high priest, or grand marabout of the empire. this title is hereditary, and is now (or up to lately) possessed by the famous sidi-el-haj-el-araby-ben-ali, who, in his district, lives in a state of nearly absolute independence, besides exercising great influence over public affairs. this saint, or priest, has, however, a rival at tedda. the two popes together pretend to decide the fate of the empire. the districts where these grand marabouts reside, are without governors, and the inhabitants pay no tribute into the imperial coffers, they are ruled by their two priests under a species of theocracy. the emperor never attempts or dares to contest their privileges. occasionally they appear abroad, exciting the people, and declaiming against the vices of the times. his moorish majesty then feels himself ill at ease, until they retire to their sanctuaries, and employs all his arts to effect the object, protesting that he will be wholly guided by their councils in the future administration of the empire. with this humiliation of the shereefs, they are satisfied, and kennel themselves into their sanctum-sanctorums. zawiat-muley-driss, which means, retirement of our master, lord edris (enoch) and sometimes called muley edris, is a far famed city of the province of fez, and placed at the foot of the lofty mountains of terhoun, about twenty-eight miles from fez, north-west, amidst a most beautiful country, producing all the necessaries and luxuries of human life. the site anciently called tuilet, was perhaps also the volubilis of the ancients. here is a sanctuary dedicated to the memory of edris, progenitor and founder of the dynasty of edrisiti. the population, given by gräberg, is nine thousand, but this is evidently exaggerated. not far off, towards the west, are some magnificent ruins of an ancient city, called kesar farâoun, or "castle of pharoah." dubdu, called also doubouton, is an ancient, large city, of the district of shaous, and once the residence of an independent prince, but now fallen into decay on account of the sterility of its site, which is upon the sides of a barren mountain. dubdu is three days' journey southeast of fez, and one day from taza, in the region of the mulweeah. taza is the capital of the well-watered district of haiaina, and one of the finest cities in morocco, in a most romantic situation, placed on a rock which is shaped like an island, and in presence of the lofty mountains of zibel medghara, to the south-west. perhaps it is the babba of the ancients; a river runs round the town. the houses and streets are spacious, and there is a large mosque. the air is pure, and provisions are excellent. the population is estimated at ten or twelve thousand, who are hospitable, and carry on a good deal of commerce with tlemsen and fez. taza is two days from fez, and four from oushda. oushda is the well-known frontier town, on the north-east, which acquired some celebrity during the late war. it is enclosed by the walls of its gardens, and is protected by a large fortress. the place contains a population of from six hundred to one thousand moors and arabs. there is a mosque, as well as three chapels, dedicated to santous. the houses, built of clay, are low and of a wretched appearance; the streets are winding, and covered with flints. the fortress, where the kaed resides, is guarded in ordinary times by a dozen soldiers; but, were this force increased, it could not be defended, in consequence of its dilapidated condition. a spring of excellent water, at a little distance from oushda, keeps up the whole year round freshness and verdure in the gardens, by means of irrigation. cattle hereabouts is of fine quality. oushda is a species of oasis of the desert of angad, and the aridity of the surrounding country makes these gardens appear delicious, melons, olives, and figs being produced in abundance. the distance between tlemsen and oushda is sixteen leagues, or about sixteen hours' march for troops; oushda is also four or five days from oran, and six days from fez. the desert commences beyond the mulweeah, at more than forty leagues from tlemsen. like the algerian angad, which extends to the south of tlemsen, it is of frightful sterility, particularly in summer. in this season, one may march for six or eight hours without finding any water. it is impossible to carry on military operations in such a country during summer. on this account, marshal bugeaud soon excavated oushda and returned to the tlemsen territory. aghla is a town, or rather large village, of the district of fez, where the late muley suleiman occasionally resided. it is situated along the river wad vergha, in a spacious and well-cultivated district. a great market of cattle, wool, and bees'-wax, is held in the neighbourhood. the country abounds in lions; but, it is pretended, of such a cowardly race, that a child can frighten them away. hence the proverb addressed to a pusillanimous individual, "you are as brave as the lions of aghla, whose tails the calves eat." the arabs certainly do occasionally run after lions with sticks, or throw stones at them, as we are accustomed to throw stones at dogs. nakhila, _i.e._, "little palm," is a little town of the province of temsna, placed in the river gueer; very ancient, and formerly rich and thickly populated. a great mart, or souk, is annually held at this place. it is the site of the ancient occath. meshru khaluf, _i.e._, "ford, or watering-place of the wild-boar," in the district of the beni-miskeen, is a populated village, and situated on the right bank of the ovad omm-erbergh, lying on the route of many of the chief cities. here is the ford of meshra khaluf, forty-five feet wide, from which the village derives its name. on the map will be seen many places called souk. the interior tribes resort thither to purchase and exchange commodities. the market-places form groups of villages. it is not a part of my plan to give any particular description of them. second, those places distinguished in the kingdom of morocco, including sous, draha, and tafilett. tefza, a berber name, which, according to some, signifies "sand," and to others, "a bundle of straw," is the capital of the province of todla, built by the aborigines on the slope of the atlas, who surrounded it with a high wall of sandstone (called, also, tefza.) at two miles east of this is the smaller town of efza, which is a species of suburb, divided from tefza by the river derna. the latter place is inhabited certainly by berbers, whose women are famous for their woollen works and weaving. tefza is also celebrated for its native black and white woollen manufactures. the population of the two places is stated at upwards of , , including , jews. pitideb, or sitideb, is another fine town in the neighbourhood, built by the amazirghs on the top of a high mountain. the inhabitants are esteemed the most civilized of their nation, and governed by their own elders and chiefs, they live in a state of almost republican independence. some good native manufactures are produced, and a large commerce with strangers is carried on. the women are reputed as being extremely fair and fascinating. ghuer, or gheu, (war, _i.e._, "difficult?") is a citadel, or rather a strong, massive rock, and the most inaccessible of all in morocco, forming a portion of the mountains of jedla, near the sources of the wad omm-erbegh. this rocky fort is the residence of the supreme amrgar, or chief of the amazirghs, who rendered himself renowned through the empire by fighting a pitch-battle with the imperial troops in . such chiefs and tribes occasion the weakness of the interior; for, whenever the sultan has been embroiled with european powers, these aboriginal amazirghs invariably seized the opportunity of avenging their wrongs and ancient grudges. the shereefs always compound with them, if they can, these primitive tribes being so many centres of an _imperium imperio_, or of revolt and disaffection. tijijet in the province of dukkalah, situate on the left bank of the river omm-erbegh, along the route from fez to morocco, is a small town, but was formerly of considerable importance. a famous market for grain is held here, which is attended by the tribe of the atlas: the country abounds in grain and cattle of the finest breed. bulawan or bou-el-awan, "father of commodious ways or journeys," is a small town of houses, with an old castle, formerly a place of consequence; and lying on an arm of the river omm-erbegh _en route_ from morocco to salee and mequinez and commanding the passage of the river. it is miles from morocco, and from salee. on the opposite side of the river, is the village of taboulaunt, peopled mostly with jews and ferrymen. soubeit is a very ancient city on the left bank of the omm-erbegh, surrounded with walls, and situate twenty miles from el-medina in a mountainous region abounding with hares; it is inhabited by a tribe of the same name, or probably sbeita, which is also the name of a tribe south of tangier. meramer is a city built by the goths on a fertile plain, near mount beni-megher, about fourteen miles east of saffee, in the province of dukkala, and carrying on a great commerce in oil and grain. el-medina is a large walled populous city of merchants and artizans, and capital of the district of haskowra; the men are seditious, turbulent and inhospitable; the women are reputed to be fair and pretty, but disposed, when opportunity offers, to confer their favours on strangers. there is another place four miles distant of nearly the same name. tagodast is another equally large and rich city of the province of haskowra crowning the heights of a lofty mountain surrounded by four other mountains, but near a plain of six miles in extent, covered with rich vegetation producing an immense quantity of argan oil, and the finest fruits. this place contains about , inhabitants, who are a noble and hospitable race. besides, argan oil, tagodast is celebrated for its red grapes, which are said to be as large as hen's eggs--the honey of tagodast is the finest in africa. the inhabitants trade mostly with the south. dimenet or demnet is a considerable town, almost entirely populated by the shelouhs and caraaite jews; it is situate upon the slopes of a mountain of the same name, or adimmei, in the district of damnat, fifteen miles distant from wad tescout, which falls into the tensift. the inhabitants are reputed to be of a bad and malignant character, but, nevertheless, learned in mussulman theology, and fond of disputing with foreigners. orthodoxy and morality are frequently enemies of one another, whilst good-hearted and honest people are often hetherodox in their opinions. aghmat, formerly a great and flourishing city and capital of the province of rhamna, built by the berbers, and well fortified--is now fallen into decay, and consists only of a miserable village inhabited by some sixty families, among which are a few jews--aghmat lies at the foot of mount atlas, on the road which conducts to tafilett, near a river of the same name, and in the midst of a fine country abounding in orchards and vine-yards; aghmat was the first capital of the marabout dynasty. fronga is a town densely populated almost entirely by shelouhs and jews, lying about fifteen miles from the atlas range upon an immense plain which produces the finest grain in morocco. tednest, the ancient capital of the province of shedmah, and built by the berbers, is deliciously placed upon a paridisical plain, and was once the residence of the shereefs. it contains a population of four thousand souls, one thousand eight hundred being jews occupied with commerce, whilst the rest cultivate the land. this is a division of labour amongst mahometans and israelites not unfrequent in north africa. but, as in europe, the jew is the trader, not the husbandman. tekoulet is a small and pretty town, rising a short distance from the sea, by the mouth of the stream dwira, in the province of hhaha. the water is reckoned the best in the province, and the people are honest and friendly; the jews inhabit one hundred houses. tesegdelt, is another city of the province of hhaha, very large and rich, perched high upon a mountain, and that fortified by nature. the principal mosque is one of the finest in the empire. tagawost is a city, perhaps the most ancient, and indeed the largest of the province of sous. it is distant ten miles from the great river sous, and fifty from the atlas. the suburbs are surrounded with huge blocks of stone. togawost contains a number of shops and manufactories of good workmen, who are divided into three distinct classes of people, all engaged in continual hostilities with one another. the men are, however, honest and laborious, while the women are pretty and coquettish. people believe st. augustine, whom the mahometans have dubbed a marabout, was born in this city. their trade is with the sahara and timbuctoo. fedsi is another considerable city, anciently the capital of sous, reclining upon a large arm of the river sous, amidst a fruitful soil, and contains about fourteen thousand inhabitants, who are governed by republican institutions. it is twenty miles e.n.e. of taroudant. beneali is a town placed near to the source of the river draha, in the atlas. it is the residence of the chief of the berbers of hadrar, on the southern atlas. beni-sabih, moussabal, or draha, is the capital of the province of draha, and a small place, but populated and commercial. on the river of the same name, was the draha of ancient geography. tatta and akka, are two towns or villages of the province of draha, situate on the southern confines of morocco, and points of rendezvous for the caravans in their route over the great desert. tatta is four days direct east from akka, and placed in ° ' lat. and ° ' long. west of paris. akka consists of two hundred houses, inhabited by mussulmen, and fifty by jews. the environs are highly cultivated. akka is two days east of wadnoun, situate on a plain at the foot of gibel-tizintit, and is placed in ° ' lat. and ° ' long. west of paris. messah, or assah. messa is, according to gräberg, a walled city, built by the berbers, not far from the river sous, and divided like nearly all the cities of sous, into three parts, or quarters, each inhabited by respective classes of shelouhs, moors, and jews. cities are also divided in this manner in the provinces of guzzala and draha. the sea on the coast of sous throws up a very fine quantity of amber. male whales are occasionally visitors here. the population is three thousand, but mr. davidson's account differs materially. the town is named assah, and distant about two miles from the sea, there being a few scattered houses on each side of the river, to within half a mile of the sea. the place is of no importance, famed only for having near it a market on tuesday, to which many people resort. the population may be one hundred. assah is also the name of the district though which the sous river flows. the bas-el-wad (or head of the river) is very properly the name of the upper part of the river; when passing through taroudant it takes the name of sous. fifteen miles from assah is the town of aghoulon, containing about six hundred people. talent, or tilin, the difference only is the adding of the berber termination. the other consonants are the same, perhaps, as mr. davidson incidentally mentions. it is a strong city, and capital of the province of sous-el-aksa, or the extreme part of sous. this province is sometimes called tesset, or tissert. a portion of it is also denominated blad-sidi-hasham, and forms a free and quasi-independant state, founded in by the emir hasham, son of the shereef ahmed ben mousa. this prince was the bug-bear of captain riley. the district contains upwards of twenty-five thousand shelouhs and industrious arabs. talent is the residence of the prince, and is situate on the declivity of a hill, not far from the river wad-el-mesah, or messa, and a mile from ilekh, or ilirgh, a populous village, where there is a famous sanctuary, resorted to by the mahometans of the surrounding regions, of the name of sidi hamed-ou-mousa, (probably ben mousa). the singularity of this sacred village is, that jews constitute the majority of the population. but they seem absolutely necessary to the very existence of the mussulmen of north africa, who cannot live without them, or make profitable exchange of the products of the soil, or of native industry, for european articles of use and luxury. shtouka, or stuka, is, according to some, a large town or village; or, as stated by davidson, a _district_. the fact is, many african districts are called by the name of a principal town or village in them, and _vice versâ_. this place stands on the banks of the wad-el-mesah, and is inhabited by some fifteen hundred shelouhs, who are governed by a sheikh, nearly independent of morocco. on talent and shtouka, mr. davidson remarks. "there is no town called stuka; it is a district; none that i can find called talent; there is tilin. the mesah flows through stuka, in which district are twenty settlements, or rather towns, some of which are large. they are known in general by the names of the sheikhs who inhabit them. i stopped at sheikh hamed's. tilin was distant from this spot a day's journey in the mountains towards the source of the river. if by talent, tissert is meant, oferen (a town) is distant six miles." on the province of sous generally, don j.a. conde has this note:-- "in this region (sous) near the sea, is the temple erected in honour of the prophet jonas; it was there he was cast out of the belly of the whale." this temple, says assed ifriki, is made of the bones of whales which perish on this coast. a little further on, he alludes to the breaking of horses, and being skilful in bodily exercises, for the moors and numidians have always been renowned in that respect. in the lesser and more remote towns, i have followed generally the enumeration of count gräberg, but there are many other places on the maps, with varieties of names or differences of position. our geography of the interior of morocco, especially in the south, is still very obscure, and i have only selected those towns and places of whose present existence there is no question. my object, in the above enumeration, has been simply to give the reader a proximate estimate of the population and resources of this country. of the strength and number of the tribes of the interior, we know scarcely anything. the names of the towns and villages of the south, so frequently beginning and ending with t., sufficiently indicate the preponderance of the berber population, under the names of shelouh or amazirgh, whilst the great error of writers has been to represent the arabs as more numerous than this aboriginal population. monsieur e. renou, in his geographical description of the empire of morocco (vol. viii. of the "exploration scientifique," &c.) foolishly observes that there is no way of arriving at correct statistics of this empire, except by comparing it with algeria; and then remarks, which is true enough, "malheureusement, la population de l'algérie n'est pas encore bien connue." when, however, he asserts that the numbers of population given by jackson and gräberg are gross, and almost unpardonable exaggerations, given at hazard, i am obliged to agree with him from the personal experience i had in morocco, and these barbary countries generally. jackson makes the whole of the population to amount to almost fifteen millions, or nearly two thirds more than it probably amounts to. gräberg estimates it at eight millions and a half. but how, or why, or wherefore, such estimates are made is not so easy to determine. certain it is, that the whole number of cities which i have enumerated, scarcely represent one million of inhabitants. but for those who like to see something more definite in statistics, however exaggerated may be the estimate, i shall give the more moderate calculations of gräberg, those of jackson being beyond all rhyme or reason. gräberg thus classifies and estimates the population. amazirghs, berbers, and touaricks , , amazirghs, shelouhs and arabs , , arabs, mixed moors, &c. , , arabs pure, bedouins, &c. , israelites, rabbinists, and caraites , negroes, fullans, and mandingoes , europeans and christians renegades ---------- total , , if two millions are deducted from this amount, perhaps the reader will have something like a probable estimate of the population of morocco. it is hardly correct to classify moors as mixed arabs, many of them being simply descendants of the aboriginal amazirghs. i am quite sure there are no touaricks in the empire of morocco. of the maroquine sahara, i have only space to mention the interesting cluster of oases of figheegh, or figuiq. shaw mentions them as "a knot of villagers," noted for their plantations of palm-trees, supplying the western province of algeria with dates. we have now more ample information of figheegh, finding this saharan district to consist of an agglomeration of twelve villages, the more considerable of which are maiz, counting eight hundred houses, el-wadghir five hundred, and zenega twelve hundred. the others vary from one or two hundred houses. the villages are more or less connected together, never farther apart than a quarter of a league, and placed on the descent of wal-el-khalouf ("river of the wild boar") whence water is procured for the gardens, containing varieties of fruit-trees and abundance of date-palms, all hedged round with prickly-pears. madder-root and tobacco are also cultivated, besides barley sufficient for consumption. the wheat is brought from the teli. the wad-el-khalouf is dry, except in winter, but its bed is bored with inexhaustible wells, whose waters are distributed among the gardens by means of a _clepsydra_, or a vessel which drops so much water in an hour. the ancients measured time by the dropping of water, like the falling of sand in the hour-glass. some of the houses in these villages have two stories, and are well built; each place has its mosque, its school, its kady, and its sheikh, and the whole agglomeration of oases is governed by a sheikh kebir, appointed by the sultan of morocco. these saharan villages are eternally in strife with one another, and sometimes take up arms. on this account, they are surrounded by crenated walls, defended by towers solidly built. the immediate cause of discord here is water, that precious element of all life in the desert. but the imaginations of the people are not satisfied with this simple reason, and they are right, for the cause lies deeply in the human heart. they say, however, their ancestors were cursed by a marabout, to punish them for their laxity in religion, and this was his anathema, "god make you, until the day of judgment, like wool-comber's cards, the one gnawing the other!" their wars, in fact, are most cruel, for they destroy the noble and fruitful palms, which, by a tacit convention, are spared in other parts of the sahara when these quarrels proceed to bloodshed. they have, besides, great tact in mining, and their reputation as miners has been a long time established. but, happily, they are addicted to commerce and various branches of industry, as well as war, having commercial relations with fez, tafilett and touat, and the people are, therefore, generally prosperous. chapter vii. london jew-boys.--excursion to the emperor's garden, and the argan forests.--another interview with the governor of mogador on the anti-slavery address.--opinion of the moors on the abolition of slavery. we have at times imported into mogador a stray london jew or so, of the lower lemon-selling sort. these lads from the minories, are highly exasperated against the moors for treating them with so much contempt. indeed, a high-spirited london jew-boy will not stop at mogador, though the adult merchant will, to get money, for mankind often learn baseness with age, and pass to it through a golden door. one of these jew-boys, being cursed by a man, naturally cursed him again, "an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth." mr. willshire did not think so; and, on the complaint of the moor, the british consul threw the british jew-boy into a moorish prison, where he remained for some days. this is one more instance of the disadvantage of having commercial consuls, where everything is sacrificed to keep on good terms with government authorities. a fire happened the other night, breaking out in the house of one of the rich jewish merchants; but it was soon extinguished, the houses being built chiefly of mortar and stone, with very little wood. the governor got up, and went to the scene of "conflagration;" he cracked a few jokes with the people and went home to bed. the moors were sorry the fire did not extend itself, wanting to have an opportunity of appropriating a few of the merchant's goods. i accompanied mr. and mrs. elton, with other friends, to spend the day in the pleasant valley of the saneeates-sultan, (garden of the emperor) sometimes called gharset-es-sultan, three or four hours' ride south from mogador. the small river of wad-el-kesab, (overlooked by the village of deeabat, where watch-dogs were barking apparently all day long as well as night), lay in our way, and was with difficulty forded, heavy rain having fallen up the country, though none on the coast. these barbary streams are very deceptive, illustrating the metaphor of the book of job, "deceitful as a brook." to-day, their beds are perfectly dry; to-morrow, a sheet of turbid water dashing and foaming to the ocean, covers them and the country round, whilst the immediate cause is concealed. abrupt and sudden overflowings occur in all rivers having their source in mountains. the book of job may also refer to the disappointment of saharan travellers, who, on arriving weary and thirsty, dying for water, at the stream of the desert, find it dried up, and so perish. the country in the valley of the emperor's garden offers nothing remarkable. bushes of underwood covering sandy mounds, a few palmettos and argan trees, in which wild doves fluttered and flew about, were all that broke the monotony of a perfect waste. there were no cultivated lands hereabouts, and i was told that a great part of morocco presents this desolate aspect. we visited, however, the celebrated argan tree, which the people pretend was planted by the lieutenant of the prophet, the mighty okba, who, having spurred his horse in the roaring rebellious surge of the atlantic, wept and wailed before heaven that there were no more nations in whose heart to plunge his awful scimitar--so teaching them the mercy of god! alas! the old hoary tree, with a most peaceful patriarchal look, seemed to belie the honour, stretching out its broad sinewy arm to shelter a hundred people from the darting fires of an african sun. a more noble object of inanimate nature is not to be contemplated than a large and lofty branching tree; in its boughs and leaves, endlessly varying, matted together and intersecting each other, we see the palpable image of infinity. but in the dry and hot climate of africa, this tree is a luxury which cannot be appreciated in europe. we sat under its fresh shade awhile, gazing with security at the bright fires of the sun, radiating over and through all visible nature. to check our enthusiasm, we had strewn at our feet old broken bottles and crockery, the _débris_ and classic relics of former visitors, who were equally attentive to creature-comforts as to the grandeur of the argan monarch of the surrounding forest. the emperor's garden contains a well of water and a few fruit-trees, on the trunk of one of which, a fine fig-tree, were carved, in durable bark, the names of european visitors. among the rest, that of a famous _belle_, whose gallant worshippers had cut her name over all its broad trunk, though they may have failed to cut their own on the plastic and india-rubber tablet of the fair one's heart. this carving on the fig-tree is the sum of all that europeans have done in morocco during several ages. we rather adopt moorish habits, and descend to their animal gratifications than inculcate our own, or the intellectual pleasures of christian nations. european females brought up in this country, few excepted, adopt with gusto the lascivious dances of the mooresses; and if this may be said of them, what may we not think of the male class, who frequently throw off all restraint in the indulgence of their passions? while reposing under the umbrageous shade of the argan tree, a moor related to us wondrous sprite and elfin tales of the forests of of these wilds. at one period, the argan woods were full of enchantresses, who prevented good mussulmen from saying their prayers, by dancing before them in all their natural charms, to the sounds of melodious and voluptuous music; and if a poor son of the prophet, perchance, passed this way at the stated times of prayer, he found it impossible to attend to his devotions, being pestered to death by these naughty houries. on another occasion, when it was high summer and the sun burnt every leaf of the black argan foliage to a yellow red, and whilst the arid earth opened her mouth in horrid gaps, crystal springs of water were seen to bubble forth from the bowels of the earth, and run in rills among _parterres_ of roses and jessamines. the boughs of the argan tree also suddenly changed into _jereeds_ of the date-palm burdened with luscious fruit; but, on weary travellers descending to slake their parching thirst and refresh themselves, they fell headlong into the gaping holes of the ground, and disappeared in the abyss of the dark entrails of the world. these argan forests continued under the fearful ban of the enchantress and wicked jinns, until a holy man was brought from the farthest desert upon the back of a flying camel, who set free the spell-bound wood by tying on each bewitched tree a small piece of cork bark on which was inscribed the sacred name of the deity. the legends of these haunted argan forests remind us of the enchanted wood of tasso, whose enchantment was dissolved by the gallant knight, rinaldo, and which enabled the crusaders to procure wood for the machines of war to assault and capture the holy city. two quotations will shew the universality and permanence of superstition, begotten of human hopes and fears. such is the beautiful imagery devoted to superstitious musings, by the illustrious bard:-- "while, like the rest, the knight expects to hear loud peals of thunder breaking on his ear, a dulcet symphony his sense invades, of nymphs, or dryads, warbling through the shades. soft sighs the breeze, soft purls the silver rill. the feathered choir the woods with music fill; the tuneful swan in dying notes complains; the mourning nightingale repeats her strains, timbrels and harps and human voices join, and in one concert all the sounds combine!" then for the streamlets and flowerets-- "where'er he treads, the earth her tribute pours, in gushing springs, or voluntary flowers. here blooms the lily; there the fragrant rose; here spouts a fountain; there a riv'let flows; from every spray the liquid manna trills, and honey from the softening bark distills. again the strange the pleasing sound he hears, of plaints and music mingling in his ears; yet naught appears that mortal voice can frame. nor harp, nor timbrel, whence the music came." i had another interview with the governor on anti-slavery subjects. mr. treppass accompanied me, and assisted to interpret. his excellency was very condescending, and even joked about his own slaves, asking me how much i would give him for them. he then continued:--"i am happy to see you before your departure. whilst you have been here, i have heard nothing of your conduct but what was just and proper. you are a quiet and prudent man, [ ] and i am sorry i could not assist you in your business (abolition). the sultan will be glad that you and i have not quarrelled, but are friends." i then asked his excellency if a person were to come direct from our government, with larger powers and presents, he would have a better chance of success. the governor replied, "not the least whatever. you have done all that could have been done. we look at the subject, not the persons. the sultan will never listen to anybody on this subject. you may cut off his head, but cannot convince him. if all the christians of the world were to come and take this country, then, of course, the mussulmen would yield the question to superior force, to the decree of god, but not till then." myself.--"how is it, sidi, that the bey of tunis, and the imaum of muscat have entered into engagements with christians for the suppression of slavery, they being mussulmen?" the governor.--"i'll tell you; we mussulmen are as bad as you christians. we are full of divisions and sects. some of our people go to one mosque, and will not go to another. they are foolish (_mahboul_). so it is with the subject of slaves. some are with you, but most are with me. the bey of tunis, and the imaum have a different opinion from us. they think they are right, and we think we are right; but we are as good as they." myself.--"sidi, does not the koran encourage the abolition of slavery, and command it as a duty to all pious mussulmen?" the governor.--"no, it does not command it, but those who voluntarily liberate their slaves are therein commended, and have the blessing of god on them." [ ] myself.--"sidi, is it in my power to do anything for you in london?" the governor.--"speak well of me, that is all. tell your friends i did all i could for you." i may mention the opinions of the more respectable moors, as to the mission. they said, "if you had managed your mission well, the sultan would have received your address; your consul is slack; the french consul is more active, because he is not the sultan's merchant. our sultan must receive every person, even a beggar, because god receives all. you would not have obtained the liberation of our slaves, but the sultan would have promised you everything. all that emanates from the english people is good this we are certain of; but it would have been better had you come with letters from the bey of tunis, shewing what had been done in that country." mr. treppass is also of the opinion, that a deputation of several persons, accompanied with some presents for the emperor and his ministers, would have produced a better effect, by making an appearance of shew and authority, suitable to the ideas of the people. [ ] if coming direct from government, it would have greater weight. he thinks, besides, there are a good number of moors who are favourable to abolition. of the connexion between the east and morocco, he says, all the barbary states look up to the sultan of constantinople as to a great authority, and during the last few years, an active correspondence, on religious matters, has been carried on between morocco and constantinople, chiefly through a celebrated doctor of the name of yousef. if the turkish sultan, therefore, would _bonâ-fide_ abolish the slave-markets, i have no doubt this would produce an impression in morocco favourable to abolition. during the time i was in morocco, i distributed some arabic tracts, translated from the english by professor lee of cambridge, on the abolition of slavery. a few arabic bibles and hebrew new testaments were also placed at my disposal for circulation by the societies. i also wrote an anti-slavery circular to the british merchants of mogador, on lord brougham's act. chapter viii. el-jereed, the country of dates.--its hard soil.--salt lake. its vast extent.--beautiful palm-trees.--the dates, a staple article of food.-- some account of the date-palm.--made of culture.--delicious beverage.-- tapping the palm.--meal formed from the dates.--baskets made of the branches of the tree.--poetry of the palm.--its irrigation.-- palm-groves.--collection of tribute by the "bey of the camp." el-jereed, or belad-el-jereed, the country of dates, or literally, the country of the palm branches, is a part of the sahara, or the hot dry country lying in the immediate vicinity of the great desert. its principal features of soil and climate offer nothing different from other portions of the sahara, or the saharan regions of algeria and morocco. the belad-el-jereed, therefore, may be properly called the tunisian sahara. shaw observes generally of jereed:--"this part of the country, and indeed the whole tract of land which lies between the atlantic and egypt, is by most of the modern geographers, called biledulgerid, a name which they seem to have borrowed from bloid-el-jeridde, of the arabians, who merely signify the dry country; though, if we except the jeridde, a small portion of it which is situate on this side of lesser syrtis, and belongs to the tunisians, all the rest of it is known by no other general name than the sahara or sahra, among those arabs, at least, whom i have conversed with." besides the grand natural feature of innumerable lofty and branching palms, whose dark depending slender leaves, are depicted by the arabian poet as hanging gracefully like the dishevelled ringlets of a beautiful woman in distress, there is the vast salt lake, el-sibhah, or literally the "salt plain," and called by some modern geographers the sibhah-el-soudeeat, or lake of marks, from having certain marks made of the trunks of the palm, to assist the caravans in their marches across its monotonous samelike surface. this vast lake, or salt plain, was divided by the ancients into three parts, and denominated respectively, palus tritonis, palus pallas, and palus libya. the first is derived from the river triton, which according to ptolemy and other ancient geographers, is made to pass through this lake in its course to the sea, but which is the present river ghobs, where it falls into the mediterranean. the name pallas is derived from the tradition of pallas having accompanied sesostris in his asiatic expeditions with the lybian women, and she may have been a native of the jereed. the lake measures from north-east to south-west about seventy english miles, with a third of the breadth, but it is not one collection of water; there being several dry places, like so many islands, interspersed over its surface, depending however, as to their number and extent upon the season of the year, and upon the quantity of water in the particular season. "at first, on crossing it," says a tourist, "the grass and bushes become gradually scarcer; then follows a tract of sand, which some way beyond, becomes in parts covered with a thin layer of salt. this, as you advance, is thicker and more united; then we find it a compact and unbroken mass or sheet, which can, however, be penetrated by a sword, or other sharp instrument, and here it was found to be eleven inches in depth; and finally in the centre, it became so hard, deep, and concentrated, as to baffle all attempts at breaking its surface except with a pickaxe. the horse's shoe, in fact, makes no impression upon its stone-like surface." the salt of the lake is considerably weaker than that of the sea, and not adapted for preserving provisions, though its flavour is very agreeable; it is not exported, nor made in any way an article of commerce. the jereed, from the existence in it of a few antiquities, such as pieces of granite and marble, and occasionally a name or a classic inscription, is proved to have been in the possession of the romans, and undoubtedly of the carthaginians before them, who could have had no difficulty in holding this flat and exposed country. the trade and resources of this country consist principally in dates. the quantity exported to other parts of the regency, as well as to foreign countries, where their fine quality is well known, is in round numbers on an average from three to four thousand quintals per annum. but in jereed itself, twenty thousand people live six months of the year entirely on dates. "a great number of poles," says sir grenville temple, "are arranged across the rooms at the height of eight or nine feet from the ground, and from these are suspended rich and large bunches of dates, which compose the winter store of the inhabitants; and in one corner of the room is one or more large earthern jars about six or seven feet high, also filled with dates pressed close together, and at the bottom of the jar is a cock, from which is drawn the juice in the form of a thick luscious syrup. it is scarcely possible to imagine anything more palatable than this 'sweet of sweets.'" as we are writing of the country of dates, _par excellence_, i must needs give some description of the palm, but it will be understood that the information is tunisian, or collected in tunis, and may differ in some respects from details collected in other parts of north africa. the date-palm abounds in the maritime as well as in the inland districts of north africa. they are usually propagated from shoots of full grown trees, which if transplanted and taken care of, will yield in six or seven years, whilst those raised immediately from the stone require sixteen years to produce fruit. the date-palm is male and female, or _dioecious_, and requires communication, otherwise the fruit is dry and insipid. the age of the palm, in its greatest vigour, is about thirty years, according to the tunisians, after planting, and will continue in vigour for seventy years, bearing anually fifteen or twenty clusters of dates, each of them fifteen or twenty pounds in weight; after this long period, they begin gradually to wither away. but the saharan tripolitans will tell you that the date-palm does not attain its age of full vigour till it reaches a hundred years, and then will flourish two or or three centuries before it withers! the only culture requisite, is to be well watered at the roots once in four or five days, and to have the lower boughs cut off when they begin to droop and wither. much rain, however, injures the dates, and we know that the countries in which they flourish, are mostly without rain. in many localities in africa, date-palms can never be watered in the dry season; it is nevertheless observable that generally wherever a palm grows and thrives water may usually be obtained by boring. the sap, or honey of the palm is a delicious and wholesome beverage when drunk quite fresh; but if allowed to remain for some hours, it acquires a sharp taste, something like cider, and becomes very intoxicating. it is called poetically _leghma_, "tears" of the dates. when a tree is found not to produce much fruit, the head is cut off, and a bowl or cavity scooped out of the summit, in which the rising sap is collected, and this is drunk in its pure state without any other preparation. if the tree be not exhausted by draining, in five or six months it grows afresh; and, at the end of two or three years, may again be cut or tapped. the palm is capable of undergoing this operation five or six times, and it may be easily known how often a tree has been cut by the number of rings of a narrow diameter which are seen towards its summit; but, if the sap is allowed to flow too long, it will perish entirely at the end of a year. this sap, by distillation, produces an agreeable spirit called _arâky_ or _arâk_: from the fruit also the jews distil a spirit called _bokka_, or what we should call _toddy_. it is usual for persons of distinction to entertain their friends upon a marriage, or the birth of a child, with this pure sap, and a tree is usually tapped for the purpose. it would appear that tapping the palm was known to the ancients, for a cornelian _intaglio_ of roman antiquity, has been found in the jereed, representing a tree in this state, and the jars in which the juice was placed. dates are likewise dried in the sun, and reduced into a kind of meal, which will keep for any length of time, and which thus becomes a most valuable resource for travellers crossing the deserts, who frequently make it their only food, moistening a handful of it with a little water. certain preparations are made of the male plant, to which medicinal virtues are attributed; the younger leaves, eaten with salt, vinegar, and oil, make an excellent salad. the heart of the tree, which lies at top between the fruit branches, and weighs from ten to twenty pounds, is eaten only on grand occasions, as those already mentioned, and possesses a delicious flavour between that of a banana and a pine-apple. the palm, besides these valuable uses to which it is applied, superseding or supplying the place of all other vegetables to the tribes of the jereed, is, nevertheless, still useful for a great variety of other purposes. the most beautiful baskets, and a hundred other nick-nackery of the wickery sort are made of its branches; ropes are made and vestments wove from the long fibres, and its wood, also, when hardened by age, is used for building. indeed, we may say, it is the all and everything of the jereed, and, as it is said of the camel and the desert, _the palm is made for the jereed, and the jereed is made for the palm_. the mussulmen make out a complete case of piety and superstition in the palm, and pretend that _they are made for the palm, and the palm is made for them_, alleging that, as soon as the turks conquered constantinople, the palm raised its graceful flowing head over the domes of the former infidel city, whilst when the moors evacuated spain, the palm pined away, and died. "god," adds the pious mussulman, "has given us the palm; amongst the christians, it will not grow!" but the poetry of the palm is an inseparable appendage in the north african landscape, and even town scenery. the moor and the arab, whose minds are naturally imbued with the great images of nature, so glowingly represented also in the sacred leaves of the koran, cannot imagine a mosque or the dome-roof of a hermitage, without the dark leaf of the palm overshadowing it; but the serenest, loveliest object on the face of the landscape is _the lonely palm_, either thrown by chance on the brow of some savage hill or planted by design to adorn some sacred spot of mother-earth. i must still give some other information which i have omitted respecting this extraordinary tree. and, after this, i further refer the reader to a tour in the jereed of which some details are given in succeeding pages. a palm-grove is really a beautiful object, and requires scarcely less attention than a vineyard. the trees are generally planted in a _quincunx_, or at times without any regular order; but at distances from each other of four or five yards. the situation selected is mostly on the banks of some stream or rivulet, running from the neighbouring hills, and the more abundant the supply of water, the healthier the plants and the finer the fruit. for this tree, which loves a warm climate, and a sandy soil, is yet wonderfully improved by frequent irrigation, and, singularly, the _quality_ of the water appears of little consequence, being salt or sweet, or impregnated with nitre, as in the jereed. irrigation is performed in the spring, and through the whole summer. the water is drawn by small channels from the stream to each individual tree, around the stalk and root of which a little basin is made and fenced round with clay, so that the water, when received, is detained there until it soaks into the earth. (all irrigation is, indeed, effected in this way.) as to the abundance of the plantations, the fruit of one plantation alone producing fifteen hundred camels' loads of dates, or four thousand five hundred quintals, three quintals to the load, is not unfrequently sold for one thousand dollars. besides the jereed, tafilett, in morocco, is a great date-country. mr. jackson says, "we found the country covered with most magnificent plantations, and extensive forests of the lofty date, exhibiting the most elegant and picturesque appearance that nature on a plain surface can present to the admiring eye. in these forests, there is no underwood, so that a horseman may gallop through them without impediment." our readers will see, when they come to the tour, that this description of the palm-groves agrees entirely with that of mr. reade and captain balfour. i have already mentioned that the palm is male and female, or, as botanists say, _dioecious_; the moors, however, pretend that the palm in this respect is just like the human being. the _female_ palm alone produces fruit and is cultivated, but the presence or vicinity of the _male_ is required, and in many oriental countries there is a law that those who own a palm-wood must have a certain number of _male_ plants in proportion. in barbary they seem to trust to chance, relying on the male plants which grow wild in the desert. they hang and shake them over the female plants, usually in february or march. koempfe says, that the male flowers, if plucked when ripe, and cautiously dried, will even, in this state, perform their office, though kept to the following year. the jereed is a very important portion of the tunisian territory, government deriving a large revenue from its inhabitants. it is visited every year by the "bey of the camp," who administers affairs in this country as a sovereign; and who, indeed, is heir-apparent to the tunisian throne. immediately on the decease of the reigning bey, the "bey of the camp" occupies the hereditary beylick, and nominates his successor to the camp and the throne, usually the eldest of the other members of the royal family, the beylick not being transmitted from father to son, only on the principle of age. at least, this has been the general rule of succession for many years. the duties of the "bey of the camp" is to visit with a "flying-camp," for the purpose of collecting tribute, the two circuits or divisions of the regency. i now introduce to the reader the narrative of a tour to the jereed, extracted from the notebooks of the tourists, together with various observations of my own interspersed, and some additional account of toser, nefta, and ghafsa. chapter ix. tour in the jereed of captain balfour and mr. reade.--sidi mohammed.-- plain of manouba.--tunis.--tfeefleeah.--the bastinado.--turkish infantry.--kairwan.--sidi amour abeda.--saints.--a french spy-- administration of justice.--the bey's presents.--the hobara.--ghafsa. hot streams containing fish.--snakes.--incantation.--moorish village. the tourists were captain balfour, of the th regiment, and mr. richard reade, eldest son of sir thomas reade. the morning before starting from tunis they went to the bardo to pay their respects to sidi mohammed, "bey of the camp," and to thank him for his condescending kindness in taking them with him to the jereed. the bey told him to send their baggage to giovanni, "guarda-pipa," which they did in the evening. at nine a. m. sidi mohammed left the bardo under a salute from the guns, one of the wads of which nearly hit captain balfour on the head. the bey proceeded across the plain of manouba, mounted on a beautiful bay charger, in front of the colours, towards beereen, the greater part of the troops of the expedition following, whilst the entire plain was covered with baggage-camels, horses, mules, and detached parties of attendants, in glorious confusion. the force of the camp consisted of--mamelukes of the seraglio, superbly mounted mamelukes of the skeefah, or those who guard the entrance of the bey's palace, or tent, and are all levantines boabs, another sort of guard of the bey, who are always about the bey's tent, and must be of this country turkish infantry spahis, o. mounted arab guards camp followers (arabs) , ----- total , this is certainly not a large force, but in several places of the march they were joined for a short time by additional arab troops, a sort of honorary welcome for the bey. as they proceeded, the force of the camp-followers increased; but, in returning, it gradually decreased, the parties going home to their respective tribes. we may notice the total absence of any of the new corps, the nithàlm. this may have been to avoid exciting the prejudices of the people; however, the smallness of the force shows that the districts of the jereed are well-affected. the summer camp to beja has a somewhat larger force, the arabs of that and other neighbouring districts not being so loyal to the government. besides the above-named troops, there were two pieces of artillery. the band attendant on these troops consisted of two or three flageolets, kettle-drums, and trumpets made of cow-horns, which, according to the report of our tourists, when in full play produced the most diabolical discord. after a ride of about three hours, we pitched our tents at beereen. through the whole of the route we marched on an average of about four miles per hour, the horses, camels, &c., walking at a good pace. the turkish infantry always came up about two hours after the mounted troops. immediately on the tents being pitched, we went to pay our respects to the bey, accompanied by giovanni, "guardapipa," as interpreter. his highness received us very affably, and bade us ask for anything we wanted. afterwards, we took some luncheon with the bey's doctor, signore nunez vaise, a tuscan jew, of whose kindness during our whole tour it is impossible to speak too highly. the doctor had with him an assistant, and tent to himself. haj kador, sidi shakeer, and several other moors, were of our luncheon-party, which was a very merry one. about half-way to beereen, the bey stopped at a marabet, a small square white house, with a dome roof, to pay his devotions to a great marabout, or saint, and to ask his parting blessing on the expedition. they told us to go on, and joined us soon after. two hours after us, the turkish agha arrived, accompanied with colours, music, and some thirty men. the bey received the venerable old gentleman under an immense tent in the shape of an umbrella, surrounded with his mamelukes and officers of state. after their meeting and saluting, three guns were fired. the agha was saluted every day in the same manner, as he came up with his infantry after us. we retired for the night at about eight o'clock. the form of the whole camp, when pitched, consisting of about a dozen very large tents, was as follows:--the bey's tent in the centre, which was surrounded at a distance of about forty feet with those of the bash-hamba [ ] of the arabs, the agha of the arabs, the sahab-el-tabah, haznadar or treasurer, the bash-boab, and that of the english tourists; then further off were the tents of the katibs and bash-katib, the bash-hamba of the turks, the doctors, and the domestics of the bey, with the cookery establishment. among the attendants of the bey were the "guarda-pipa," guard of the pipe, "guarda-fusile," guard of the gun, "guarda-café," guard of the coffee, "guarda-scarpe," guard of the shoes, [ ] and "guarda-acqua," guard of water. a man followed the bey about holding in his hand a golden cup, and leading a mule, having two paniers on its back full of water, which was brought from tunis by camels. there was also a story-teller, who entertained the bey every night with the most extraordinary stories, some of them frightfully absurd. the bey did not smoke--a thing extraordinary, as nearly all men smoke in tunis. his highness always dined alone. none of his ladies ever accompany him in these expeditions. the tents had in them from twenty to fifty men each. our tent consisted of our two selves, a boab to guard the baggage, two arabs to tend the horses and camels, and another moor of all work, besides captain balfour's maltese, called michael. we had three camels for our baggage. the first night we found very cold; but having abundance of clothing, we slept soundly, in spite of the perpetual wild shoutings of the arab sentries, stationed round the camp, the roaring and grumbling of the camels, the neighing and coughing of the horses, all doing their utmost to drive away slumber from our eyelids. we halted on the morrow, which gave us an opportunity of getting a few things from tunis which we had neglected to bring. but before returning, we ate some sweetmeats sent us by the guarda-pipa, with a cup of coffee. the guarda-pipa is also a dragoman interpreter of his highness, and a genoese by birth, but now a renegade. in this country they do not know what a good breakfast is; they take a cup of coffee in the morning early, and wait till twelve or one o'clock, when they take a hearty meal, and then sup in the evening, late or early, according to the season. before returning to tunis, we called upon his highness, and told him our object. we afterwards called to see the bey every morning, to pay our respects to him, as was befitting on these occasions. his highness entered into the most familiar conversation with us. on coming back again from tunis, it rained hard, which continued all night. in the evening the welcome news was proclaimed that the tents would not be struck until daylight: previously, the camp was always struck at o'clock, about three hours before daylight, which gave rise to great confusion, besides being without shelter during the coldest part of the night (three hours before sun-rise) was a very serious trial for the health of the men. the reason, however, was, to enable the camels to get up to the new encampment; their progress, though regular and continual, is very slow. of a morning the music played off the _réveil_ an hour before sunrise. the camp presented an animated appearance, with the striking of tents, packing camels, mounting horses, &c. we paid our respects to his highness, who was sitting in an arab tent, his own being down. the music was incessantly grating upon our ears, but was in harmony with the irregular marching and movements of the arabs, one of them occasionally rushing out of the line of march, charging, wheeling about, firing, reloading, shouting furiously, and making the air ring with his cries. the order of march was as follows:--the bey mounts, and, going along about one hundred yards from the spot, he salutes the arab guards, who follow behind him; then, about five or six miles further, overtaking the turkish soldiers, who, on his coming up, are drawn up on each side of the road, his highness salutes them; and then afterwards the water-carriers are saluted, being most important personages in the dry countries of this circuit, and last of all, the gunners; after all which, the bey sends forward a mameluke, who returns with the commander, or agha of the arabs, to his highness. this done, the bey gallops off to the right or left from the line of march, on whichsoever side is most game--the bey going every day to shoot, whilst the agha takes his place and marches to the next halting-place. one morning the bey shot two partridges while on horseback. "in fact," says mr. rade, "he is the best shot on horseback i ever saw--he seldom missed his game." as captain b. was riding along with the doctor, they remarked a cannon-ball among some ruins; but, being told a saint was buried there, they got out of the way as quick as if a deadly serpent had been discovered. stretching away to the left, we saw a portion of the remains of the carthaginian aqueduct. the march was only from six to eight miles, and the encampment at tfeefleeah. at day-break, at noon, at o'clock, p.m. and at sunset, the muezzen called from outside and near the door of the bey's tent the hour of prayer. an aide-de-camp also proclaimed, at the same place, whether we should halt, or march, on the morrow, the arabs consider fat dogs a great delicacy, and kill and eat them whenever they can lay hands upon them. captain b. was fortunate in not bringing his fat pointer, otherwise he would have lost him. the arabs eat also foxes and wolves, and many animals of the chase not partaken of by us. the french in algiers kill all the fat cats, and turn them into hares by dexterous cooking. the mornings and evenings we found cold, but mid-day very hot and sultry. we left tfeefleeah early, and went in search of wild-boar; found only their tracks, but saw plenty of partridges and hares; the ground being covered with brushwood and heath, we soonæ lost sight of them. the arabs were seen on a sudden running and galloping in all directions, shouting and pointing to a hill, when a huge beast was put up, bristling and bellowing, which turned out to be a hyæna. he was shot by a mameluke, si smyle, and fell in a thicket, wallowing in his blood. he was a fine fellow, and had an immense bead, like a bull-dog. they put him on a mule, and carried him in triumph to the bey. when r. arrived at the camp, the bey sent him the skin and the head as a present, begging that he would not eat the brain. there is a superstitious belief among the moors that, if a person eats the brain of a hyæna he immediately becomes mad. the hyæna is not the savage beast commonly represented; he rarely attacks any person, and becomes untameably ferocious by being only chained up. he is principally remarkable for his stupidity when at large in the woods. the animal abounds in the forests of the morocco atlas. our tourists saw no lions _en route_, or in the jereed; the lion does not like the sandy and open country of the plain. very thick brushwood, and ground broken with rocks, like the ravines of the atlas, are his haunts. several arabs were flogged for having stolen the barley of which they had charge. the bastinado was inflicted by two inferior mamelukes, standing one on each side of the culprit, who had his hands and his feet tied behind him. in general, it may be said that bastinadoing in tunis is a matter of form, many of the strokes ordered to be inflicted being never performed, and those given being so many taps or scratches. it is very rare to see a man bleeding from the bastinado; i (the author) never did. it is merely threatened as a terror; whilst it is not to be overlooked, that the soles of the feet of arabs, and the lower classes in this country, are like iron, from the constant habit of going barefoot upon the sharpest stones. severe punishments of any kind are rarely inflicted in tunis. the country was nearly all flat desert, with scarcely an inhabitant to dissipate its savage appearance. the women of a few arab horsehair tents (waterproof when in good repair) saluted us as we passed with their shrill looloos. there appeared a great want of water. we passed the ruins of several towns and other remains. the camels were always driven into camp at sunset, and hobbled along, their two fore-legs being tied, or one of them being tied up to the knee, by which the poor animals are made to cut a more melancholy figure than with their usual awkward gait and moody character. we continued our march about ten miles in nearly a southern direction, and encamped at a place called heelet-el-gazlen. one morning shortly after starting, we came to a small stream with very high and precipitous banks, over which one arch of a fine bridge remained, but the other being wanting, we had to make a considerable _détour_ before we could cross; the carriages had still greater difficulty. here we have an almost inexcusable instance of the disinclination of the moors to repairs, for had the stream been swollen, the camp would have been obliged to make a round-about march by the way of hamman-el-enf, of some thirty miles; and all for the want of an arch which would scarcely cost a thousand piastres! this stream or river is the same as that which passes near hamman-el-enf, and the extensive plain through which it meanders is well cultivated, with douwars, or circular villages of the arabs dotted about. we saw hares, but, the ground being difficult running for the dogs, we caught but few. bevies of partridges got up, but we were unprepared for them. in the evening, the bey sent a present of a very fine bay horse to r. marched about ten miles, and halted at ben sayden. the following day after starting, we left the line of march to shoot; saw one boar, plenty of foxes and wolves, and we put up another hyæna, but the bag consisted principally of partridges, the red-legged partridge or _perdix ruffa_, killed, by the bey, who is a dead-shot. our ride lay among hills; there was very little water, which accounted for the few inhabitants. after dinner, went out shooting near jebanah, and bagged a few partridges, but, not returning before the sun went down, the bey sent a dozen fellows bawling out our names, fearing some harm had befallen us. on leaving the hills, there lay stretched at our feet a boundless plain, on which is situate kairwan, extending also to susa, and leagues around. north africa, is a country of hills and plains--such was the case along our entire route. we saw a large herd of gazelles feeding, as well as several single ones, but they have the speed of the greyhound, so we did not grace our supper with any. saw several birds called kader, about the size of a partridge, but we shot none. a good many hares and partridges either crossed our path or whirred over our heads. passed over a running stream called zebharah, where we saw the remains of an ancient bridge, but in the place where the baggage went over there was a fine one in good repair. here was a small dome-topped chapel, called sidi farhat, in which are laid the ashes of a saint. we had seen many such in the hills; indeed these gubbah abound all over barbary, and are placed more frequently on elevations. we noticed particularly the turkish infantry; they were irregulars with a vengeance, though regulars compared to the arabs. on overtaking them, they drew up on each side, and some dozen of them kept up a running sham fight with their swords and small wooden and metal shields before the bey. the officers kissed the hand of the bey, and his treasurer tipped their band, for so we must call their tumtums and squeaking-pipes. this ceremony took place every morning, and they were received in the camp with all the honours. they kept guard during the night, and did all they could to keep us awake by their eternal cry of "alleya," which means, "be off," or "keep your distance!" these troops had not been recruited for eight years, and will soon die off; and yet we see that the bey treats these remnants of the once formidable turkish tunisian janissaries with great respect; of course, in an affair with the arabs, their fidelity to the bey would be most unshaken. as we journeyed onward, we saw much less vegetation and very little cultivation. an immense plain lay before and around us, in which, however, there was some undulating ground. passed a good stone bridge; were supplied with water near a large arab encampment, around which were many droves of camels; turned up several hares, partridges, and gazelles. one of the last gave us a good chase, but the greyhounds caught him; in the first half mile, he certainly beat them by a good half of the instance, but having taken a turn which enabled the dogs to make a short cut, and being blown, they pulled the swift delicate creature savagely down. there were several good courses after hares, though her pursuers gave puss no fair play, firing at her before the dogs and heading her in every possible way. rode to kairwan. few christians arrive in this city. prince pückler muskau was the fourth when he visited it in . the town is clean, but many houses are in ruins. the greater part of a regiment of the nitham are quartered here. the famous mosque, of course, we were not allowed to enter, but many of its marble pillars and other ornaments, we heard from giovanni, were the spoils of christian churches and pagan temples. the house of the kaëd was a good specimen of dwellings in this country. going along a street, we were greatly surprised at seeing our attendants, among whom were si smyle (a very intelligent and learned man, and who taught mr. r. arabic during the tour) and the bash-boab, jumping off their horses, and, running up to an old-looking moor, and then seizing his hand, kissed it; and for some time they would not leave the ragged ruffian-like saint. at last, having joined us, they said he was sidi amour abeda, a man of exceeding sanctity, and that if the bey had met the saint, his highness must have done the same. the saint accompanied us to the kaëd's house; and, on entering, we saw the old kaëd himself, who was ill and weeping on account of the arrival of his son, the commander of a portion of the guards of the camp. we went up stairs, and sat down to some sweetmeats which had been prepared for us, together with si smyle and hamda, but, as we were commencing, the saint, who was present, laid hold of the sweets with his hands, and blessed them, mumbling _bismillas_ [ ] and other jargon. we afterwards saw a little house, in course of erection by order of the bey, where the remains of sidi amour abeda are to be deposited at his death, so that the old gentleman can have the pleasure of visiting his future burial-place. in this city, a lineal descendant of the prophet, and a lucky guesser in the way of divining, are the essential ingredients in the composition of a moorish saint. saints of one order or another are as thick here as ordinary priests in malta, whom the late facetious major wright was accustomed to call _crows_--from their black dress--but better, cormorants, as agreeing with their habits of fleecing the poor people. sidi amour abeda's hands ought to be lily-white, for every one who meets him kisses them with devout and slavering obeisance. the renegade doctor of the bey told us that the old dervish now in question would like nothing better than to see us english infidels burnt alive. fanaticism seems to be the native growth of the human heart! we afterwards visited the jabeah, or well, which they show as a curiosity, as also the camel which turns round the buckets and brings up the water, being all sanctified, like the wells of mecca, and the drinking of the waters forming an indispensable part of the pilgrimage to all holy mohammedan cities. we returned to the kaëd's, and sat down to a capital dinner. the old governor was a great fanatic, and when r. ran up to shake hands with him, the mamelukes stopped r. for fear he might be insulted. we visited the fortress, which was in course of repair, our _cicerone_ being sidi reschid, an artillery-officer. we then returned to the camp, and found santa maria, the french officer, had arrived, who, during the tour, employed himself in taking sketches and making scientific observations. he was evidently a french spy on the resources of the bey. it was given out, however, that he was employed to draw charts of algiers, tunis, and tripoli, by his government. he endeavoured to make himself as unpopular as some persons try to make themselves agreeable, being very jealous of us, and every little thing that we had he used to cry for it and beg it like a child, sometimes actually going to the bey's tent in person, and asking his highness for the things which he saw had been given to us. we went to see his highness administer justice, which he always did, morning and evening, whilst at kairwan. there were many plaintiffs, but no defendants brought up; most of them were turned out in a very summary manner. to some, orders were given, which we supposed enabled them to obtain redress; others were referred to the kadys and chiefs. the bey, being in want of camels, parties were sent out in search of them, who drove in all the finest that they could find, which were then marked ("tabâ,") _à la bey_, and immediately became the bey's property. it was a curious sight to see the poor animals thrown over, and the red-hot iron put to their legs, amidst the cries and curses of their late different owners--all which were not in the least attended to, the wants of the bey, or government, being superior on such occasions of necessity, or what not, to all complaint, law, or justice. about two hundred changed hands in this way. the bey of tunis has an immense number of camels which he farms out. he has overseers in certain districts, to whom he gives so many camels; these let them out to other persons for mills and agricultural labours, at so much per head. the overseers annually render an account of them to government, and, when called upon, supply the number required. at this time, owing to a disorder which had caused a great mortality, camels had been very scarce, and this was the reason of the extensive seizure just mentioned. if an arab commits manslaughter, his tribe is mulcted thirty-three camels; and, as the crime is rather common in the bedouin districts, the bey's acquisition in this way is considerable. a few years ago, a sicilian nobleman exported from tunis to sicily some eighty camels, the duty for which the bey remitted. the camel, if ever so healthy and thriving in the islands of the mediterranean, could never supersede the labour of mules. the camel is only useful where there are vast plains to travel, as in north africa, arabia, persia, australasia, and some parts of the east indies. a hundred more arabs joined, who passed in a single file before the bey for inspection: they came rushing into the camp by twos and threes, firing off their long guns. we crossed large plains, over which ran troops of gazelles, and had many gallops after them; but they go much faster than the greyhound, and, unless headed and bullied, there is little chance of taking them, except found asleep. on coming on a troop unawares, r. shot one, which the dogs caught. r. went up afterwards to cut its throat _à la moresque_, when he was insulted by an arab. r. noticed the fellow, and afterwards told the bey, who instantly ordered him to receive two hundred bastinadoes, and to be put in chains; but, just as they had begun to whip him, r. went up and generously begged him off. this is the end of most bastinados in the country. we passed a stream which they said had swallowed up some persons, and was very dangerous. a muddy stream, they add, is often very fatal to travellers. the bey surprised captain b. by sending him a handsome black horse as a present; he also sent a grey one to the frenchman, who, when complaining of it, saying that it was a bad one, to the bey's mamelukes, his highness sent for it, and gave him another. under such circumstances, saint mary ought to have looked very foolish. the bey shot a kader, a handsome bird, rather larger than a partridge, with black wings, and flies like a plover. we had a large hawking-establishment with us, some twenty birds, very fine falconry, which sometimes carried off hares, and even attacked young goat-kids. marched to a place called gilma, near which the road passes through an ancient town. shaw says, "gilma, the ancient cilma, or oppidum chilmanenense, is six leagues to the east-south-east of spaitla. we have here the remains of a large city, with the area of a temple, and some other fragments of large buildings. according to the tradition of the arabs, this place received its name in consequence of a miracle pretended to have been wrought by one of their marabouts, in bringing hither the river of spaitla, after it was lost underground. for ja elma signifies, in their language, 'the water comes!' an expression we are to imagine of surprise at the arrival of the stream." during our tour, the mornings were generally cold. we proceeded about twenty miles, and encamped near a place called wady tuckah. this river comes from the hills about three or four miles off, and when the camp arrives at kairwan, the bey sends an order to the arabs of the district to let the water run down to the place where the tents are pitched. when we arrived, the water had just come. we saw warrens of hares, and caught many with the dogs. troops of gazelles were also surprised; one was fired at, and went off scampering on three legs. the hawks caught a beautiful bird called hobara, or habary, [ ] about the size of the small hen-turkey, lily white on the back, light brown brindle, tuft of long white feathers on its head, and ruffle of long black feathers, which they stretch out at pleasure, with a large grey eye. a curious prickly plant grows about here, something like a dwarf broom, if its leaves were sharp thorns, it is called kardert. the bey made r. a present of the hobara. one day three gazelles were caught, and also a fox, by r.'s greyhound, which behaved extremely well, and left the other dogs in the rear, every now and then attacking him in the hind-quarters. saw seven or eight hobaras, but too windy for the hawks to be flown. captain b. chased a gazelle himself, and had the good fortune to catch him. as soon as an arab secures an animal, he immediately cuts its throat, repeating "bismillah, allah akbar," "in the name (of god), god is great." we marched seventeen miles to a place called aly ben own, the name of the saint buried close by. the plain we crossed must have been once thickly inhabited, as there were many remains. we were joined by more arabs, and our force continued to augment. the bey, being in want of horses, the same system of seizing them was adopted as with the camels. one splendid morning that broke over our encampment we had an opportunity of witnessing africa's most gorgeous scenery. [ ] plenty of hobaras; they fly like a goose. the hawks took two or three of them, also some hares. the poor hare does not know what to make of the hawks; after a little running, it gives itself up for death, only first dodging out of the bird's pounce, or hiding itself in a tuft of grass or a bush, but which it is not long allowed to do, for the arabs soon drive it out from its vain retreat. the hawk, when he seizes the hare with one claw, catches hold of any tuft of grass or irregularity of the ground with the other; a strong leather strap is also fastened from one leg to the other, to prevent them from being pulled open or strained. we came upon a herd of small deer, called ebba, which are a little larger than the gazelle, but they soon bounded beyond our pursuit, leaving us scarcely time to admire their delicate make and unapproachable speed. we crossed a range of hills into another plain, at the extremity of which lies ghafsa. the surface was naked, with the exception of tufts of strong, rushy grass, almost a sure indication of hares, and of which we started a great number. we saw another description of bird, called rhaad, [ ] with white wings, which flew like a pigeon, but more swiftly. near our tract were the remains of a large tank of ancient roman construction. the bey shot a fox. marched fourteen or fifteen miles to zwaneah, which means "little garden," though there is no sign of such thing, unless it be the few oranges, dates, and pomegranates which they find here. we had water from a tank of modern construction; some remains were close to the camp, the ancient cistern and stone duct leading from the hills. we had two thousand camels with the camp and following it, for which not a single atom of provender is carried, the camels subsisting scantily upon the coarse grass, weeds or thorns, which the soil barely affords. the camel is very fond of sharp, prickly thorns. you look upon the animal, with its apparently most tender mouth, chopping the sharpest thorns it can find, full of amazement! some of the chiefs who have lately joined us, have brought their wives with them, riding on camels in a sort of palanquin or shut-up machine. these palanquins have a kind of mast and shrouds, from which a bell is slung, tinkling with the swinging motion of the camel. this rude contrivance makes the camel more than ever "the ship of the desert." several fine horses were brought in as presents to the bey, one a very fine mare. our next march was towards ghafsa, about twenty miles off. we were joined by a considerable number of fresh arabs, who "played at powder," and kept firing and galloping before the bey the whole day; some of them managed themselves and their arms and horses with great address, balancing the firelock on their heads, firing it, twisting it round, throwing it into the air, and catching it again, and all without once losing the command of their horses. an accident happened amidst the fun; two of the parties came in contact, and one of them received a dreadful gash on the forehead. the dresses of some of them were very rich, and looked very graceful on horseback. a ride over sand-hills brought us in view of the town, embedded in olive and date-trees, looking fresh and green after our hot and dusty march; it lay stretched at the foot of a range of hills, which formed the boundaries of another extensive plain. we halted at ghafsa, [ ] which is almost a mass of rubbish filled with dirty people, although there are plenty of springs about, principally hot and mineral waters. although the moors, by their religion, are enjoined the constant use of the bath, yet because they do not change their linen and other clothes, they are always very dirty. they do not, however, exceed the maltese and sicilians, and many other people of the neighbourhood, in filth, and perhaps the moors are cleaner in their hahits than they. the arabs are extremely disgusting, and their women are often seen in a cold winter's evening, standing with their legs extended over a smoky wood fire, holding up their petticoats, and continuing in this indelicate position for hours together. in these thermæ, or hot, sulphurous, and other mineral springs, is the phenomenon of the existence of fish and small snakes. these were observed by our tourists, but i shall give three other authorities besides them. shaw says: "'the ouri-el-nout,' _i.e_., 'well of fish,' and the springs of ghasa and toser, nourish a number of small fishes of the mullet and perch kind, and are of an easy digestion. of the like quality are the other waters of the jereed, all of them, after they become cold, being the common drink of the inhabitants." sir grenville temple remarks: "the thermometer in the water marked ninety-five degrees; and, what is curious, a considerable number of fish is found in this stream, which measure from four to six inches in length, and resemble, in some degree, the gudgeon, having a delicate flavour. bruce mentions a similar fact, but he says he saw it in the springs of feriana. part of the ancient structure of these baths still exists, and pieces of inscriptions are observed in different places." mr. honneger has made a sketch of this fish. the wood-cut represents it one half the natural size: [illustration] the snake, not noticed by former tourists, has been observed by mr. honneger, which nourishes itself entirely upon the fish. the wood-cut represents the snake half its natural size: [illustration] the fish and the snake live together, though not very amicably, in the hot-springs. prince pükler muskau, who travelled in tunis, narrates that, "near the ruins of utica was a warm spring, in whose almost hot waters we found several turtles, _which seemed to inhabit this basin_." however, perhaps, there is no such extraordinary difficulty in the apprehension of this phenomenon, for "the gulf stream," on leaving the gulf of mexico, "has a temperature of more than ° (centigrade), or - / degrees of fahrenheit." [ ] many a fish must pass through and live in this stream. and after all, since water is the element of fish, and is hotter or colder in all regions, like the air, the element of man, which he breathes, warmer or cooler, according to clime and local circumstances--there appear to be no physical objections in the way of giving implicit credence to our tourists. water is so abundant, that the adjoining plain might be easily irrigated, and planted with ten thousand palms and forests of olives. god is bountiful in the desert, but man wilfully neglects these aqueous riches springing up eternally to repair the ravages of the burning simoum! in one of the groves we met a dervish, who immediately set about charming our boab. he began by an incantation, then seized him round the middle, and, stooping a little, lifted him on his shoulders, continuing the while the incantation. he then put him on his feet again, and, after several attempts, appeared to succeed in bringing off his stomach something in the shape of leaden bullets, which he then, with an air of holy swagger, presented to the astonished guard of the bey. the dervish next spat on his patient's hands, closed them in his own, then smoothed him down the back like a mountebank smooths his pony, and stroked also his head and beard; and, after further gentle and comely ceremonies of this sort, the charming of the charmer finished, and the boab presented the holy man with his fee. we dined at the kaëd's house; this functionary was a very venerable man, a perfect picture of a patriarch of the olden scriptural times of abraham, isaac, and jacob. there was not a single article of furniture in the room, except a humble sofa, upon which he sat. we inspected the old kasbah at ghafsa, which is in nearly a state of ruin, and looked as if it would soon be down about our ears. it is an irregular square, and built chiefly of the remains of ancient edifices. it was guarded by fifty turks, whose broken-down appearance was in perfect harmony with the citadel they inhabited. the square in a building is the favourite form of the moors and mohammedans generally; the kaaba of mecca, the _sanctum sanctorum_, is a square. the moors endeavour to imitate the sacred objects of their religion in every way, even in the commonest affairs of human existence, whilst likewise their troops of wives and concubines are only an earthly foretaste and an earnest of the celestial ladies they expect to meet hereafter. we saw them making oil, which was in a very primitive fashion. the oil-makers were nearly all women. the olives were first ground between stones worked by the hands, until they became of the consistence of paste, which was then taken down to the stream and put into a wooden tub with water. on being stirred up, the oil rises to the top, which they skim off with their hands and put into skins or jars; when thus skimmed, they pass the grounds or refuse through a sieve, the water running off; the stones and pulp are then saved for firing. but in this way much of the oil is lost, as may be seen by the greasy surface of the water below where this rude process is going on. among the oil-women, we noticed a girl who would have been very pretty and fascinating had she washed herself instead of the olives. we entered an arab house inhabited by some twenty persons, chiefly women, who forthwith unceremoniously took off our caps, examined very minutely all our clothes with an excited curiosity, laughed heartily when we put our hands in our pockets, and wished to do the same, and then pulled our hair, looking under our faces with amorous glances. on the hill overlooking the town, we also met two women screaming frightfully and tearing their faces; we learned that one of them had lost her child. the women make the best blankets here with handlooms, and do the principal heavy work. we saw some hobaras, also a bird called getah, smaller than a partridge, something like a ptarmigan, with its summer feathers, and head shaped like a quail. the bey sent two live ones to r., besides a couple of large jerboahs of this part, called here, _gundy_. they are much like the guinea-pig, but of a sandy colour, and very soft and fine, like a young hare. the jerboahs in the neighbourhood of tunis are certainly more like the rat. the other day, near the south-west gates, we fell in with a whole colony of them--which, however, were the lesser animal, or jerd species--who occupied an entire eminence to themselves, the sovereignty of which seemed to have been conceded to them by the bey of tunis. they looked upon us as intruders, and came very near to us, as if asking us why we had the audacity to disturb the tranquillity of their republic. the ground here in many places was covered with a substance like the rime of a frosty morning; it tastes like salt, and from it they get nitre. captain b. thinks it was salt. the water which we drank was brought from ghafsa: the bey drinks water brought from tunis. we marched across a vast plain, covered with the salt just mentioned, which was congealed in shining heaps around bushes or tufts of grass, and among which also scampered a few hares. we encamped at a place called ghorbatah. close to the camp was a small shallow stream, on each side of which grew many canes; we bathed in the stream, and felt much refreshed. the evening was pleasantly cool, like a summer evening in england, and reminded us of the dear land of our birth. numerous plains in north africa are covered with saline and nitrous efflorescence; to the presence of these minerals is owing the inexhaustible fertility of the soil, which hardly ever receives any manure, only a little stubble being occasionally burnt. we saw flights of the getah, and of another bird called the gedur, nearly the same, but rather lighter in colour. when they rise from the ground, they make a curious noise, something like a partridge. we were unusually surprised by a flight of locusts, not unlike grasshoppers, of about two inches long, and of a reddish colour. saw also gazelles. halted by the dry bed of a river, called furfouwy. a pool supplied the camp: in the mountains, at a distance, there was, however, a delicious spring, a stream of liquid pearls in these thirsty lands! a bird called mokha appeared now and then; it is about the size of a nightingale, and of a white light-brown colour. we seldom heard such sweet notes as this bird possesses. its flying is beautifully novel and curious; it runs on the ground, and now and then stops and rises about fifteen feet from the surface, giving, as it ascends, two or three short slow whistles, when it opens its graceful tail and darts down to the ground, uttering another series of melodious whistles, but much quicker than when it rises. we continued our march over nearly the same sort of country, but all was now flat as far as the eye could see, the hills being left behind us. about eight miles from furfouwy, we came to a large patch of date-trees, watered by many springs, but all of them hot. under the grateful shade of the lofty palm were flowers and fruits in commingled sweetness and beauty. here was the village of dra-el-hammah, surrounded, like all the towns of the jereed, with date-groves and gardens. the houses were most humbly built of mud and bricks. after a scorching march, we encamped just beyond, having made only ten miles. saw quantities of bright soft spar, called talc. here also the ground was covered with a saline effloresence. near us were put up about a dozen blue cranes, the only birds seen to-day. a gazelle was caught, and others chased. we particularly observed huge patches of ground covered with salt, which, at a distance, appeared just like water. chapter x. toser.--the bey's palace.--blue doves.--the town described.--industry of the people.--sheikh tahid imprisoned and punished.--leghorn.--the boo-habeeba.--a domestic picture.--the bey's diversions.--the bastinado.-- concealed treasure.--nefta.--the two saints.--departure of santa maria.-- snake-charmers.--wedyen.--deer stalking.--splendid view of the sahara.-- revolting acts.--qhortabah.--ghafsa.--byrlafee.--mortality among the camels--aqueduct.--remains of udina.--arrival at tunis.--the boab's wives.--curiosities.--tribute collected.--author takes leave of the governor of mogador, and embarks for england.--rough weather.--arrival in london. leaving dra-el-hammah, after a hot march of five or six miles, we arrived at the top of a rising ground, at the base of which was situate the famous toser, the head-quarters of the camp in the jereed, and as far as it goes. behind the city was a forest of date-trees, and beyond these and all around, as far as the eye could wander, was an immeasurable waste--an ocean of sand--a great part of which we could have sworn was water, unless told to the contrary. we were met, before entering toser, with some five or six hundred arabs, who galloped before the bey, and fired as usual. the people stared at us christians with open mouths; our dress apparently astonished them. at toser, the bey left his tent and entered his palace, so called in courtesy to his highness, but a large barn of a house, without any pretensions. we had also a room allotted to us in this palace, which was the best to be found in the town, though a small dark affair. toser is a miserable assemblage of mud and brick huts, of very small dimensions, the beams and the doors being all of date-wood. the gardens, however, under the date-trees are beautiful, and abundantly watered with copious streams, all of which are warm, and in one of which we bathed ourselves and felt new vigour run through our veins. we took a walk in the gardens, and were surprised at the quantities of doves fluttering among the date-trees; they were the common blue or barbary doves. in the environs of mogador, these doves are the principal birds shot. toser, or touzer, the _tisurus_ of ancient geography, is a considerable town of about six thousand souls, with several villages in its neighbourhood. the impression of toser made upon our tourists agrees with that of the traveller, desfontaines, who writes of it in :--"the bey pitched his tent on the right side of the city, if such can be called a mass of _mud-houses_." the description corresponds also with that of dr. shaw, who says that "the villages of the jereed are built of mud-walls and rafters of palm-trees." evidently, however, some improvement has been made of late years. the arabs of toser, on the contrary, and which very natural, protested to the french scientific commission that toser was the finest city in el-jereed. they pretend that it has an area as large as algiers, surrounded with a mud wall, twelve or fifteen feet high, and crenated. in the centre is a vast open space, which serves for a market-place. toser has mosques, schools, moorish baths--a luxury rare on the confines of the desert, fondouks or inns, &c. the houses have flat terraces, and are generally well-constructed, the greater part built from the ruins of a roman town; but many are now dilapidated from the common superstitious cause of not repairing or rebuilding old houses. the choice material for building is brick, mostly unbaked or sun-dried. most of these houses stand detached. toser, situate in a plain, is commanded from the north-west by a little rocky mountain, whence an abundant spring takes its source, called _meshra_, running along the walls of the city southward, divides itself afterwards in three branches, waters the gardens, and, after having irrigated the plantations of several other villages, loses itself in the sand at a short distance. the wells within the city of toser are insufficient for the consumption of the inhabitants, who fetch water from wad meshra. the neighbouring villages are belad-el-ader, zin, abbus; and the sacred villages are zaouweeat, of tounseea, sidi ali bou lifu, and taliraouee. the arabs of the open country, and who deposit their grain in and trade with these villages, are oulad sidi sheikh, oulad sidi abeed, and hammania. the dates of toser are esteemed of the finest quality. walked about the town; several of the inhabitants are very wealthy. the dead saints are, however, here, and perhaps everywhere else in tunis, more decently lodged, and their marabets are real "whitewashed sepulchres." they make many burnouses at toser, and every house presents the industrious sight of the needle or shuttle quickly moving. we tasted the leghma, or "tears of the date," for the first time, and rather liked it. on going to shoot doves, we, to our astonishment, put up a snipe. the weather was very hot; went to shoot doves in the cool of the evening. the bey administers justice, morning and evening, whilst in the jereed. an arab made a present of a fine young ostrich to the bey, which his highness, after his arrival in tunis, sent to r. the great man here is the sheikh tahid, who was imprisoned for not having the tribute ready for the bey. the tax imposed is equivalent to two bunches for each date-tree. the sheikh has to collect them, paying a certain yearly sum when the bey arrives, a species of farming-out. it was said that he is very rich, and could well find the money. the dates are almost the only food here, and the streets are literally gravelled with their stones. santa maria again returned his horse to the bey, and got another in its stead. he is certainly a man of _delicate_ feeling. this gentleman carried his impudence so far that he even threatened some of the bey's officers with the supreme wrath of the french government, unless they attended better to his orders. a new sheikh was installed, a good thing for the bey's officers, as many of them got presents on the occasion. we blessed our stars that a roof was over our heads to shield us from the burning sun. we blew an ostrich-egg, had the contents cooked, and found it very good eating. they are sold for fourpence each, and it is pretended that one makes an ample meal for twelve persons. we are supplied with leghma every morning; it tastes not unlike cocoa-nut milk, but with more body and flavour. r. very unwell, attributed it to his taking copious draughts of the leghma. rode out of an evening; there was a large encampment of arabs outside the town, thoroughly sun-burnt, hardy-looking fellows, some of them as black as negroes. many people in toser have sore eyes, and several with the loss of one eye, or nearly so; opthalmia, indeed, is the most prevalent disease in all barbary. the neighbourhood of the desert, where the greater part of the year the air is filled with hot particles of sand, is very unfavourable to the sight; the dazzling whiteness of the whitewashed houses also greatly injures the eyes. but the moors pretend that lime-washing is necessary to the preservation of the houses from the weather, as well as from filth of all sorts. we think really it is useful, by preventing dirty people in many cases from being eaten up by their own filth and vermin, particularly the jews, the tunisian jews being the dirtiest persons in the regency. the lime-wash is the grand _sanitary_ instrument in north africa. there are little birds that frequent the houses, that might be called jereed sparrows, and which the arabs name boo-habeeba, or "friend of my father;" but their dress and language are very different, having reddish breasts, being of a small size, and singing prettily. shaw mentions them under the name of the capsa-sparrow, but he is quite wrong in making them as large as the common house-sparrow. he adds: "it is all over of a lark-colour, excepting the breast, which is somewhat lighter, and shineth like that of a pigeon. the boo-habeeba has a note infinitely preferable to that of the canary, or nightingale." he says that all attempts to preserve them alive out of the districts of the jereed have failed. r. has brought several home from that country, which were alive whilst i was in tunis. there are also many at the bardo in cages, that live in this way as long as other birds. went to see the houses of the inhabitants: they were nearly all the same, the furniture consisting of a burnouse-loom, a couple of millstones, and a quantity of basins, plates, and dishes, hung upon the walls for effect, seldom being used; there were also some skins of grain. the beams across the rooms, which are very high, are hung with onions, dates, and pomegranates; the houses are nearly all of one story. some of the women are pretty, with large long black eyes and lashes; they colour the lower lid black, which does not add to their beauty, though it shows the bewitching orb more fully and boldly. they were exceedingly dirty and ragged, wearing, nevertheless, a profusion of ear-rings, armlets, anclets, bracelets, and all sorts of _lets_, with a thousand talismanic charms hanging from their necks upon their ample bosoms, which latter, from the habit of not wearing stays, reach as low down as their waists. they wrap up the children in swaddling-clothes, and carry them behind their backs when they go out. two men were bastinadoed for stealing a horse, and not telling where they put him; every morning they were to be flogged until they divulged their hiding-place. a man brought in about a foot of horse's skin, on which was the bey's mark, for which he received another horse. this is always done when any animal dies belonging to the beys, the man in whose hands the animal is, receiving a new one on producing the part of the skin marked. the bey and his ministers and mamelukes amused themselves with shooting at a mark. the bey made some good hits. the bey and his mamelukes also took diversion in spoiling the appearance of a very nice young horse; they daubed hieroglyphics upon his shoulders and loins, and dyed the back where the saddle is placed, and the three legs below the knee with henna, making the other leg look as white as possible. another grey horse, a very fine one, was also cribbed. we may remark here, that there were very few fine horses to be met with, all the animals looking poor and miserable, whilst these few fine ones fell into the hands of the bey. it is probable, however, that the arabs kept their best and most beautiful horses out of the way, while the camp was moving among them. the old sheikh still continued in prison. the bastinadoes with which he had been treated were inflicted on his bare person, cold water being applied thereto, which made the punishment more severe. after receiving one hundred, he said he would shew his hiding-place; and some people being sent with him, dug a hole where he pointed out, but without coming to anything. this was done several times, but with the same effect. he was then locked up in chains till the following morning. millions of dollars lie buried by the arabs at this moment in different parts of barbary, especially in morocco, perhaps the half of which will never be found, the owners of them having died before they could point out their hoarded treasures to their relatives, as but a single person is usually in the secret. money is in this way buried by tribes, who have nothing whatever to fear from their sovereigns and their sheikhs; they do it from immemorial custom. it is for this reason the arabs consider that under all ancient ruins heaps of money are buried, placed there by men or demons, who hold the shining hoards under their invincible spell. they cannot comprehend how european tourists can undertake such long journeys, merely for the purpose of examining old heaps of stones, and making plans and pictures of such rubbish. when any person attempts to convince the arabs that this is the sole object, they only laugh with incredulity. went to nefta, a ride of about fourteen miles, lying somewhat nearer the sahara than toser. the country on the right was undulating sand, on the left an apparently boundless ocean, where lies, as a vast sheet of liquid fire, when the sun shines on it, the now long celebrated palus libya. in this so-called lake no water is visible, except a small marsh like the one near toser, where we went duck-shooting. our party was very respectable, consisting of the agha of the arabs, two or three of the bey's mamelukes, the kaëd of the jereed, whose name is braun, and fifty or sixty arab guards, besides ourselves. on entering nefta, the escort immediately entered, according to custom, a marabet (that of sidi bou aly), captain b. and r. meanwhile standing outside. there were two famous saints here, one of whom was a hundred years of age. the other, sidi mustapha azouz, had the character of being a very clever and good man, which also his intelligent and benevolent appearance betokened, and not a fanatic, like amour abeda of kairwan. there were at the time of our visit to him about two hundred people in his courtyard, who all subsisted on his charities. we were offered dates, kouskousou, [ ] and a seed which they call sgougou, and which has the appearance of dried apple-seed. the arabs eat it with honey, first dipping their fingers into the honey, and then into the seed, which deliciously sticks to the honey. the sheikh's saint also distributed beads and rosaries. he gave r. a bag of sgougou-seed, as well as some beads. these two sheikhs are objects of most religious veneration amongst all true believers, and there is nothing which would not be done at their bidding. nefta, the negeta of the ancients, is the frontier town of the tunisian territories from the south, being five days' journey, or about thirty-five or forty leagues from the oases of souf, and fifteen days' from ghadumes. nefta is not so much a town as an agglomeration of villages, separated from one another by gardens, and occupying an extent of surface twice the size that of the city of algiers. these villages are hal guema, mesâba, zebda ouled, sherif, beni zeid, beni ali, sherfa, and zaouweeah sidi ahmed. the position of nefta and its environs is very picturesque. water is here abundant. the principal source, which, under the name of wad nefta, takes its rise at the north of the city, in the midst of a movement of earth, enters the villages of sherfa and sidi ahmed; divides them in two, and fecundates its gardens planted with orange-trees, pomegranates, and fig-trees. the same spring, by the means of ducts of earth, waters a forest of date-trees which extends some leagues. a regulator of the water (kaëd-el-ma) distributes it to each proprietor of the plantation. the houses of nefta are built generally of brick; some with taste and luxury; the interior is ornamented with dutch tiles brought from tunis. each quarter has its mosque and school, and in the centre of the group of villages is a place called rebot, on the banks of wad nefta, which serves for a common market. here are quarters specially devoted to the aristocratic landed proprietors, and others to the busy merchants. the shereefs are the genuine nobles, or seigneurs of nefta, from among whom the bey is wont to choose the governors of the city. the complexion of the population is dark, from its alliance with negress slaves, like most towns advanced in the desert. the manners of the people are pure. they are strict observers of the law, and very hospitable to strangers. captain b., however, thought that, had he not been under the protection of the bey, his head would not have been worth much in these districts. every traveller almost forms a different opinion, and frequently the very opposite estimate, respecting the strangers amongst whom he is sojourning. a few jewish artizans have always been tolerated here, on condition of wearing a black handkerchief round their heads, and not mount a horse, &c. recently the bey, however, by solemn decrees, has placed the jews exactly on the same footing of rights and privileges as the rest of his subjects. nefta is the intermediate _entrepôt_ of commerce which tunis pours towards the sahara, and for this reason is called by the arabs, "the gate of tunis;" but the restrictive system established by the turks during late years at ghadumes, has greatly damaged the trade between the jereed and the desert. the movement of the markets and caravans takes place at the beginning of spring, and at the end of summer. only a portion of the inhabitants is devoted to commerce, the rich landed proprietory and the shereefs representing the aristocracy, lead the tranquil life of nobles, the most void of care, and, perhaps, the happiest of which contemplative philosophy ever dreamed. the oasis of nefta, indeed, is said to be the most poetic of the desert; its gardens are delicious; its oranges and lemons sweet; its dates the finest fruit in the "land of dates." nearly all the women are pretty, of that beauty peculiar to the oriental race; and the ladies who do not expose themselves to the fierce sun of the day, are as fair as mooresses. santa maria left for ghabs, to which place there is not a correct route laid down in any chart. there are three routes, but the wells of one are only known to travellers, a knowledge which cannot be dispensed with in these dry regions. the wells of the other two routes are known to the bordering tribes alone, who, when they have taken a supply of water, cover them up with sand, previously laying a camel-skin over the well-mouth, to prevent the sand falling into the water, so that, while dying with thirst, you might be standing on a well and be none the wiser. the frenchman has taken with him an escort of twelve men. the weather is cooler, with a great deal of wind, raising and darkening the sky with sand; even among the dategroves our eyes and noses were like so many sand-quarries. sheikh tahib has been twice subjected to corporal punishment in the same way as before mentioned, with the addition of fifty, but they cannot make him bleed as they wish. he declares he has not got the money, and that he cannot pay them, though they cut him to pieces. as he has collected a great portion of the tribute of the people, one cannot much pity the lying rogue. we were amused with the snake-charmers. these gentry are a company under the protection of their great saint sidi aysa, who has long gone upwards, but also is now profitably employed in helping the juggling of these snake-mountebanks. these fellows take their snakes about in small bags or boxes, which are perfectly harmless, their teeth and poison-bags being extracted. they carry them in their bosoms, put them in their mouths, stuffing a long one in of some feet in length, twist them around their arms, use them as a whip to frighten the people, in the meanwhile screaming out and crying unto their heavenly protector for help, the bystanders devoutly joining in their prayers. the snake-charmers usually perform other tricks, such as swallowing nails and sticking an iron bar in their eyes; and they wear their hair long like women, which gives them a very wild maniacal look. three of the mamelukes and ourselves went to wedyen, a town and date-wood about eight miles from toser, to the left. the date-grove is extensive, and there are seven villages in it of the same name. we slept in the house of the sheikh, who complained that the frenchman, in passing that way, had allowed his escort to plunder, and actually bound the poor sheikh, threatening him on his remonstrating. what conduct for christians to teach these people! one morning before daylight, we were on horseback, and _en route_ towards the hills, for the purpose of shooting loted, as they call a species of deer found here. the ground in the neighbourhood of wedyen is tossed about like a hay-field, and volcanic looking. about four miles off we struck into the rocks, on each side of our path, rising perpendicularly in fantastic shapes. on reaching the highest ground, the view was exceedingly wild. much of the rock appeared as if it had only just been cooled from a state of fusion; there was also a quantity of tuffo rock, similar to that in the neighbourhood of naples. the first animal we saw was a wolf, which, standing on the sky-line of the opposite hill, looked gigantic. the deep valley between, however, prevented our nearer approach. we soon after came on a loted, who took to his heels, turning round a mass of rock; but, soon after, he almost met as, and we had a view of him within forty yards. several shots were fired at him without effect, and he at last made his escape, with a speed which defied all our attempts at following him. dismounting, the sheikh ali, of the arab tribe hammama, who was with us, and who is the greatest deer-stalker in the country, preceded us a little distance to look out for deer, the marks of which were here very numerous. after a short time, an arab brought information of a herd of some thirty, with a good many young ones; but our endeavours to have a shot at them were fruitless, though one of the arabs got near enough to loose the dogs at them, and a greyhound was kicked over for his pains. we saw no more of them; but our want of success was not surprising, silence not being in the least attended to, and our party was far too large. the arabs have such a horrible habit of vociferation, that it is a wonder they ever take any game at all. about the hills was scattered a great variety of aromatic plants, quantities of shells, and whole oyster-beds, looking almost as fresh as if they had been found by the sea-side. on our return from toser, we had an extensive view of the sahara, an ocean as far as the eye could see, of what one would have taken his oath was water, the shores, inlets, and bays being clearly defined, but, in reality, nothing but salt scattered on the surface. several islets were apparently breaking its watery expanse, but these also were only heaps of sand raised from the surrounding flat. the whole country, hills, plains and deserts, gave us an idea as if the materials had been thrown together for manufacture, and had never been completed. nevertheless these savage deserts of boundless extent are as complete in their kind as the smiling meadows and fertile corn-fields of england, each being perfect in itself, necessary to the grand whole of creation, and forming an essential portion of the works of divine providence. the sheikh tahib's gardens were sold for , piastres, his wife also added to this , , and he was set at liberty. the dates have been coming in to a great amount. there are many different kinds. the principal are:--degalah, the most esteemed, which are very sweet and almost transparent. captain b. preferred the trungah, another first-rate sort, which are plum-shaped, and taste something like a plum. there are also the monachah, which are larger than the other two, dryer and more mealy, and not so sweet as degalah, and other sorts. the dates were very fine, though in no very great abundance, the superior state of ripeness being attributed to there only being a single day of rain during the past year in the jereed. rain is bad for the dates, but the roots of the tree cannot have too much water. the tent-pitchers of the camp went round and performed, in mask, actions of the most revolting description, some being dressed as women, and dancing in the most lascivious and indecent manner. one fellow went up to r., who was just on the point of knocking him down, when, seeing the treasurer of the bey cracking his sides with laughter, he allowed the brute to go off under such high patronage. it was even said that these fellows were patronized by his highness. but, on all moorish feastdays, lascivious actions of men and women are an indispensable part of their entertainment. this is the worst side of the character of the moors. the moorish women were never so profligate as since the arrival of the french in algeria. one of the greatest chiefs, sultan kaëd, of the hammama has just died. he was an extremely old man, and it is certain that people live to a good old age in this burning clime. during his life, he had often distinguished himself, and lastly against the french, before constantina. whilst in the hills one day, we came suddenly upon a set of arabs, about nine in number, who took to their heels on seeing us. a man has just been killed near this place, probably by the same gang. for robbery and murder, no hills could be better fitted, the passes being so intricate, and the winds and turns so sudden and sharp. the sheikh ali brought in two loteds, a female and its young one, which he had shot. the head of the loted is like a deer's, but the eye is further up: it is about a fallowdeer's size. the female has not the beard like a goat, but long hair, reaching from the head to the bottom of the chest, and over the fore-legs. these loteds were taken in consequence of an order from the bey, that they should not return without some. on our march back to tunis, we encamped for two days by the foot of a range of hills at sheesheeah, about ten miles off. the water, brought from some distance, was bad and salt. we proceeded to ghortabah, our old place. two of the prisoners (about twelve of whom we had with us), and one of the turks, died from the excessive heat. the two couriers that were sent with despatches for the government were attacked near this place by the arabs, and the horse of one was so injured, that it was necessary to kill him; the man who rode the horse was also shot through the leg. this was probably in revenge for the exactions of the bey of the camp on the tribes. on our return to ghafsa, we had rain, hail, and high wind, and exceedingly cold--a siberian winter's day on the verge of the scorching desert. the ground, where there was clay, very slippery; the camels reeled about as if intoxicated. the consequence was, it was long before the tents came up, and we endured much from this sudden change of the weather. our sufferings were, however, nothing as compared to others, for during the day, ten men were brought in dead, from the cold (three died four days before from heat), principally turks; and, had there been no change in the temperature, we cannot tell how many would have shared the same fate. many of the camels, struggling against the clayey soil, could not come up. eight more men were shortly buried, and three were missing. the sudden transition from the intense heat of the one day to the freezing cold of the next, probably gave the latter a treble power, producing these disastrous effects, the poor people being sadly ill-clad, and quite unprepared for such extreme rigour. besides, on our arrival at the camp, all the money in europe could not have purchased us the required comforts, or rather necessaries, to preserve our health. cold makes everybody very selfish. we were exceedingly touched on hearing of the death of a little girl, whom we saw driven out of a kitchen, in which the poor helpless little thing had taken refuge from the inclemency of the weather. santa maria arrived from ghabs without accident, having scarcely seen a soul the whole of the way. he certainly was an enterprizing fellow, worthy of imitation. he calculated the distance from ghabs to toser at miles. there are a number of towns in the districts of ghabs better built than those of nefta and toser; ghabs river is also full of water and the soil of the country is very fertile. the dates are not so good as those of the jereed. ghabs is about miles from ghafsa. we here took our farewell of santa maria; he went to beja, the head-quarters of the summer-camp: thence, of course, he would proceed to algiers, to give an account of his _espionage_. next season, he said, he would go to tripoli and ghadames; he had been many years in north africa, and spoke arabic fluently. we next marched to byrlafee, about twenty miles, and ninety-one from toser, where there are the ruins of an old town. the weather continued cold and most wintry. here is a very ancient well still in use. fragments of cornices and pillars are strewn about. the foundations of houses, and some massive stone towers, which from their having a pipe up the centre, must have had something to do with regulating the water, are all that remain. we had now much wind, but no rain. a great many camels and horses perished. altogether, the number of camels that died on the return of the camp, was . the price of a camel varies from to piastres. many good ones were sold at the camp for eighty piastres each, or about two pounds ten shillings, english money. a good sheep was disposed of for four or five piastres, or about three shillings. there were also some ludicrous sales. a horse in the extremities of nature, or near to the _articulo mortis_, was sold for a piastre, eight pence; a camel, in a like situation, was sold for a piastre and a half. a tolerably good horse in tunis sells at from to piastres. there are the remains of an aqueduct at gilma, and several other buildings, the capitals of the pillars being elaborately worked. it is seen that nearly the entire surface of tunis is covered with remains of aqueducts, roman, christian, and moorish. if railways be applied to this country--the french, are already talking about forming one from algiers to blidah, across the mitidjah--unquestionably along the lines will be constructed ducts for water, which could thus be distributed over the whole country. instead of the camels of the "bey of the camp" carrying water from tunis to the jereed, the railway would take from zazwan, the best and most delicious water in the regency, to the dry deserts of the jereed, with the greatest facility. as to railways paying in this country, the resources of tunis, if developed, could pay anything. marching onwards about eighteen miles, we encamped two or three beyond an old place called sidi-ben-habeeba. a man murdered a woman from jealousy in the camp, but made his escape. almost every eminence we passed was occupied with the remains of some ancient fort, or temple. there was a good deal of corn in small detached patches, but it must be remembered, the north-western provinces are the corn-districts. in the course of the following three days, we reached sidi-mahammedeah, where are the magnificent remains of udina. after about an hour's halt, and when all the tents had been comfortably pitched, the bey astonished us with an order to continue our march, and we pursued our way to momakeeah, about thirty miles, which we did not reach until after dark. we passed, for some three or four hours, through a flight of locusts, the air being darkened, and the ground loaded with them. at a little distance, a flight of locusts has the appearance of a heavy snow-storm. these insects rarely visit the capital; but, since the appearance of those near momakeeah, they have been collected in the neighbourhood of the city, cooked, and sold among the people. momakeeah is a countryhouse belonging to the bey, to whom, also, belongs a great portion of the land around. there is a large garden, laid out in the italian style attached to this country-seat. on arriving at tunis, we called at the bardo as we passed, and saw the guard mounting. there was rather a fine band of military music; moorish musicians, but playing, after the european style, italian and moorish airs. we must give here some account of our boab's domestic concerns. he boasted that he had had twenty-seven wives, his religion allowing four at once, which he had bad several times; he was himself of somewhat advanced years. according to him, if a man quarrels with his wife, he can put her in prison, but must, at the same time, support her. a certain quantity of provision is laid down by law, and he must give her two suits, or changes, of clothes a year. but he must also visit her once a week, and the day fixed is friday. if the wife wishes to be separated, and to return to her parents, she must first pay the money which he may demand, and must also have his permission, although he himself may send her to her parents whenever he chooses, without assigning any reason. he retains the children, and he may marry again. the woman is generally expected to bring her husband a considerable sum in the way of dowry, but, on separation, she gets nothing back. this was the boab's account, but i think he has overdone the harshness and injustice of the mohammedan law of marriage in relating it to our tourists. it may be observed that the strict law is rarely acted upon, and many respectable moors have told me that they have but one wife, and find that quite enough. it is true that many moors, especially learned men, divorce their wives when they get old, feeling the women an embarrassment to them, and no wonder, when we consider these poor creatures have no education, and, in their old age, neither afford connubial pleasure nor society to their husbands. with respect to divorce, a woman can demand by law and right to be separated from her husband, or divorced, whenever he ill-treats her, or estranges himself from her. eunuchs, who have the charge of the women, are allowed to marry, although they cannot have any family. the chief eunuch of the bardo has the most revolting countenance. our tourists brought home a variety of curious jereed things: small date-baskets full of dates, woollen articles, skins of all sorts, and a few live animals. sidi mohammed also made them many handsome presents. some deer, jereed goats, an ostrich, &c., were sent to mr. r. after his return, and both captain b. and mr. r. have had every reason to be extremely gratified with the hospitality and kind attentions of the "bey of the camp." it is very difficult to ascertain the amount of tribute collected in the jereed, some of which, however, was not got in, owing to various impediments. our tourists say generally:-- camel-loads. [ ] money, dollars, and piastres, (chiefly i imagine, the latter.) burnouses, blankets, and quilts, &c. dates (these were collected at toser, and brought from nefta and the surrounding districts) ---- total it is impossible, with this statement before us, to make out any exact calculation of the amount of tribute. a cantar of dates varies from fifteen to twenty-five shillings, say on an average a pound sterling; this will make the amount of the camel-loads at five cantars per load £ , six camel-loads of woollen manufactures, &c., at sixty pound per load, value ------ total £ , the money, chiefly piastres, must be left to conjecture. however, mr. levy, a large merchant at tunis, thinks the amount might be from to , piastres, or, taking the largest sum, £ , sterling: total amount of the tribute of the jereed: in goods £ , ditto, in money: , ------ total £ , to this sum may be added the smaller presents of horses, camels, and other beasts of burden. * * * * * before leaving mogador, in company with mr. willshire, i saw his excellency, the governor again, when i took formal leave of him. he accompanied me down to the port with several of the authorities, waiting until i embarked for the renshaw schooner. several of the consuls, and nearly all the europeans, were also present. on the whole, i was satisfied with the civilities of the moorish authorities, and offer my cordial thanks to the europeans of mogador for their attentions during my residence in that city. a little circumstance shews the subjection of our merchants, the consul not excepted, to the moorish government. one of the merchants wished to accompany me on board, but was not permitted, on account of his engagements with the sultan. a merchant cannot even go off the harbour to superintend the stowing of his goods. never were prisoners of war, or political offenders, so closely watched as the boasted imperial merchants of this city. after setting sail, we were soon out of sight of mogador; and, on the following day, land disappeared altogether. during the next month, we were at sea, and out of view of the shore. i find an entry in my journal, when off the isle of wight. we had had most tremendous weather, successive gales of foul wind, from north and north-east. our schooner was a beautiful vessel, a fine sailer with a flat bottom, drawing little water, made purposely for barbary ports. she had her bows completely under water, and pitched her way for twenty-five succeeding days, through huge rising waves of sea and foam. during the whole of this time, i never got up, and lived on bread and water with a little biscuit. captain taylor, who was a capital seaman, and took the most accurate observations, lost all patience, and, though a good methodist, would now and then rush on deck, and swear at the perverse gale and wrathful sea. we took on board a fine barb for mr. elton, which died after a few days at sea, in these tempests. i had a young vulture that died a day before the horse, or we should have fed him on the carcase. [illustration] an aoudad which we conveyed on account of mr. willshire to london, for the zoological society, outlived these violent gales, and was safely and comfortably lodged in the regent's park. after my return from africa, i paid my brave and hardy fellow-passenger a visit, and find the air of smoky london agrees with him as well as the cloudless region of the morocco desert. appendix. the following account of the bombardment of mogador by the french, written at the period by an english resident may be of interest at the present time. mogador was bombarded on the th of august, . hostilities began at o'clock a.m., by the moors firing twenty-one guns before the french had taken up their position, but the fire was not returned until p.m. the 'gemappes,' ; 'suffren,' ; 'triton,' ; ships of the line. 'belle poule,' , frigate; 'asmodée' and 'pluton,' steamers, and some brigs, constituted the bombarding squadron. the batteries were silenced, and the moorish authorities with many of the inhabitants fled, leaving the city unprotected against the wild tribes, who this evening and the next morning, sacked and fired the city. on the th, nine hundred french were landed on the isle of mogador. after a rude encounter with the garrison, they took possession of it and its forts. their loss was, after twenty-eight hours' bombarding, trifling, some twenty killed and as many more wounded; the moors lost some five hundred on the isle killed, besides the casualties in the city. the british consul and his wife, and mr. and mrs. robertson, with others, were obliged to remain in the town during the bombardment on account of their liabilities to the emperor. the escape of these people from destruction was most miraculous. the bombarding squadron reached on the th, the english frigate, 'warspite,' on the th, and the wind blowing strong from n.e., and preventing the commencement of hostilities, afforded opportunity to save, if possible, the british consul's family and other detained europeans; but, notwithstanding the strenuous remonstrances of the captain of the 'warspite', nothing whatever could prevail upon the moorish deputy-governor in command, sidi abdallah deleero, to allow the british and other europeans to take their departure. the governor even peremptorily refused permission for the wife of the consul to leave, upon the cruel sophism that, "the christian religion asserts the husband and wife to be one, consequently," added the governor, "as it is my duty, which i owe to my emperor, to prevent the consul from leaving mogador, i must also keep his wife." the fact is the moors, in their stupidity, and perhaps in their revenge, thought the retaining of the british consul and the europeans might, in some way or other, contribute to the defence of themselves, save the city, or mitigate the havoc of the bombardment. at any rate, they would say, "let the christians share the same fate and dangers as ourselves." during the bombardment, the moors for two hours fought well, but their best gunner, a spanish renegade, omar ei-haj, being killed, they became dispirited and abandoned the batteries. the governor and his troops, about sunset, disgracefully and precipitately fled, followed by nearly all the moorish population, thereby abandoning mogador to pillage, and the european jews to the merciless wild tribes, who, though levied to defend the town, had, for some hours past, hovered round it like droves of famished wolves. as the governor fled out, terrified as much at the wild tribes as of the french, in rushed these hordes, led on by their desperate chiefs. these wretches undismayed, unmoved by the terrors of the bombarding ravages around, strove and vied with each other in the committal of every act of the most unlicensed ferocity and depredation, breaking open houses, assaulting the inmates, murdering such as shewed resistance, denuding the more submissive of their clothing, abusing women--particularly in the jewish quarter--to all which atrocities the europeans were likewise exposed. at the most imminent hazard of their lives, the british consul and his wife, with a few others, escaped from these ruffians. truly providential was their flight through streets, resounding with the most turbulent confusion and sanguinary violence. it was late when the plunderers appeared before the consulates, where, without any ceremony, by hundreds, they fell to work, breaking open bales of goods, ransacking places for money and other treasures; and, thus unsatisfied in their rapacity, they tore and burnt all the account-books and consular documents. other gangs fought over the spoil; some carrying off their booty, and others setting it on fire. it was a real pandemonium of discord and licentiousness. during the darkness, and in the midst of such scenes, it was that the consul and his wife threaded their precarious flight through the streets, and in their way were intercepted by a marauding band, who attacked them; tore off his coat; and, seizing his wife, insisted upon denuding her, four or five daggers being raised to her throat, expecting to find money concealed about their persons; nor would the ruffians desist until they ascertained they had none, the consul having prudently resolved to take no money with them. fortunately, at this juncture, his wife was able to speak, and in arabic (being born here, and daughter of a former consul), therefore she could give force to her entreaties by appealing to them not to imbue their hands in the blood of their countrywomen. this had the desired effect. the chief of the party undertook to conduct them to the water-port, when, coming in contact with another party, a conflict about booty ensued, during which the consul's family got out of the town to a place of comparative security. incidents of a similar alarming nature attended the escape of mr. robertson, his wife, and four children; one, a baby in arms. in the crowd, mr. robertson, with a child in each hand, lost sight of mrs. robertson, with her infant and another child. distracted by sad forebodings, poor mr. robertson forced his way to the water-port, but not before a savage mountainer--riding furiously by him--aimed a sabre-blow at him to cut him down; but, as the murderous arm was poised above, mr. robertson stooped, and, raising his arm at the time, warded it off; the miscreant then rode off, being satisfied at this cut at the detested nazarene. another ruffian seized one of his little girls, a pretty child of nine years old, and scratched her arm several times with his dagger, calling out _flous_ (money) at each stroke. at the water-port, mr. robertson joined his fainting wife, and the british consul and his wife, with mr. lucas and mr. allnut. an old moor never deserted the consul's family, "faithful among the faithless;" and a jewess, much attached to the family, abandoned them only to return to those allied to her by the ties of blood. their situation was now still perilous, for, should they be discovered by the wild berbers, they all might be murdered. this night, the th, was a most anxious one, and their apprehensions were dreadful. dawn of day was fast approaching, and every hour's delay rendered their condition more precarious. in this emergency, mr. lucas, who never once failed or lost his accustomed suavity and presence of mind amidst these imminent dangers, resolved upon communicating with the fleet by a most hazardous experiment. on his way from the town-gate to the water-port, he noticed some deal planks near the beach. the idea struck him of turning these into a raft, which, supporting him, could enable their party to communicate with the squadron. mr. lucas fetched the planks, and resolutely set to work. taking three of them, and luckily finding a quantity of strong grass cordage, he arranged them in the water, and with some cross-pieces, bound the whole together; and, besides, having found two small pieces of board to serve him as paddles, he gallantly launched forth alone, and, in about an hour, effected his object, for he excited the attention of the french brig, 'canard,' from which a boat came and took him on board. the officers, being assured there were no moors on guard at the batteries, and that the berbers were wholly occupied in plundering the city, promptly and generously sent off a boat with mr. lucas to the rescue of the alarmed and trembling fugitives. the prince de joinville afterwards ordered them to be conveyed on board the 'warspite.' the self-devotedness, sagacity, and indefatigable exertions of the excellent young man, mr. lucas, were above all encomiums, and, at the hands of the british government, he deserved some especial mark of favour. poor mrs. levy (an english jewess, married to a maroquine jew), and her family were left behind, and accompanied the rest of the miserable jews and natives, to be maltreated, stripped naked, and, perhaps, murdered, like many poor jews. mr. amrem elmelek, the greatest native merchant and a jew, died from fright. carlos bolelli, a roman, perished during the sack of the city. mogador was left a heap of ruins, scarcely one house standing entire, and all tenantless. in the fine elegiac bulletin of the bombarding prince, "alas! for thee, mogador! thy walls are riddled with bullets, and thy mosques of prayer blackened with fire!" (or something like these words.) commerce with morocco. tangier. tangier trades almost exclusively with gibraltar, between which place and this, an active intercourse is constantly kept up. the principal articles of importation into tangier are, cotton goods of all kinds, cloth, silk-stuffs, velvets, copper, iron, steel, and hardware of every description; cochineal, indigo, and other dyes; tea, coffee, sulphur, paper, planks, looking-glasses, tin, thread, glass-beads, alum, playing-cards, incense, sarsaparilla, and rum. the exports consist in hides, wax, wool, leeches, dates, almonds, oranges, and other fruit, bark, flax, durra, chick-peas, bird-seed, oxen and sheep, henna, and other dyes, woollen sashes, haicks, moorish slippers, poultry, eggs, flour, &c. the value of british and foreign goods imported into tangier in was: british goods, £ , _s_., foreign goods, £ , . the goods exported from tangier during the same year was: for british ports, £ , _s_., for foreign ports, £ , . the following is a statement of the number of british and foreign ships that entered and cleared from this port during the same year. entered: british ships , the united tonnage of which was , ; foreign ships , the total tonnage of which was , . cleared: british ships , the united tonnage of which was , ; foreign ships , the total tonnage of which was , . three thousand head of cattle are annually exported, at a fixed duty of five dollars per head, to gibraltar, for the use of that garrison, in conformity with the terms of special grants that have, from time to time, been made by the present sultan and some of his predecessors. in addition to the above, about , head are, likewise, exported annually, for the same destination, at a higher rate of duty, varying from eight dollars to ten dollars per head. gibraltar, also, draws from this place large supplies of poultry, eggs, flour, and other kinds of provisions. mogador. from the port of mogador are exported the richest articles the country produces, viz., almonds, sweet and bitter gums, wool, olive-oil, seeds of various kinds, as cummin, gingelen, aniseed; sheep-skins, calf, and goat-skins, ostrich-feathers, and occasionally maize. the amount of exports in was: for british ports, £ , _s_. _d_., for foreign ports, £ , _s_. _d_. the imports are manchester cotton goods, which have entirely superseded the east india long cloths, formerly in universal use, blue salampores, prints, sugar, tea, coffee, buenos ayres slides, iron, steel, spices, drugs, nails, beads and deals, woollen cloth, cotton wool, and mirrors of small value, partly for consumption in the town, but chiefly for that of the interior, from morocco and its environs, as far as timbuctoo. the amount of imports in was: british goods, £ , _s_. _d_., foreign goods £ , _s_. _d_. the trade last year was greatly increased by the unusually large demand for olive-oil from all parts, and there is no doubt that, under a more liberal government, the commerce might be developed to a vast extent. rabat. the principal goods imported at rabat are, alum, calico of different qualities, cinnamon, fine cloth, army cloth, cloves, copperas, cotton prints, raw cotton, sewing cotton, cutlery, dimity, domestics, earthenware, ginger, glass, handkerchiefs (silk and cotton), hardware, indigo, iron, linen, madder root, muslin, sugar (refined and raw), tea, and tin plate. the before-mentioned articles are imported partly for consumption in rabat and sallee, and partly for transmission into the interior. the value of different articles of produce exported at rabat during the last five years amounts to £ , _s_. there can be no doubt that the imports and exports at rabat would greatly increase, if the present high duties were reduced, and government monopolies abolished. large quantities of hides were exported before they were a government monopoly: now the quantity exported is very inconsiderable. mazagan. _goods imported_.--brown domestics, called american white, muslins, raw cotton, cotton-bales, silk and cotton pocket-handkerchiefs; tea, coffee, sugars, iron, copperas, alum; many other articles imported, but in very small quantities. a small portion of the importations is consumed at mazagan and azimore, but the major portions in the interior. the amount of the leading goods exported in was:--bales of wool, , ; almonds, serons; grain, , fanegas. no doubt the commerce of this port would be increased under better fiscal laws than those now established. but the primary and immediate thing to be looked after is the wilful casting into the anchorage-ground of stone-ballast by foreigners. british masters are under control, but foreigners will persist, chiefly sardinian masters. the end [ ] the predecessor of muley abd errahman. [ ] on account, of their once possessing the throne, the shereefs have a peculiar jealousy of marabouts, and which latter have not forgotten their once being sovereigns of morocco. the _moravedi_ were "really a dynasty of priests," as the celebrated magi, who usurped the throne of cyrus. the shereefs, though descended from the prophet, are not strictly priests, or, to make the distinction perfectly clear the shereefs are to be considered a dynasty corresponding to the type of melchizdek, uniting in themselves the regal and sacerdotal authority, whilst the _marabouteen_ were a family of priests like the sons of aaron. abd-el-kader unites in himself the princely and sacerdotal authority like the shereefs, though not of the family of the prophet. mankind have always been jealous of mere theocratic government, and dynasties of priests have always been failures in the arts of governing, and the egyptian priests, though they struggled hard, and were the most accomplished of this class of men, could not make themselves the sovereigns of egypt. [ ] according to others the sâdia reigned before the shereefs. [ ] i was greatly astonished to read in mr. hay's "western barbary," (p. ), these words--"during one of the late rebellions, a beautiful young girl was offered up as a propitiatory sacrifice, her throat being cut before the tent of the sultan, and in his presence!" this is an unmitigated libel on the shereefian prince ruling morocco. first of all, the sacrifice of human beings is repudiated by every class of inhabitants in barbary. such rites, indeed, are unheard of, nay, unthought of. if the mahometan religion has been powerful in any one thing, it is in that of rooting out from the mind of man every notion of human sacrifice. it is this which makes the sacrifice of the saviour such an obnoxious doctrine to mussulmen. it is true enough, at times, oxen are immolated to god, but not to moorish princes, "to appease an offended potentate." one spring, when there was a great drought, the people led up to the hill of ghamart, near carthage, a red heifer to be slaughtered, in order to appease the displeasure of deity; and when the bey's frigate, which, a short time ago, carried a present to her britannic majesty, from tunis to malta, put back by stress of weather, two sheep were sacrificed to some tutelar saints, and two guns were fired in their honour. the companions of abd-el-kader in a storm, during his passage from oran to toulon, threw handsful of salt to the raging deep to appease its wild fury. but as to sacrificing human victims, either to an incensed deity, or to man, impiously putting himself in the place of god, the moors of barbary have not the least conception of such an enormity. it would seem, unfortunately, that the practice of the gentleman, who travelled a few miles into the interior of morocco on a horse-mission, had been to exaggerate everything, and, where effect was wanting, not to have scrupled to have recourse to unadulterated invention. but this style of writing cannot be defended on any principle, when so serious a case is brought forward as that of sacrificing a human victim to appease the wrath of an incensed sovereign, and that prince now living in amicable relations with ourselves. [ ] gräberg de hemso, whilst consul-general for sweden and sardinia (at morocco!) concludes the genealogy of these mussulman sovereigns with this strange, but catholic-spirited rhapsody:-- "muley abd-ur-bakliman, who is now gloriously and happily reigning, whom we pray almighty god, all goodness and power, to protect and exalt by prolonging his life, glory, and reign in this world and in the next; and giving him, during eternity, the heavenly beatitude, in order that his soul, in the same manner as flame to flame, river to sea, may be united with his sweetest, most perfect and ineffable creator. amen." [ ] yezeed was half-irish, born of the renegade widow of an irish sergeant of the corps of sappers and miners, who was placed at the disposition of this government by england, and who died in morocco. on his death, the facile, buxom widow was admitted, "nothing loath," into the harem of sidi-mohammed, who boasted of having within its sacred enclosure of love and bliss, a woman from every clime. here the daughter of erin brought forth this ferocious tyrant, whose maxim of carnage, and of inflicting suffering on humanity was, "my empire can never be well governed, unless a stream of blood flows from the gate of the palace to the gate of the city." to do yezeed justice, he followed out the instincts of his birth, and made war on all the world except the english (or irish). tully's letters on tripoli give a graphic account of the exploits of yezeed, who, to his inherent cruelty, added a fondness for practical (hibernian) jokes. his father sent him several times on a pilgrimage to mecca to expiate his crimes, when he amused, or alarmed, all the people whose countries he passed through, by his terrific vagaries. one day he would cut off the heads of a couple of his domestics, and play at bowls with them; another day, he would ride across the path of an european, or a consul, and singe his whiskers with the discharge of a pistol-shot; another day, he would collect all the poor of a district, and gorge them with a razzia he had made on the effects of some rich over-fed bashaw. the multitude sometimes implored heaven's blessing on the head of yezeed. at other times trembled for their own heads. meanwhile, our european consuls made profound obeisance to this son of the shereef, enthroned in the west. so the tyrant passed the innocent days of his pilgrimage. so the godless herd of mankind acquiesced in the divine rights of royalty. [ ] see appendix at the end of this volume. [ ] the middle western region consists of algiers and part of tunis. [ ] pliny, the elder, confirms this tradition mentioned by pliny. marcus yarron reports, "that in all spain there are spread iberians, persians, phoenicians, celts, and carthaginians." (lib. iii. chap. ). [ ] in latin, mauri, maurice, maurici, maurusci, and it is supposed, so called by the greeks from their dark complexions. [ ] the more probable derivation of this word is from _bar_, signifying land, or earth, in contradistinction from the sea, or desert, beyond the cultivable lands to the south. to give the term more force it is doubled, after the style of the semitic reduplication. de haedo de la captividad gives a characteristic derivation, like a genuine hidalgo, who proclaimed eternal war against los moros. he says--"moors, alartes, cabayles, and some turks, form all of them a dirty, lazy, inhuman, indomitable nation of beasts, and it is for this reason that, for the last few years, i have accustomed myself to call that land the land of barbary." [ ] procopius, de bello vandilico, lib. ii. cap. . [ ] some derive it from _sarak_, an arabic word which signifies to steal, and hence, call the conquerors thieves. others, and with more probability, derive it from _sharak_, the east, and make them orientals, and others say there is an arabic word _saracini_, which means a pastoral people, and assert that saracine is a corruption from it, the new arabian immigrants being supposed to have been pastoral tribes. [ ] some suppose that _amayeegh_ means "great," and the tribes thus distinguished themselves, as our neighbours are wont to do by the phrase "la grande nation." the shoulah are vulgarly considered to be descended from the philistines, and to have fled before joshua on the conquest of palestine. in his translation of the description of spain, by the shereef el-edris (madrid, ), don josef antonio conde speaks of the berbers in a note-- "masmuda, one of the five principal tribes of barbaria; the others are zeneta, called zenetes in our novels and histories, sanhagha which we name zenagas; gomêsa is spelt in our histories gomares and gomeles. huroara, some of these were originally from arabia; there were others, but not so distinguished. la de ketâma was, according to tradition, african, one of the most ancient, for having come with afrikio. "ben kis ben taifi ben tebâ, the younger, who came from the king of the assyrians, to the land of the west. "none of these primitive tribes appear to have been known to the romans, their historians, however, have transmitted to us many names of other aboriginal tribes, some of which resemble fractions now existing, as the getules are probably the present geudala or geuzoula. but the present berbers do not correspond with the names of the five original people just mentioned. in morocco, there are amayeegh and shelouh, in algeria the kabyles, in tunis the aoures, sometimes the shouwiah, and in sahara the touarichs. there are, besides, numerous subdivisions and admixtures of these tribes." [ ] monsieur balbi is decidedly the most recent, as well as the best authority to apply to for a short and definite description of this most celebrated mountain system, called by him "système atlantique," and i shall therefore annex what he says on this interesting subject, "orographie." he says--"of the 'système atlantique,' which derives its name from the mount atlas, renowned for so many centuries, and still so little known; we include in this vast system, all the heights of the region of maghreb--we mean the mountain of the barbary states--as well as the elevations scattered in the immense sahara or desert. it appears that the most important ridge extends from the neighbourhood of cape noun, or the atlantic, as far as the east of the great syrte in the state of tripoli. in this vast space it crosses the new state of sidi-hesdham, the empire of morocco, the former state of algiers, as well as the state of tripoli and the regency of tunis. it is in the empire of morocco, and especially in the east of the town of morocco, and in the south-east of fez, that that ridge presents the greatest heights of the whole system. it goes on diminishing afterwards in height as it extends towards the east, so that it appears the summits of the territory of algiers are higher than those on the territory of tunis, and the latter are less high than those to be found in the state of tripoli. several secondary ridges diverge in different directions from the principal chain; we shall name among them the one which ends at the strait of gibraltar in the empire of morocco. several intermediary mountains seem to connect with one another the secondary chains which intersect the territories of algiers and tunis. geographers call little atlas the secondary mountains of the land of sous, in opposition to the name of great atlas, they give to the high mountains of the empire of morocco. in that part of the principal chain called mount gharian, in the south of tripoli, several low branches branch off and under the names of mounts maray, black mount haroudje, mount liberty, mount tiggerandoumma and others less known, furrow the great solitudes of the desert of lybia and sahara proper. from observations made on the spot by mr. bruguière in the former state of algiers, the great chain which several geographers traced beyond the little atlas under the name of great atlas does not exist. the inhabitants of mediah who were questioned on the subject by this traveller, told him positively, that the way from that town to the sahara was through a ground more or less elevated, and slopes more or less steep, and without having any chain of mountains to cross. the pass of teniah which leads from algiers to mediah is, therefore, included in the principal chain of that part of the regency. [ ] xenophon, in his anabasis, speaks of ostriches in mesopotamia being run down by fleet horses. [ ] mount atlas was called dyris by the ancient aborigines, or derem, its name amongst the modern aborigines. this word has been compared to the hebrew, signifying the place or aspect of the sun at noon-day, as if mount atlas was the back of the world, or the cultivated parts of the globe, and over which the sun was seen at full noon, in all his fierce and glorious splendour. bochart connects the term with the hebrew meaning 'great' or 'mighty,' which epithet would be naturally applied to the atlas, and all mountains, by either a savage or civilized people. we have, also, on the northern coast, russadirum, the name given by the moors to cape bon, which is evidently a compound of _ras_, head, and _dirum_, mountain, or the head of the mountain. we have again the root of this word in doa-el-hamman, tibet deera, &c., the names of separate chains of the mighty atlas. any way, the modern der-en is seen to be the same with the ancient dir-is. [ ] the only way of obtaining any information at all, is through the registers of taxation; and, to the despotism and exactions of these and most governments, we owe a knowledge of the proximate amount of the numbers of mankind. [ ] tangier, mogador, wadnoun, and sous have already been described, wholly, or in part. [ ] in , arzila was sacked by the english, and remained for twenty years uninhabited. [ ] according to mr. hay, a portion of the salee rovers seem to have finally taken refuge here. up the river el-kous, the imperial squadron lay in ordinary, consisting of a corvette, two brigs, (once merchant-vessels, and which had been bought of christians), and a schooner, with some few gun-boats, and even these two or three vessels were said to be all unfit for sea. but, when great britain captured the rock of gibraltar, we, supplanting the moors became the formidable toll-keepers of the herculean straits, and the salee rivers have ever since been in our power. if the shereefs have levied war or tribute on european navies since that periods it has been under our tacit sanction. the opinion of nelson is not the less true, that, should england engage in war with any maritime state of europe, morocco must be our warm and active friend or enemy, and, if our enemy, we must again possess ourselves of our old garrison of tangier. [ ] so called, it is supposed, from the quantity of aniseed grown in the neighbourhood. [ ] near cape blanco is the ruined town of tit or tet, supposed to be of carthaginian origin, and once also possessed by the portuguese, when commerce therein flourished. [ ] el-kesar is a very common name of a fortified town, and is usually written by the spaniards alcazar, being the name of the celebrated royal palace at seville. [ ] marmol makes this city to have succeeded the ancient roman town of silda or gilda. mequinez has been called ez-zetounah, from the immense quantities of olives in its immediate vicinity. [ ] don j. a. conde says--"fes or sea fez, the capital of the realm of that name; the fables of its origin, and the grandeur of the moors, who always speak of their cities as foundations of heroes, or lords of the whole world, &c., a foible of which our historians are guilty. nasir-eddin and the same ullug beig say, for certain, that fez is the court of the king in the west. i must observe here, that nothing is less authentic than the opinions given by casiri in his library of the escurial, that by the word algarb, they always mean the west of spain, and by the word almagreb, the west of africa; one of these appellations is generally used for the other. the same casiri says, with regard to fez, that it was founded by edno ben abdallah, under the reign of almansor abu giafar; he is quite satisfied with that assertion, but does not perceive that it contains a glaring anachronism. fez was already a very ancient city before the mohammed anuabi of the mussulmen, and joseph, in his a. j., mentions a city of mauritania; the prophet nahum speaks of it also, when he addresses ninive, he presents it as an example for no ammon. he enumerates its districts and cities, and says, fut and lubim, fez and lybia, &c. [ ] i imagine we shall never know the truth of this until the french march an army into fez, and sack the library. [ ] it is true enough what the governor says about _quietness_, but the novelty of the mission turned the heads of the people, and made a great noise among them. the slave-dealers of sous vowed vengeance against me, and threatened to "rip open my bowels" if i went down there. [ ] the sultan's minister, ben oris, addressing our government on the question says, "whosoever sets any person free god will set his soul free from the fire," (hell), quoting the koran. [ ] a person going to the emperor without a present, is like a menace at court, for a present corresponds to our "good morning." [ ] _bash_, means chief, as bash-mameluke, chief of the mamelukes. it is a turkish term. [ ] this office answers vulgarly to our _boots_ at english inns. [ ] bismilla, arabic for "in the name of god!" the mohammedan grace before meat, and also drink. [ ] shaw says.--"the hobara is of the bigness of a capon, it feeds upon the little grubs or insects, and frequents the confines of the desert. the body is of a light dun or yellowish colour, and marked over with little brown touches, whilst the larger feathers of the wing are black, with each of them a white spot near the middle; those of the neck are whitish with black streaks, and are long and erected when the bird is attacked. the bill is flat like the starling's, nearly an inch and a half long, and the legs agree in shape and in the want of the hinder toe with the bustard's, but it is not, as golins says, the bustard, that bird being twice as big as the hobara. nothing can be more entertaining than to see this bird pursued by the hawk, and what a variety of flights and stratagems it makes use of to escape." the french call the hobara, a little bustard, _poule de carthage_, or carthage-fowl. they are frequently sold in the market of tunis, as ordinary fowls, but eat something like pheasant, and their flesh is red. [ ] the most grandly beautiful view in tunis is that from the belvidere, about a mile north-west from the capital, looking immediately over the marsa road. here, on a hill of very moderate elevation, you have the most beautiful as well as the most magnificent panoramic view of sea and lake, mountain and plain, town and village, in the whole regency, or perhaps in any other part of north africa. there are besides many lovely walks around the capital, particularly among and around the craggy heights of the south-east. but these are little frequented by the european residents, the women especially, who are so stay-at-homeative that the greater part of them never walked round the suburbs once in their lives. europeans generally prefer the marina, lined on each side, not with pleasant trees, but dead animals, sending forth a most offensive smell. [ ] shaw says: "the rhaad, or safsaf, is a granivorous and gregarious bird, which wanteth the hinder toe. there are two species, and both about and a little larger than the ordinary pullet. the belly of both is white, back and wings of a buff colour spotted with brown, tail lighter and marked all along with black transverse streaks, beak and legs stronger than the partridge. the name rhaad, "thunder," is given to it from the noise it makes on the ground when it rises, safsaf, from its beating the air, a sound imitating the motion." [ ] ghafsa, whose name bochart derives from the hebrew "comprimere," is an ancient city, claiming as its august founder, the libyan hercules. it was one of the principal towns in the dominions of jugurtha, and well-fortified, rendered secure by being placed in the midst of immense deserts, fabled to have been inhabited solely by snakes and serpents. marius took it by a _coup-de-main_, and put all the inhabitants to the sword. the modern city is built on a gentle eminence, between two arid mountains, and, in a great part, with the materials of the ancient one. ghafsa has no wall of _euceinte_, or rather a ruined wall surrounds it, and is defended by a kasbah, containing a small garrison. this place may be called the gate of the tunisian sahara; it is the limit of blad-el-jereed; the sands begin now to disappear, and the land becomes better, and more suited to the cultivation of corn. three villages are situated in the environs, sala, el-kesir, and el-ghetar. a fraction of the tribe of hammand deposit their grain in ghafsa. this town is famous for its manufactories of baraeans and blankets ornamented with pretty coloured flowers. there is also a nitre and powder-manufactory, the former obtained from the earth by a very rude process. the environs are beautifully laid out in plantations of the fig, the pomegranate, and the orange, and especially the datepalm, and the olive-tree. the oil made here is of peculiarly good quality, and is exported to tugurt, and other oases of the desert. [ ] kaemtz's meteorology, p. . [ ] this is the national dish of barbary, and is a preparation of wheat-flour granulated, boiled by the steam of meat. it is most nutritive, and is eaten with or without meat and vegetables. when the grains are large, it is called hamza. [ ] a camel-load is about five cantars, and a cantar is a hundred weight. [transcriber's note: in this electronic edition, the footnotes were numbered and relocated to the end of the work. in ch. , "mogrel-el-aska" was corrected to "mogrel-el-aksa"; in ch. , "lattely" to "lately"; in ch. , "book" to "brook"; in ch. , "cirumstances" to "circumstances". also, "amabasis" was corrected to "anabasis" in footnote .] in morocco [illustration: _from a photograph from the service des beaux-arts au maroc_ fez elbali from the ramparts] in morocco by edith wharton illustrated [illustration] new york charles scribner's sons copyright, , , by charles scribner's sons published october, the scribner press to general lyautey resident general of france in morocco and to madame lyautey, thanks to whose kindness the journey i had so long dreamed of surpassed what i had dreamed preface i having begun my book with the statement that morocco still lacks a guide-book, i should have wished to take a first step toward remedying that deficiency. but the conditions in which i travelled, though full of unexpected and picturesque opportunities, were not suited to leisurely study of the places visited. the time was limited by the approach of the rainy season, which puts an end to motoring over the treacherous trails of the spanish zone. in , owing to the watchfulness of german submarines in the straits and along the northwest coast of africa, the trip by sea from marseilles to casablanca, ordinarily so easy, was not to be made without much discomfort and loss of time. once on board the steamer, passengers were often kept in port (without leave to land) for six or eight days; therefore for any one bound by a time-limit, as most war-workers were, it was necessary to travel across country, and to be back at tangier before the november rains. this left me only one month in which to visit morocco from the mediterranean to the high atlas, and from the atlantic to fez, and even had there been a djinn's carpet to carry me, the multiplicity of impressions received would have made precise observation difficult. the next best thing to a djinn's carpet, a military motor, was at my disposal every morning; but war conditions imposed restrictions, and the wish to use the minimum of petrol often stood in the way of the second visit which alone makes it possible to carry away a definite and detailed impression. these drawbacks were more than offset by the advantage of making my quick trip at a moment unique in the history of the country; the brief moment of transition between its virtually complete subjection to european authority, and the fast approaching hour when it is thrown open to all the banalities and promiscuities of modern travel. morocco is too curious, too beautiful, too rich in landscape and architecture, and above all too much of a novelty, not to attract one of the main streams of spring travel as soon as mediterranean passenger traffic is resumed. now that the war is over, only a few months' work on roads and railways divide it from the great torrent of "tourism"; and once that deluge is let loose, no eye will ever again see moulay idriss and fez and marrakech as i saw them. in spite of the incessant efforts of the present french administration to preserve the old monuments of morocco from injury, and her native arts and industries from the corruption of european bad taste, the impression of mystery and remoteness which the country now produces must inevitably vanish with the approach of the "circular ticket." within a few years far more will be known of the past of morocco, but that past will be far less visible to the traveller than it is to-day. excavations will reveal fresh traces of roman and phenician occupation; the remote affinities between copts and berbers, between bagdad and fez, between byzantine art and the architecture of the souss, will be explored and elucidated; but, while these successive discoveries are being made, the strange survival of mediæval life, of a life contemporary with the crusaders, with saladin, even with the great days of the caliphate of bagdad, which now greets the astonished traveller, will gradually disappear, till at last even the mysterious autocthones of the atlas will have folded their tents and silently stolen away. ii authoritative utterances on morocco are not wanting for those who can read them in french; but they are to be found mainly in large and often inaccessible books, like m. doutté's "en tribu," the marquis de segonzac's remarkable explorations in the atlas, or foucauld's classic (but unobtainable) "reconnaissance au maroc"; and few, if any, have been translated into english. m. louis châtelain has dealt with the roman ruins of volubilis and m. tranchant de lunel, m. raymond koechlin, m. gaillard, m. ricard, and many other french scholars, have written of moslem architecture and art in articles published either in "france-maroc," as introductions to catalogues of exhibitions, or in the reviews and daily papers. pierre loti and m. andré chevrillon have reflected, with the intensest visual sensibility, the romantic and ruinous morocco of yesterday; and in the volumes of the "conférences marocaines," published by the french government, the experts gathered about the resident-general have examined the industrial and agricultural morocco of to-morrow. lastly, one striking book sums up, with the clearness and consecutiveness of which french scholarship alone possesses the art, the chief things to be said on all these subjects, save that of art and archæology. this is m. augustin bernard's volume, "le maroc," the one portable and compact yet full and informing book since leo africanus described the bazaars of fez. but m. augustin bernard deals only with the ethnology, the social, religious and political history, and the physical properties, of the country; and this, though "a large order," leaves out the visual and picturesque side, except in so far as the book touches on the always picturesque life of the people. for the use, therefore, of the happy wanderers who may be planning a moroccan journey, i have added to the record of my personal impressions a slight sketch of the history and art of the country. in extenuation of the attempt i must add that the chief merit of this sketch will be its absence of originality. its facts will be chiefly drawn from the pages of m. augustin bernard, m. h. saladin, and m. gaston migeon, and the rich sources of the "conférences marocaines" and the articles of "france-maroc." it will also be deeply indebted to information given on the spot by the brilliant specialists of the french administration, to the marquis de segonzac, with whom i had the good luck to travel from rabat to marrakech and back; to m. alfred de tarde, editor of "france-maroc"; to m. tranchant de lunel, director of the french school of fine arts in morocco; to m. goulven, the historian of portuguese mazagan; to m. louis châtelain, and to the many other cultivated and cordial french officials, military and civilian, who, at each stage of my journey, did their amiable best to answer my questions and open my eyes. note in the writing of proper names and of other arab words the french spelling has been followed. in the case of proper names, and names of cities and districts, this seems justified by the fact that they occur in a french colony, where french usage naturally prevails; and to spell _oudjda_ in the french way, and _koubba_, for instance, in the english form of _kubba_, would cause needless confusion as to their respective pronunciation. it seems therefore simpler, in a book written for the ordinary traveller, to conform altogether to french usage. table of contents page preface vii i. rabat and salÉ ii. volubilis, moulay idriss and meknez iii. fez iv. marrakech v. harems and ceremonies vi. general lyautey's work in morocco vii. a sketch of moroccan history viii. note on moroccan architecture ix. books consulted index illustrations fez elbali from the ramparts _frontispiece_ facing page general view from the kasbah of the oudayas--rabat interior court of the medersa of the oudayas--rabat entrance of the medersa--salÉ market-place outside the town--salÉ chella-ruins of mosque--salÉ the western portico of the basilica of antonius pius--volubilis moulay idriss the market-place--moulay idriss market-place on the day of the ritual dance of the hamadchas--moulay idriss the market-place. procession of the confraternity of the hamadchas--moulay idriss gate: "bab-mansour"--meknez the ruins of the palace of moulay-ismaËl--meknez fez eldjid a reed-roofed street--fez the nedjarine fountain--fez the bazaars. a view of the souk el attarine and the quaisarya--fez the "little garden" in background, palace of the bahia--marrakech the great court, palace of the bahia--marrakech apartment of the grand vizier's favorite, palace of the bahia--marrakech a fondak--marrakech mausoleum of the saadian sultans showing the tombs--marrakech the sultan of morocco under the green umbrella a clan of mountaineers and their caÏd the sultan entering marrakech in state women watching a procession from a roof a street fountain--marrakech gate of the kasbah of the oudayas--rabat medersa bouanyana--fez the praying-chapel in the medersa el attarine--fez interior court of the medersa--salÉ the gate of the portuguese--marrakech map the part of morocco visited by mrs. wharton i rabat and salÉ i leaving tangier to step on board a steamer in a spanish port, and three hours later to land in _a country without a guide-book_, is a sensation to rouse the hunger of the repletest sight-seer. the sensation is attainable by any one who will take the trouble to row out into the harbour of algeciras and scramble onto a little black boat headed across the straits. hardly has the rock of gibraltar turned to cloud when one's foot is on the soil of an almost unknown africa. tangier, indeed, is in the guide-books; but, cuckoo-like, it has had to lays its egg in strange nests, and the traveller who wants to find out about it must acquire a work dealing with some other country--spain or portugal or algeria. there is no guide-book to morocco, and no way of knowing, once one has left tangier behind, where the long trail over the rif is going to land one, in the sense understood by any one accustomed to european certainties. the air of the unforeseen blows on one from the roadless passes of the atlas. this feeling of adventure is heightened by the contrast between tangier--cosmopolitan, frowsy, familiar tangier, that every tourist has visited for the last forty years--and the vast unknown just beyond. one has met, of course, travellers who have been to fez; but they have gone there on special missions, under escort, mysteriously, perhaps perilously; the expedition has seemed, till lately, a considerable affair. and when one opens the records of moroccan travellers written within the last twenty years, how many, even of the most adventurous, are found to have gone beyond fez? and what, to this day, do the names of meknez and marrakech, of mogador, saffi or rabat, signify to any but a few students of political history, a few explorers and naturalists? not till within the last year has morocco been open to travel from tangier to the great atlas, and from moulay idriss to the atlantic. three years ago christians were being massacred in the streets of salé, the pirate town across the river from rabat, and two years ago no european had been allowed to enter the sacred city of moulay idriss, the burial-place of the lawful descendant of ali, founder of the idrissite dynasty. now, thanks to the energy and the imagination of one of the greatest of colonial administrators, the country, at least in the french zone, is as safe and open as the opposite shore of spain. all that remains is to tell the traveller how to find his way about it. ten years ago there was not a wheeled vehicle in morocco; now its thousands of miles of trail, and its hundreds of miles of firm french roads, are travelled by countless carts, omnibuses and motor-vehicles. there are light railways from rabat to fez in the west, and to a point about eighty-five kilometres from marrakech in the south; and it is possible to say that within a year a regular railway system will connect eastern morocco with western algeria, and the ports of tangier and casablanca with the principal points of the interior. what, then, prevents the tourist from instantly taking ship at bordeaux or algeciras and letting loose his motor on this new world? only the temporary obstacles which the war has everywhere put in the way of travel. till these are lifted it will hardly be possible to travel in morocco except by favour of the resident-general; but, normal conditions once restored, the country will be as accessible, from the straits of gibraltar to the great atlas, as algeria or tunisia. to see morocco during the war was therefore to see it in the last phase of its curiously abrupt transition from remoteness and danger to security and accessibility; at a moment when its aspect and its customs were still almost unaffected by european influences, and when the "christian" might taste the transient joy of wandering unmolested in cities of ancient mystery and hostility, whose inhabitants seemed hardly aware of his intrusion. ii the trail to el-ksar with such opportunities ahead it was impossible, that brilliant morning of september, , not to be off quickly from tangier, impossible to do justice to the pale-blue town piled up within brown walls against the thickly-foliaged gardens of "the mountain," to the animation of its market-place and the secret beauties of its steep arab streets. for tangier swarms with people in european clothes, there are english, french and spanish signs above its shops, and cab-stands in its squares; it belongs, as much as algiers, to the familiar dog-eared world of travel--and there, beyond the last dip of "the mountain," lies the world of mystery, with the rosy dawn just breaking over it. the motor is at the door and we are off. the so-called spanish zone, which encloses internationalized tangier in a wide circuit of territory, extends southward for a distance of about a hundred and fifteen kilometres. consequently, when good roads traverse it, french morocco will be reached in less than two hours by motor-travellers bound for the south. but for the present spanish enterprise dies out after a few miles of macadam (as it does even between madrid and toledo), and the tourist is committed to the _piste_. these _pistes_--the old caravan-trails from the south--are more available to motors in morocco than in southern algeria and tunisia, since they run mostly over soil which, though sandy in part, is bound together by a tough dwarf vegetation, and not over pure desert sand. this, however, is the utmost that can be said of the spanish _pistes_. in the french protectorate constant efforts are made to keep the trails fit for wheeled traffic, but spain shows no sense of a corresponding obligation. after leaving the macadamized road which runs south from tangier one seems to have embarked on a petrified ocean in a boat hardly equal to the adventure. then, as one leaps and plunges over humps and ruts, down sheer banks into rivers, and up precipices into sand-pits, one gradually gains faith in one's conveyance and in one's spinal column; but both must be sound in every joint to resist the strain of the long miles to arbaoua, the frontier post of the french protectorate. [illustration: the part of morocco visited by mrs. wharton] luckily there are other things to think about. at the first turn out of tangier, europe and the european disappear, and as soon as the motor begins to dip and rise over the arid little hills beyond to the last gardens one is sure that every figure on the road will be picturesque instead of prosaic, every garment graceful instead of grotesque. one knows, too, that there will be no more omnibuses or trams or motorcyclists, but only long lines of camels rising up in brown friezes against the sky, little black donkeys trotting across the scrub under bulging pack-saddles, and noble draped figures walking beside them or majestically perching on their rumps. and for miles and miles there will be no more towns--only, at intervals on the naked slopes, circles of rush-roofed huts in a blue stockade of cactus, or a hundred or two nomad tents of black camel's hair resting on walls of wattled thorn and grouped about a terebinth-tree and a well. between these nomad colonies lies the _bled_, the immense waste of fallow land and palmetto desert: an earth as void of life as the sky above it of clouds. the scenery is always the same; but if one has the love of great emptinesses, and of the play of light on long stretches of parched earth and rock, the sameness is part of the enchantment. in such a scene every landmark takes on an extreme value. for miles one watches the little white dome of a saint's grave rising and disappearing with the undulations of the trail; at last one is abreast of it, and the solitary tomb, alone with its fig-tree and its broken well-curb, puts a meaning into the waste. the same importance, but intensified, marks the appearance of every human figure. the two white-draped riders passing single file up the red slope to that ring of tents on the ridge have a mysterious and inexplicable importance: one follows their progress with eyes that ache with conjecture. more exciting still is the encounter of the first veiled woman heading a little cavalcade from the south. all the mystery that awaits us looks out through the eye-slits in the grave-clothes muffling her. where have they come from, where are they going, all these slow wayfarers out of the unknown? probably only from one thatched _douar_[ ] to another; but interminable distances unroll behind them, they breathe of timbuctoo and the farthest desert. just such figures must swarm in the saharan cities, in the soudan and senegal. there is no break in the links: these wanderers have looked on at the building of cities that were dust when the romans pushed their outposts across the atlas. iii el-ksar to rabat a town at last--its nearness announced by the multiplied ruts of the trail, the cactus hedges, the fig-trees weighed down by dust leaning over ruinous earthern walls. and here are the first houses of the european el-ksar--neat white spanish houses on the slope outside the old arab settlement. of the arab town itself, above reed stockades and brown walls, only a minaret and a few flat roofs are visible. under the walls drowse the usual gregarious lazaruses; others, temporarily resuscitated, trail their grave-clothes after a line of camels and donkeys toward the olive-gardens outside the town. the way to rabat is long and difficult, and there is no time to visit el-ksar, though its minaret beckons so alluringly above the fruit-orchards; so we stop for luncheon outside the walls, at a canteen with a corrugated iron roof where skinny spaniards are serving thick purple wine and eggs fried in oil to a party of french soldiers. the heat has suddenly become intolerable, and a flaming wind straight from the south brings in at the door, with a cloud of blue flies, the smell of camels and trampled herbs and the strong spices of the bazaars. luncheon over, we hurry on between the cactus hedges, and then plunge back into the waste. beyond el-ksar the last hills of the rif die away, and there is a stretch of wilderness without an outline till the lesser atlas begins to rise in the east. once in the french protectorate the trail improves, but there are still difficult bits; and finally, on a high plateau, the chauffeur stops in a web of crisscross trails, throws up his hands, and confesses that he has lost his way. the heat is mortal at the moment. for the last hour the red breath of the sirocco has risen from every hollow into which we dipped; now it hangs about us in the open, as if we had caught it in our wheels and it had to pause above us when we paused. all around is the featureless wild land, palmetto scrub stretching away into eternity. a few yards off rises the inevitable ruined _koubba_[ ] with its fig-tree: in the shade under its crumbling wall the buzz of the flies is like the sound of frying. farther off, we discern a cluster of huts, and presently some arab boys and a tall pensive shepherd come hurrying across the scrub. they are full of good-will, and no doubt of information; but our chauffeur speaks no arabic and the talk dies down into shrugs and head-shakings. the arabs retire to the shade of the wall, and we decide to start--for anywhere.... the chauffeur turns the crank, but there is no responding quiver. something has gone wrong; we can't move, and it is not much comfort to remember that, if we could, we should not know where to go. at least we should be cooler in motion than sitting still under the blinding sky. such an adventure initiates one at the outset into the stern facts of desert motoring. every detail of our trip from tangier to rabat had been carefully planned to keep us in unbroken contact with civilization. we were to "tub" in one european hotel, and to dine in another, with just enough picnicking between to give a touch of local colour. but let one little cog slip and the whole plan falls to bits, and we are alone in the old untamed moghreb, as remote from europe as any mediæval adventurer. if one lose one's way in morocco, civilization vanishes as though it were a magic carpet rolled up by a djinn. it is a good thing to begin with such a mishap, not only because it develops the fatalism necessary to the enjoyment of africa, but because it lets one at once into the mysterious heart of the country: a country so deeply conditioned by its miles and miles of uncitied wilderness that until one has known the wilderness one cannot begin to understand the cities. we came to one at length, after sunset on that first endless day. the motor, cleverly patched up, had found its way to a real road, and speeding along between the stunted cork-trees of the forest of mamora brought us to a last rise from which we beheld in the dusk a line of yellow walls backed by the misty blue of the atlantic. salé, the fierce old pirate town, where robinson crusoe was so long a slave, lay before us, snow-white in its cheese-coloured ramparts skirted by fig and olive gardens. below its gates a stretch of waste land, endlessly trailed over by mules and camels, sloped down to the mouth of the bou-regreg, the blue-brown river dividing it from rabat. the motor stopped at the landing-stage of the steam-ferry; crowding about it were droves of donkeys, knots of camels, plump-faced merchants on crimson-saddled mules, with negro servants at their bridles, bare-legged water-carriers with hairy goat-skins slung over their shoulders, and arab women in a heap of veils, cloaks, mufflings, all of the same ashy white, the caftans of clutched children peeping through in patches of old rose and lilac and pale green. across the river the native town of rabat lay piled up on an orange-red cliff beaten by the atlantic. its walls, red too, plunged into the darkening breakers at the mouth of the river; and behind it, stretching up to the mighty tower of hassan, and the ruins of the great mosque, the scattered houses of the european city showed their many lights across the plain. iv the kasbah of the oudayas salé the white and rabat the red frown at each other over the foaming bar of the bou-regreg, each walled, terraced, minareted, and presenting a singularly complete picture of the two types of moroccan town, the snowy and the tawny. to the gates of both the atlantic breakers roll in with the boom of northern seas, and under a misty northern sky. it is one of the surprises of morocco to find the familiar african pictures bathed in this unfamiliar haze. even the fierce midday sun does not wholly dispel it: the air remains thick, opalescent, like water slightly clouded by milk. one is tempted to say that morocco is tunisia seen by moonlight. the european town of rabat, a rapidly developing community, lies almost wholly outside the walls of the old arab city. the latter, founded in the twelfth century by the great almohad conqueror of spain, yacoub-el-mansour, stretches its mighty walls to the river's mouth. thence they climb the cliff to enclose the kasbah[ ] of the oudayas, a troublesome tribe whom one of the almohad sultans, mistrusting their good faith, packed up one day, flocks, tents and camels, and carried across the _bled_ to stow them into these stout walls under his imperial eye. great crenellated ramparts, cyclopean, superb, follow the curve of the cliff. on the landward side they are interrupted by a gate-tower resting on one of the most nobly decorated of the horseshoe arches that break the mighty walls of moroccan cities. underneath the tower the vaulted entrance turns, arab fashion, at right angles, profiling its red arch against darkness and mystery. this bending of passages, so characteristic a device of the moroccan builder, is like an architectural expression of the tortuous secret soul of the land. [illustration: _from a photograph from the service des beaux-arts au maroc_ rabat--general view from the kasbah of the oudayas] outside the kasbah a narrow foot-path is squeezed between the walls and the edge of the cliff. toward sunset it looks down on a strange scene. to the south of the citadel the cliff descends to a long dune sloping to a sand-beach; and dune and beach are covered with the slanting headstones of the immense arab cemetery of el alou. acres and acres of graves fall away from the red ramparts to the grey sea; and breakers rolling straight from america send their spray across the lowest stones. there are always things going on toward evening in an arab cemetery. in this one, travellers from the _bled_ are camping in one corner, donkeys grazing (on heaven knows what), a camel dozing under its pack; in another, about a new-made grave, there are ritual movements of muffled figures and wailings of a funeral hymn half drowned by the waves. near us, on a fallen headstone, a man with a thoughtful face sits chatting with two friends and hugging to his breast a tiny boy who looks like a grasshopper in his green caftan; a little way off, a solitary philosopher, his eye fixed on the sunset, lies on another grave, smoking his long pipe of kif. there is infinite sadness in this scene under the fading sky, beside the cold welter of the atlantic. one seems to be not in africa itself, but in the africa that northern crusaders may have dreamed of in snow-bound castles by colder shores of the same ocean. this is what moghreb must have looked like to the confused imagination of the middle ages, to norman knights burning to ransom the holy places, or hansa merchants devising, in steep-roofed towns, of barbary and the long caravans bringing apes and gold-powder from the south. * * * * * inside the gate of the kasbah one comes on more waste land and on other walls--for all moroccan towns are enclosed in circuit within circuit of battlemented masonry. then, unexpectedly, a gate in one of the inner walls lets one into a tiled court enclosed in a traceried cloister and overlooking an orange-grove that rises out of a carpet of roses. this peaceful and well-ordered place is the interior of the medersa (the college) of the oudayas. morocco is full of these colleges, or rather lodging-houses of the students frequenting the mosques; for all mahometan education is given in the mosque itself, only the preparatory work being done in the colleges. the most beautiful of the medersas date from the earlier years of the long merinid dynasty ( - ), the period at which moroccan art, freed from too distinctively spanish and arab influences, began to develop a delicate grace of its own as far removed from the extravagance of spanish ornament as from the inheritance of roman-byzantine motives that the first moslem invasion had brought with it from syria and mesopotamia. these exquisite collegiate buildings, though still in use whenever they are near a well-known mosque, have all fallen into a state of sordid disrepair. the moroccan arab, though he continues to build--and fortunately to build in the old tradition, which has never been lost--has, like all orientals, an invincible repugnance to repairing and restoring, and one after another the frail exposed arab structures, with their open courts and badly constructed terrace-roofs, are crumbling into ruin. happily the french government has at last been asked to intervene, and all over morocco the medersas are being repaired with skill and discretion. that of the oudayas is already completely restored, and as it had long fallen into disuse it has been transformed by the ministry of fine arts into a museum of moroccan art. the plan of the medersas is always much the same: the eternal plan of the arab house, built about one or more arcaded courts, with long narrow rooms enclosing them on the ground floor, and several stories above, reached by narrow stairs, and often opening on finely carved cedar galleries. the chief difference between the medersa and the private house, or even the _fondak_,[ ] lies in the use to which the rooms are put. in the medersas, one of the ground-floor apartments is always fitted up as a chapel, and shut off from the court by carved cedar doors still often touched with old gilding and vermilion. there are always a few students praying in the chapel, while others sit in the doors of the upper rooms, their books on their knees, or lean over the carved galleries chatting with their companions who are washing their feet at the marble fountain in the court, preparatory to entering the chapel. [illustration: _from a photograph by schmitt, rabat_ rabat--interior court of the medersa of the oudayas] in the medersa of the oudayas, these native activities have been replaced by the lifeless hush of a museum. the rooms are furnished with old rugs, pottery, brasses, the curious embroidered hangings which line the tents of the chiefs, and other specimens of arab art. one room reproduces a barber's shop in the bazaar, its benches covered with fine matting, the hanging mirror inlaid with mother-of-pearl, the razor-handles of silver _niello_. the horseshoe arches of the outer gallery look out on orange-blossoms, roses and the sea. it is all beautiful, calm and harmonious; and if one is tempted to mourn the absence of life and local colour, one has only to visit an abandoned medersa to see that, but for french intervention, the charming colonnades and cedar chambers of the college of the oudayas would by this time be a heap of undistinguished rubbish--for plaster and rubble do not "die in beauty" like the firm stones of rome. v robinson crusoe's "sallee" before morocco passed under the rule of the great governor who now administers it, the european colonists made short work of the beauty and privacy of the old arab towns in which they established themselves. on the west coast, especially, where the mediterranean peoples, from the phenicians to the portuguese, have had trading-posts for over two thousand years, the harm done to such seaboard towns as tangier, rabat and casablanca is hard to estimate. the modern european colonist apparently imagined that to plant his warehouses, _cafés_ and cinema-palaces within the walls which for so long had fiercely excluded him was the most impressive way of proclaiming his domination. under general lyautey such views are no longer tolerated. respect for native habits, native beliefs and native architecture is the first principle inculcated in the civil servants attached to his administration. not only does he require that the native towns shall be kept intact, and no european building erected within them; a sense of beauty not often vouchsafed to colonial governors causes him to place the administration buildings so far beyond the walls that the modern colony grouped around them remains entirely distinct from the old town, instead of growing out of it like an ugly excrescence. the arab quarter of rabat was already irreparably disfigured when general lyautey came to morocco; but ferocious old salé, phenician counting-house and breeder of barbary pirates, had been saved from profanation by its moslem fanaticism. few christian feet had entered its walls except those of the prisoners who, like robinson crusoe, slaved for the wealthy merchants in its mysterious terraced houses. not till two or three years ago was it completely pacified; and when it opened its gates to the infidel it was still, as it is to-day, the type of the untouched moroccan city--so untouched that, with the sunlight irradiating its cream-coloured walls and the blue-white domes above them, it rests on its carpet of rich fruit-gardens like some rare specimen of arab art on a strip of old oriental velvet. within the walls, the magic persists: which does not always happen when one penetrates into the mirage-like cities of arabian africa. salé has the charm of extreme compactness. crowded between the river-mouth and the sea, its white and pale-blue houses almost touch across the narrow streets, and the reed-thatched bazaars seem like miniature reductions of the great trading labyrinths of tunis or fez. everything that the reader of the arabian nights expects to find is here: the whitewashed niches wherein pale youths sit weaving the fine mattings for which the town is still famous; the tunnelled passages where indolent merchants with bare feet crouch in their little kennels hung with richly ornamented saddlery and arms, or with slippers of pale citron leather and bright embroidered _babouches_; the stalls with fruit, olives, tunny-fish, vague syrupy sweets, candles for saints' tombs, mantegnesque garlands of red and green peppers, griddle-cakes sizzling on red-hot pans, and all the varied wares and cakes and condiments that the lady in the tale of the three calanders went out to buy, that memorable morning in the market of bagdad. [illustration: _from a photograph from the service des beaux-arts au maroc_ salé--entrance of the medersa] only at salé all is on a small scale: there is not much of any one thing, except of the exquisite matting. the tide of commerce has ebbed from the intractable old city, and one feels, as one watches the listless purchasers in her little languishing bazaars, that her long animosity against the intruder has ended by destroying her own life. the feeling increases when one leaves the bazaar for the streets adjoining it. an even deeper hush than that which hangs over the well-to-do quarters of all arab towns broods over these silent thorough-fares, with heavy-nailed doors barring half-ruined houses. in a steep deserted square one of these doors opens its panels of weather-silvered cedar on the court of the frailest, ghostliest of medersas--mere carved and painted shell of a dead house of learning. mystic interweavings of endless lines, patient patterns interminably repeated in wood and stone and clay, all are here, from the tessellated paving of the court to the honeycombing of the cedar roof through which a patch of sky shows here and there like an inset of turquoise tiling. this lovely ruin is in the safe hands of the french fine arts administration, and soon the wood-carvers and stucco-workers of fez will have revived its old perfection; but it will never again be more than a show-medersa, standing empty and unused beside the mosque behind whose guarded doors and high walls one guesses that the old religious fanaticism of salé is dying also, as her learning and her commerce have died. [illustration: _from a photograph by schmitt, rabat_ salé--market-place outside the town] in truth the only life in her is centred in the market-place outside the walls, where big expanding rabat goes on certain days to provision herself. the market of salé, though typical of all moroccan markets, has an animation and picturesqueness of its own. its rows of white tents pitched on a dusty square between the outer walls and the fruit-gardens make it look as though a hostile tribe had sat down to lay siege to the town; but the army is an army of hucksters, of farmers from the rich black lands along the river, of swarthy nomads and leather-gaitered peasant women from the hills, of slaves and servants and tradesmen from rabat and salé; a draped, veiled, turbaned mob shrieking, bargaining, fist-shaking, call on allah to witness the monstrous villanies of the misbegotten miscreants they are trading with, and then, struck with the mysterious eastern apathy, sinking down in languid heaps of muslin among the black figs, purple onions and rosy melons, the fluttering hens, the tethered goats, the whinnying foals, that are all enclosed in an outer circle of folded-up camels and of mules dozing under faded crimson saddles. vi chella and the great mosque the merinid sultans of rabat had a terribly troublesome neighbour across the bou-regreg, and they built chella to keep an eye on the pirates of salé. but chella has fallen like a babylonian city triumphed over by the prophets; while salé, sly, fierce and irrepressible, continued till well on in the nineteenth century to breed pirates and fanatics. the ruins of chella lie on the farther side of the plateau above the native town of rabat. the mighty wall enclosing them faces the city wall of rabat, looking at it across one of those great red powdery wastes which seem, in this strange land, like death and the desert forever creeping up to overwhelm the puny works of man. the red waste is scored by countless trains of donkeys carrying water from the springs of chella, by long caravans of mules and camels, and by the busy motors of the french administration; yet there emanates from it an impression of solitude and decay which even the prosaic tinkle of the trams jogging out from the european town to the exhibition grounds above the sea cannot long dispel. perpetually, even in the new thriving french morocco, the outline of a ruin or the look in a pair of eyes shifts the scene, rends the thin veil of the european illusion, and confronts one with the old grey moslem reality. passing under the gate of chella, with its richly carved corbels and lofty crenellated towers, one feels one's self thus completely reabsorbed into the past. below the gate the ground slopes away, bare and blazing, to a hollow where a little blue-green minaret gleams through fig-trees, and fragments of arch and vaulting reveal the outline of a ruined mosque. was ever shade so blue-black and delicious as that of the cork-tree near the spring where the donkey's water-cans are being filled? under its branches a black man in a blue shirt lies immovably sleeping in the dust. close by women and children splash and chatter about the spring, and the dome of a saint's tomb shines through lustreless leaves. the black man, the donkeys, the women and children, the saint's dome, are all part of the inimitable eastern scene in which inertia and agitation are so curiously combined, and a surface of shrill noise flickers over depths of such unfathomable silence. the ruins of chella belong to the purest period of moroccan art. the tracery of the broken arches is all carved in stone or in glazed turquoise tiling, and the fragments of wall and vaulting have the firm elegance of a classic ruin. but what would even their beauty be without the leafy setting of the place? the "unimaginable touch of time" gives chella its peculiar charm: the aged fig-tree clamped in uptorn tiles and thrusting gouty arms between the arches; the garlanding of vines flung from column to column; the secret pool to which childless women are brought to bathe, and where the tree springing from a cleft of the steps is always hung with the bright bits of stuff which are the votive offerings of africa. the shade, the sound of springs, the terraced orange-garden with irises blooming along channels of running water, all this greenery and coolness in the hollow of a fierce red hill make chella seem, to the traveller new to africa, the very type and embodiment of its old contrasts of heat and freshness, of fire and languor. it is like a desert traveller's dream in his last fever. yacoub-el-mansour was the fourth of the great almohad sultans who, in the twelfth century, drove out the effete almoravids, and swept their victorious armies from marrakech to tunis and from tangier to madrid. his grandfather, abd-el-moumen, had been occupied with conquest and civic administration. it was said of his rule that "he seized northern africa to make order prevail there"; and in fact, out of a welter of wild tribes confusedly fighting and robbing he drew an empire firmly seated and securely governed, wherein caravans travelled from the atlas to the straits without fear of attack, and "a soldier wandering through the fields would not have dared to pluck an ear of wheat." [illustration: _from a photograph from the service des beaux-arts au maroc_ chella--ruins of mosque] his grandson, the great el-mansour, was a conqueror too; but where he conquered he planted the undying seed of beauty. the victor of alarcos, the soldier who subdued the north of spain, dreamed a great dream of art. his ambition was to bestow on his three capitals, seville, rabat and marrakech, the three most beautiful towers the world had ever seen; and if the tower of rabat had been completed, and that of seville had not been injured by spanish embellishments, his dream would have been realized. the "tower of hassan," as the sultan's tower is called, rises from the plateau above old rabat, overlooking the steep cliff that drops down to the last winding of the bou-regreg. truncated at half its height, it stands on the edge of the cliff, a far-off beacon to travellers by land and sea. it is one of the world's great monuments, so sufficient in strength and majesty that until one has seen its fellow, the koutoubya of marrakech, one wonders if the genius of the builder could have carried such perfect balance of massive wall-spaces and traceried openings to a triumphant completion. near the tower, the red-brown walls and huge piers of the mosque built at the same time stretch their roofless alignment beneath the sky. this mosque, before it was destroyed, must have been one of the finest monuments of almohad architecture in morocco: now, with its tumbled red masses of masonry and vast cisterns overhung by clumps of blue aloes, it still forms a ruin of roman grandeur. the mosque, the tower, the citadel of the oudayas, and the mighty walls and towers of chella, compose an architectural group as noble and complete as that of some mediæval tuscan city. all they need to make the comparison exact is that they should have been compactly massed on a steep hill, instead of lying scattered over the wide spaces between the promontory of the oudayas and the hillside of chella. the founder of rabat, the great yacoub-el-mansour, called it, in memory of the battle of alarcos, "the camp of victory" (_ribat-el-path_), and the monuments he bestowed on it justified the name in another sense, by giving it the beauty that lives when battles are forgotten. footnotes: [ ] village of tents. the village of mud-huts is called a _nourwal_. [ ] saint's tomb. the saint himself is called a _marabout_. [ ] citadel. [ ] the moroccan inn or caravanserai. ii volubilis, moulay idriss and meknez i volubilis one day before sunrise we set out from rabat for the ruins of roman volubilis. from the ferry of the bou-regreg we looked backward on a last vision of orange ramparts under a night-blue sky sprinkled with stars; ahead, over gardens still deep in shadow, the walls of salé were passing from drab to peach-colour in the eastern glow. dawn is the romantic hour in africa. dirt and dilapidation disappear under a pearly haze, and a breeze from the sea blows away the memory of fetid markets and sordid heaps of humanity. at that hour the old moroccan cities look like the ivory citadels in a persian miniature, and the fat shopkeepers riding out to their vegetable-gardens like princes sallying forth to rescue captive maidens. our way led along the highroad from rabat to the modern port of kenitra, near the ruins of the phenician colony of mehedyia. just north of kenitra we struck the trail, branching off eastward to a european village on the light railway between rabat and fez, and beyond the railway-sheds and flat-roofed stores the wilderness began, stretching away into clear distances bounded by the hills of the rarb,[ ] above which the sun was rising. range after range these translucent hills rose before us; all around the solitude was complete. village life, and even tent life, naturally gathers about a river-bank or a spring; and the waste we were crossing was of waterless sand bound together by a loose desert growth. only an abandoned well-curb here and there cast its blue shadow on the yellow _bled_, or a saint's tomb hung like a bubble between sky and sand. the light had the preternatural purity which gives a foretaste of mirage: it was the light in which magic becomes real, and which helps to understand how, to people living in such an atmosphere, the boundary between fact and dream perpetually fluctuates. the sand was scored with tracks and ruts innumerable, for the road between rabat and fez is travelled not only by french government motors but by native caravans and trains of pilgrims to and from the sacred city of moulay idriss, the founder of the idrissite dynasty, whose tomb is in the zerhoun, the mountain ridge above volubilis. to untrained eyes it was impossible to guess which of the trails one ought to follow; and without much surprise we suddenly found the motor stopping, while its wheels spun round vainly in the loose sand. the military chauffeur was not surprised either; nor was captain de m., the french staff-officer who accompanied us. "it often happens just here," they admitted philosophically. "when the general goes to meknez he is always followed by a number of motors, so that if his own is stuck he may go on in another." this was interesting to know, but not particularly helpful, as the general and his motors were not travelling our way that morning. nor was any one else, apparently. it is curious how quickly the _bled_ empties itself to the horizon if one happens to have an accident in it! but we had learned our lesson between tangier and rabat, and were able to produce a fair imitation of the fatalistic smile of the country. the officer remarked cheerfully that somebody might turn up, and we all sat down in the _bled_. a berber woman, cropping up from nowhere, came and sat beside us. she had the thin sun-tanned face of her kind, brilliant eyes touched with _khol_, high cheek-bones, and the exceedingly short upper lip which gives such charm to the smile of the young nomad women. her dress was the usual faded cotton shift, hooked on the shoulders with brass or silver clasps (still the antique _fibulæ_), and wound about with a vague drapery in whose folds a brown baby wriggled. the coolness of dawn had vanished and the sun beat down from a fierce sky. the village on the railway was too far off to be reached on foot, and there were probably no mules there to spare. nearer at hand there was no sign of help: not a fortified farm, or even a circle of nomad tents. it was the unadulterated desert--and we waited. not in vain; for after an hour or two, from far off in the direction of the hills, there appeared an army with banners. we stared at it unbelievingly. the _mirage_, of course! we were too sophisticated to doubt it, and tales of sun-dazed travellers mocked by such visions rose in our well-stocked memories. the chauffeur thought otherwise. "good! that's a pilgrimage from the mountains. they're going to salé to pray at the tomb of the _marabout_; to-day is his feast-day." and so they were! and as we hung on their approach, and speculated as to the chances of their stopping to help, i had time to note the beauty of this long train winding toward us under parti-colored banners. there was something celestial, almost diaphanous, in the hundreds of figures turbaned and draped in white, marching slowly through the hot colorless radiance over the hot colorless sand. the most part were on foot, or bestriding tiny donkeys, but a stately caïd rode alone at the end of the line on a horse saddled with crimson velvet; and to him our officer appealed. the caïd courteously responded, and twenty or thirty pilgrims were ordered to harness themselves to the motor and haul it back to the trail, while the rest of the procession moved hieratically onward. i felt scruples at turning from their path even a fraction of this pious company; but they fell to with a saintly readiness, and before long the motor was on the trail. then rewards were dispensed; and instantly those holy men became a prey to the darkest passions. even in this land of contrasts the transition from pious serenity to rapacious rage can seldom have been more rapid. the devotees of the _marabout_ fought, screamed, tore their garments and rolled over each other with sanguinary gestures in the struggle for our pesetas; then, perceiving our indifference, they suddenly remembered their religious duties, scrambled to their feet, tucked up their flying draperies, and raced after the tail-end of the procession. through a golden heat-haze we struggled on to the hills. the country was fallow, and in great part too sandy for agriculture; but here and there we came on one of the deep-set moroccan rivers, with a reddish-yellow course channelled between perpendicular banks of red earth, and marked by a thin line of verdure that widened to fruit-gardens wherever a village had sprung up. we traversed several of these "sedentary"[ ] villages, _nourwals_ of clay houses with thatched conical roofs, in gardens of fig, apricot and pomegranate that must be so many pink and white paradises after the winter rains. one of these villages seemed to be inhabited entirely by blacks, big friendly creatures who came out to tell us by which trail to reach the bridge over the yellow _oued_. in the _oued_ their womenkind were washing the variegated family rags. they were handsome blue-bronze creatures, bare to the waist, with tight black astrakhan curls and firmly sculptured legs and ankles; and all around them, like a swarm of gnats, danced countless jolly pickaninnies, naked as lizards, with the spindle legs and globular stomachs of children fed only on cereals. half terrified but wholly interested, these infants buzzed about the motor while we stopped to photograph them; and as we watched their antics we wondered whether they were the descendants of the little soudanese boys whom the founder of meknez, the terrible sultan moulay-ismaël, used to carry off from beyond the atlas and bring up in his military camps to form the nucleus of the black guard which defended his frontiers. we were on the line of travel between meknez and the sea, and it seemed not unlikely that these _nourwals_ were all that remained of scattered outposts of moulay-ismaël's legionaries. after a time we left _oueds_ and villages behind us and were in the mountains of the rarb, toiling across a high sandy plateau. far off a fringe of vegetation showed promise of shade and water, and at last, against a pale mass of olive-trees, we saw the sight which, at whatever end of the world one comes upon it, wakes the same sense of awe: the ruin of a roman city. volubilis (called by the arabs the castle of the pharaohs) is the only considerable roman colony so far discovered in morocco. it stands on the extreme ledge of a high plateau backed by the mountains of the zerhoun. below the plateau, the land drops down precipitately to a narrow river-valley green with orchards and gardens, and in the neck of the valley, where the hills meet again, the conical white town of moulay idriss, the sacred city of morocco, rises sharply against a wooded background. so the two dominations look at each other across the valley: one, the lifeless roman ruin, representing a system, an order, a social conception that still run through all our modern ways; the other, the untouched moslem city, more dead and sucked back into an unintelligible past than any broken architrave of greece or rome. volubilis seems to have had the extent and wealth of a great military outpost, such as timgad in algeria; but in the seventeenth century it was very nearly destroyed by moulay-ismaël, the sultan of the black guard, who carried off its monuments piece-meal to build his new capital of meknez, that mequinez of contemporary travellers which was held to be one of the wonders of the age. little remains to volubilis in the way of important monuments: only the fragments of a basilica, part of an arch of triumph erected in honour of caracalla, and the fallen columns and architraves which strew the path of rome across the world. but its site is magnificent; and as the excavation of the ruins was interrupted by the war it is possible that subsequent search may bring forth other treasures comparable to the beautiful bronze _sloughi_ (the african hound) which is now its principal possession. it was delicious, after seven hours of travel under the african sun, to sit on the shady terrace where the curator of volubilis, m. louis châtelain, welcomes his visitors. the french fine arts have built a charming house with gardens and pergolas for the custodian of the ruins, and have found in m. châtelain an archæologist so absorbed in his task that, as soon as conditions permit, every inch of soil in the circumference of the city will be made to yield up whatever secrets it hides. ii moulay idriss we lingered under the pergolas of volubilis till the heat grew less intolerable, and then our companions suggested a visit to moulay idriss. [illustration: _from a photograph from the service des beaux-arts au maroc_ volubilis--the western portico of the basilica of antonius pius] such a possibility had not occurred to us, and even captain de m. seemed to doubt whether the expedition were advisable. moulay idriss was still said to be resentful of christian intrusion: it was only a year before that the first french officers had entered it. but m. châtelain was confident that there would be no opposition to our visit, and with the piled-up terraces and towers of the sacred city growing golden in the afternoon light across the valley it was impossible to hesitate. we drove down through an olive-wood as ancient as those of mitylene and corfu, and then along the narrowing valley, between gardens luxuriant even in the parched moroccan autumn. presently the motor began to climb the steep road to the town, and at a gateway we got out and were met by the native chief of police. instantly at the high windows of mysterious houses veiled heads appeared and sidelong eyes cautiously inspected us. but the quarter was deserted, and we walked on without meeting any one to the street of the weavers, a silent narrow way between low whitewashed niches like the cubicles in a convent. in each niche sat a grave white-robed youth, forming a great amphora-shaped grain-basket out of closely plaited straw. vine-leaves and tendrils hung through the reed roofing overhead, and grape-clusters cast their classic shadow at our feet. it was like walking on the unrolled frieze of a white etruscan vase patterned with black vine garlands. the silence and emptiness of the place began to strike us: there was no sign of the oriental crowd that usually springs out of the dust at the approach of strangers. but suddenly we heard close by the lament of the _rekka_ (a kind of long fife), accompanied by a wild thrum-thrum of earthenware drums and a curious excited chanting of men's voices. i had heard such a chant before, at the other end of north africa, in kairouan, one of the other great sanctuaries of islam, where the sect of the aïssaouas celebrate their sanguinary rites in the _zaouïa_[ ] of their confraternity. yet it seemed incredible that if the aïssaouas of moulay idriss were performing their ceremonies that day the chief of police should be placidly leading us through the streets in the very direction from which the chant was coming. the moroccan, though he has no desire to get into trouble with the christian, prefers to be left alone on feast-days, especially in such a stronghold of the faith as moulay idriss. [illustration: _from a photograph from the service des beaux-arts au maroc_ moulay-idriss ( , inhabitants)] but "geschehen ist geschehen" is the sum of oriental philosophy. for centuries moulay idriss had held out fanatically on its holy steep; then, suddenly, in , its chiefs saw that the game was up, and surrendered without a pretense of resistance. now the whole thing was over, the new conditions were accepted, and the chief of police assured us that with the french uniform at our side we should be safe anywhere. "the aïssaouas?" he explained. "no, this is another sect, the hamadchas, who are performing their ritual dance on the feast-day of their patron, the _marabout_ hamadch, whose tomb is in the zerhoun. the feast is celebrated publicly in the market-place of moulay idriss." as he spoke we came out into the market-place, and understood why there had been no crowd at the gate. all the population was in the square and on the roofs that mount above it, tier by tier, against the wooded hillside: moulay idriss had better to do that day than to gape at a few tourists in dust-coats. short of sfax, and the other coast cities of eastern tunisia, there is surely not another town in north africa as white as moulay idriss. some are pale blue and pinky yellow, like the kasbah of tangier, or cream and blue like salé; but tangier and salé, for centuries continuously subject to european influences, have probably borrowed their colors from genoa and the italian riviera. in the interior of the country, and especially in morocco, where the whole color-scheme is much soberer than in algeria and tunisia, the color of the native houses is always a penitential shade of mud and ashes. but moulay idriss, that afternoon, was as white as if its arcaded square had been scooped out of a big cream cheese. the late sunlight lay like gold-leaf on one side of the square, the other was in pure blue shade; and above it, the crowded roofs, terraces and balconies packed with women in bright dresses looked like a flower-field on the edge of a marble quarry. [illustration: _from a photograph from the service des beaux-arts au maroc_ moulay-idriss--the market-place] the bright dresses were as unusual a sight as the white walls, for the average moroccan crowd is the color of its houses. but the occasion was a special one, for these feasts of the hamadchas occur only twice a year, in spring and autumn, and as the ritual dances take place out of doors, instead of being performed inside the building of the confraternity, the feminine population seizes the opportunity to burst into flower on the house-tops. it is rare, in morocco, to see in the streets or the bazaars any women except of the humblest classes, household slaves, servants, peasants from the country or small tradesmen's wives; and even they (with the exception of the unveiled berber women) are wrapped in the prevailing grave-clothes. the _filles de joie_ and dancing-girls whose brilliant dresses enliven certain streets of the algerian and tunisian towns are invisible, or at least unnoticeable, in morocco, where life, on the whole, seems so much less gay and brightly-tinted; and the women of the richer classes, mercantile or aristocratic, never leave their harems except to be married or buried. a throng of women dressed in light colors is therefore to be seen in public only when some street festival draws them to the roofs. even then it is probable that the throng is mostly composed of slaves, household servants, and women of the lower _bourgeoisie_; but as they are all dressed in mauve and rose and pale green, with long earrings and jewelled head-bands flashing through their parted veils, the illusion, from a little distance, is as complete as though they were the ladies in waiting of the queen of sheba; and that radiant afternoon at moulay idriss, above the vine-garlanded square, and against the background of piled-up terraces, their vivid groups were in such contrast to the usual gray assemblages of the east that the scene seemed like a setting for some extravagantly staged ballet. for the same reason the spectacle unrolling itself below us took on a blessed air of unreality. any normal person who has seen a dance of the aïssaouas and watched them swallow thorns and hot coals, slash themselves with knives, and roll on the floor in epilepsy must have privately longed, after the first excitement was over, to fly from the repulsive scene. the hamadchas are much more savage than aïssaouas, and carry much farther their display of cataleptic anæsthesia; and, knowing this, i had wondered how long i should be able to stand the sight of what was going on below our terrace. but the beauty of the setting redeemed the bestial horror. in that unreal golden light the scene became merely symbolical: it was like one of those strange animal masks which the middle ages brought down from antiquity by way of the satyr-plays of greece, and of which the half-human protagonists still grin and contort themselves among the christian symbols of gothic cathedrals. [illustration: _from a photograph taken by captain henissart of the french army_ moulay-idriss--market-place on the day of the ritual dance of the hamadchas] at one end of the square the musicians stood on a stone platform above the dancers. like the musicians in a bas-relief they were flattened side by side against a wall, the fife-players with lifted arms and inflated cheeks, the drummers pounding frantically on long earthenware drums shaped like enormous hour-glasses and painted in barbaric patterns; and below, down the length of the market-place, the dance unrolled itself in a frenzied order that would have filled with envy a paris or london impresario. in its centre an inspired-looking creature whirled about on his axis, the black ringlets standing out in snaky spirals from his haggard head, his cheek-muscles convulsively twitching. around him, but a long way off, the dancers rocked and circled with long raucous cries dominated by the sobbing booming music; and in the sunlit space between dancers and holy man, two or three impish children bobbed about with fixed eyes and a grimace of comic frenzy, solemnly parodying his contortions. meanwhile a tall grave personage in a doge-like cap, the only calm figure in the tumult, moved gravely here and there, regulating the dance, stimulating the frenzy, or calming some devotee who had broken the ranks and lay tossing and foaming on the stones. there was something far more sinister in this passionless figure, holding his hand on the key that let loose such crazy forces, than in the poor central whirligig who merely set the rhythm of the convulsions. the dancers were all dressed in white caftans or in the blue shirts of the lowest classes. in the sunlight something that looked like fresh red paint glistened on their shaved black or yellow skulls and made dark blotches on their garments. at first these stripes and stains suggested only a gaudy ritual ornament like the pattern on the drums; then one saw that the paint, or whatever it was, kept dripping down from the whirling caftans and forming fresh pools among the stones; that as one of the pools dried up another formed, redder and more glistening, and that these pools were fed from great gashes which the dancers hacked in their own skulls and breasts with hatchets and sharpened stones. the dance was a blood-rite, a great sacrificial symbol, in which blood flowed so freely that all the rocking feet were splashed with it. gradually, however, it became evident that many of the dancers simply rocked and howled, without hacking themselves, and that most of the bleeding skulls and breasts belonged to negroes. every now and then the circle widened to let in another figure, black or dark yellow, the figure of some humble blue-shirted spectator suddenly "getting religion" and rushing forward to snatch a weapon and baptize himself with his own blood; and as each new recruit joined the dancers the music shrieked louder and the devotees howled more wolfishly. and still, in the centre, the mad _marabout_ spun, and the children bobbed and mimicked him and rolled their diamond eyes. such is the dance of the hamadchas, of the confraternity of the _marabout_ hamadch, a powerful saint of the seventeenth century, whose tomb is in the zerhoun above moulay idriss. hamadch, it appears, had a faithful slave, who, when his master died, killed himself in despair, and the self-inflicted wounds of the brotherhood are supposed to symbolize the slave's suicide; though no doubt the origin of the ceremony might be traced back to the depths of that ensanguined grove where mr. fraser plucked the golden bough. the more naïve interpretation, however, has its advantages, since it enables the devotees to divide their ritual duties into two classes, the devotions of the free men being addressed to the saint who died in his bed, while the slaves belong to the slave, and must therefore simulate his horrid end. and this is the reason why most of the white caftans simply rock and writhe, while the humble blue shirts drip with blood. [illustration: _from a photograph taken by captain henissart of the french army_ moulay-idriss--the market-place. procession of the confraternity of the hamadchas] the sun was setting when we came down from our terrace above the market-place. to find a lodging for the night we had to press on to meknez, where we were awaited at the french military post; therefore we were reluctantly obliged to refuse an invitation to take tea with the caïd, whose high-perched house commands the whole white amphitheatre of the town. it was disappointing to leave moulay idriss with the hamadchas howling their maddest, and so much besides to see; but as we drove away under the long shadows of the olives we counted ourselves lucky to have entered the sacred town, and luckier still to have been there on the day of the dance which, till a year ago, no foreigner had been allowed to see. a fine french road runs from moulay idriss to meknez, and we flew on through the dusk between wooded hills and open stretches on which the fires of nomad camps put orange splashes in the darkness. then the moon rose, and by its light we saw a widening valley, and gardens and orchards that stretched up to a great walled city outlined against the stars. iii meknez all that evening, from the garden of the military subdivision on the opposite height, we sat and looked across at the dark tree-clumps and moon-lit walls of meknez, and listened to its fantastic history. meknez was built by the sultan moulay-ismaël, around the nucleus of a small town of which the site happened to please him, at the very moment when louis xiv was creating versailles. the coincidence of two contemporary autocrats calling cities out of the wilderness has caused persons with a taste for analogy to describe meknez as the versailles of morocco: an epithet which is about as instructive as it would be to call phidias the benvenuto cellini of greece. there is, however, a pretext for the comparison in the fact that the two sovereigns took a lively interest in each other's affairs. moulay-ismaël sent several embassies to treat with louis xiv on the eternal question of piracy and the ransom of christian captives, and the two rulers were continually exchanging gifts and compliments. the governor of tetouan, who was sent to paris in , having brought as presents to the french king a lion, a lioness, a tigress, and four ostriches, louis xiv shortly afterward despatched m. de saint-amand to morocco with two dozen watches, twelve pieces of gold brocade, a cannon six feet long and other firearms. after this the relations between the two courts remained friendly till , at which time they were strained by the refusal of france to return the moorish captives who were employed on the king's galleys, and who were probably as much needed there as the sultan's christian slaves for the building of moorish palaces. [illustration: _from a photograph from the service des beaux-arts au maroc_ meknez--gate: "bab-mansour"] six years later the sultan despatched abdallah-ben-aïssa to france to reopen negotiations. the ambassador was as brilliantly received and as eagerly run after as a modern statesman on an official mission, and his candidly expressed admiration for the personal charms of the princesse de conti, one of the french monarch's legitimatized children, is supposed to have been mistaken by the court for an offer of marriage from the emperor of barbary. but he came back without a treaty. moulay-ismaël, whose long reign ( to ) and extraordinary exploits make him already a legendary figure, conceived, early in his career, a passion for meknez; and through all his troubled rule, with its alternations of barbaric warfare and far-reaching negotiations, palace intrigue, crazy bloodshed and great administrative reforms, his heart perpetually reverted to the wooded slopes on which he dreamed of building a city more splendid than fez or marrakech. "the sultan" (writes his chronicler aboul kasim-ibn-ahmad, called "ezziani") "loved meknez, the climate of which had enchanted him, and he would have liked never to leave it." he left it, indeed, often, left it perpetually, to fight with revolted tribes in the atlas, to defeat one berber army after another, to carry his arms across the high atlas into the souss, to adorn fez with the heads of seven hundred vanquished chiefs, to put down his three rebellious brothers, to strip all the cities of his empire of their negroes and transport them to meknez ("so that not a negro, man, woman or child, slave or free, was left in any part of the country"); to fight and defeat the christians ( ); to take tangier, to conduct a campaign on the moulouya, to lead the holy war against the spanish ( ), to take larache, the spanish commercial post on the west coast (which furnished eighteen hundred captives for meknez); to lay siege to ceuta, conduct a campaign against the turks of algiers, repress the pillage in his army, subdue more tribes, and build forts for his black legionaries from oudjda to the oued noun. but almost each year's bloody record ends with the placid phrase: "then the sultan returned to meknez." in the year , ezziani writes, the indomitable old man "deprived his rebellious sons of their principalities; after which date he consecrated himself exclusively to the building of his palaces and the planting of his gardens. and in (nineteen years later in this long reign!) he ordered the destruction of the mausoleum of moulay idriss for the purpose of enlarging it. and to gain the necessary space he bought all the adjacent land, and the workmen did not leave these new labors till they were entirely completed." in this same year there was levied on fez a new tax which was so heavy that the inhabitants were obliged to abandon the city. yet it is written of this terrible old monarch, who devastated whole districts, and sacrificed uncounted thousands of lives for his ruthless pleasure, that under his administration of his chaotic and turbulent empire "the country rejoiced in the most complete security. a jew or a woman might travel alone from oudjda to the oued noun without any one's asking their business. abundance reigned throughout the land: grain, food, cattle were to be bought for the lowest prices. nowhere in the whole of morocco was a highwayman or a robber to be found." and probably both sides of the picture are true. * * * * * what, then, was the marvel across the valley, what were the "lordly pleasure-houses" to whose creation and enlargement moulay-ismaël returned again and again amid the throes and violences of a nearly centenarian life? the chronicler continues: "the sultan caused all the houses near the kasbah[ ] to be demolished, _and compelled the inhabitants to carry away the ruins of their dwellings_. all the eastern end of the town was also torn down, and the ramparts were rebuilt. he also built the great mosque next to the palace of nasr.... he occupied himself personally with the construction of his palaces, and before one was finished he caused another to be begun. he built the mosque of elakhdar; the walls of the new town were pierced with twenty fortified gates and surmounted with platforms for cannon. within the walls he made a great artificial lake where one might row in boats. there was also a granary with immense subterranean reservoirs of water, and a stable _three miles long_ for the sultan's horses and mules; twelve thousand horses could be stabled in it. the flooring rested on vaults in which the grain for the horses was stored.... he also built the palace of elmansour, which had twenty cupolas; from the top of each cupola one could look forth on the plain and the mountains around meknez. all about the stables the rarest trees were planted. within the walls were fifty palaces, each with its own mosque and its baths. never was such a thing known in any country, arab or foreign, pagan or moslem. the guarding of the doors of these palaces was intrusted to twelve hundred black eunuchs." such were the wonders that seventeenth century travellers toiled across the desert to see, and from which they came back dazzled and almost incredulous, as if half-suspecting that some djinn had deluded them with the vision of a phantom city. but for the soberer european records, and the evidence of the ruins themselves (for the whole of the new meknez is a ruin), one might indeed be inclined to regard ezziani's statements as an oriental fable; but the briefest glimpse of moulay-ismaël's meknez makes it easy to believe all his chronicler tells of it, even to the three miles of stables. next morning we drove across the valley and, skirting the old town on the hill, entered, by one of the twenty gates of moulay-ismaël, a long empty street lined with half-ruined arcades. beyond was another street of beaten red earth bordered by high red walls blotched with gray and mauve. ahead of us this road stretched out interminably (meknez, before washington, was the "city of magnificent distances"), and down its empty length only one or two draped figures passed, like shadows on the way to shadowland. it was clear that the living held no further traffic with the meknez of moulay-ismaël. here it was at last. another great gateway let us, under a resplendently bejewelled arch of turquoise-blue and green, into another walled emptiness of red clay; a third gate opened into still vaster vacancies, and at their farther end rose a colossal red ruin, something like the lower stories of a roman amphitheatre that should stretch out indefinitely instead of forming a circle, or like a series of roman aqueducts built side by side and joined into one structure. below this indescribable ruin the arid ground sloped down to an artificial water which was surely the lake that the sultan had made for his boating-parties; and beyond it more red earth stretched away to more walls and gates, with glimpses of abandoned palaces and huge crumbling angle-towers. the vastness, the silence, the catastrophic desolation of the place, were all the more impressive because of the relatively recent date of the buildings. as moulay-ismaël had dealt with volubilis, so time had dealt with his own meknez; and the destruction which it had taken thousands of lash-driven slaves to inflict on the stout walls of the roman city, neglect and abandonment had here rapidly accomplished. but though the sun-baked clay of which the impatient sultan built his pleasure-houses will not suffer comparison with the firm stones of rome, "the high roman fashion" is visible in the shape and outline of these ruins. what they are no one knows. in spite of ezziani's text (written when the place was already partly destroyed) archæologists disagree as to the uses of the crypt of rose-flushed clay whose twenty rows of gigantic arches are so like an alignment of roman aqueducts. were these the vaulted granaries, or the subterranean reservoirs under the three miles of stabling which housed the twelve thousand horses? the stables, at any rate, were certainly near this spot, for the lake adjoins the ruins as in the chronicler's description; and between it and old meknez, behind walls within walls, lie all that remains of the fifty palaces with their cupolas, gardens, mosques and baths. this inner region is less ruined than the mysterious vaulted structure, and one of the palaces, being still reserved for the present sultan's use, cannot be visited; but we wandered unchallenged through desert courts, gardens of cypress and olive where dried fountains and painted summer-houses are falling into dust, and barren spaces enclosed in long empty façades. it was all the work of an eager and imperious old man, who, to realize his dream quickly, built in perishable materials; but the design, the dimensions, the whole conception, show that he had not only heard of versailles but had looked with his own eyes on volubilis. [illustration: _from a photograph from the service des beaux-arts au maroc_ meknez--the ruins of the palace of moulay-ismaël] to build on such a scale, and finish the work in a single lifetime, even if the materials be malleable and the life a long one, implies a command of human labor that the other sultan at versailles must have envied. the imposition of the _corvée_ was of course even simpler in morocco than in france, since the material to draw on was unlimited, provided one could assert one's power over it; and for that purpose ismaël had his black army, the hundred and fifty thousand disciplined legionaries who enabled him to enforce his rule over all the wild country from algiers to agadir. the methods by which this army were raised and increased are worth recounting in ezziani's words: "a _taleb_[ ] of marrakech having shown the sultan a register containing the names of the negroes who had formed part of the army of el-mansour, moulay-ismaël ordered his agents to collect all that remained of these negroes and their children.... he also sent to the tribes of the beni-hasen, and into the mountains, to purchase all the negroes to be found there. thus all that were in the whole of moghreb were assembled, from the cities and the countryside, till not one was left, slave or free. "these negroes were armed and clothed, and sent to mechra erremel (north of meknez) where they were ordered to build themselves houses, plant gardens and remain till their children were ten years old. then the sultan caused all the children to be brought to him, both boys and girls. the boys were apprenticed to masons, carpenters, and other tradesmen; others were employed to make mortar. the next year they were taught to drive the mules, the third to make _adobe_ for building; the fourth year they learned to ride horses bareback, the fifth they were taught to ride in the saddle while using firearms. at the age of sixteen these boys became soldiers. they were then married to the young negresses who had meanwhile been taught cooking and washing in the sultan's palaces--except those who were pretty, and these were given a musical education, after which each one received a wedding-dress and a marriage settlement, and was handed over to her husband. "all the children of these couples were in due time destined for the black army, or for domestic service in the palaces. every year the sultan went to the camp at mechra erremel and brought back the children. the black army numbered one hundred and fifty thousand men, of whom part were at erremel, part at meknez, and the rest in the seventy-six forts which the sultan built for them throughout his domain. may the lord be merciful to his memory!" such was the army by means of which ismaël enforced the _corvée_ on his undisciplined tribes. many thousands of lives went to the building of imperial meknez; but his subjects would scarcely have sufficed if he had not been able to add to them twenty-five thousand christian captives. m. augustin bernard, in his admirable book on morocco, says that the seventeenth century was "the golden age of piracy" in morocco; and the great ismaël was no doubt one of its chief promoters. one understands his unwillingness to come to an agreement with his great friend and competitor, louis xiv, on the difficult subject of the ransom of christian captives when one reads in the admiring ezziani that it took fifty-five thousand prisoners and captives to execute his architectural conceptions. "these prisoners, by day, were occupied on various tasks; at night they were locked into subterranean dungeons. any prisoner who died at his task was _built into the wall he was building_." (this statement is confirmed by john windus, the english traveller who visited the court of moulay-ismaël in the sultan's old age.) many europeans must have succumbed quickly to the heat and the lash, for the wall-builders were obliged to make each stroke in time with their neighbors, and were bastinadoed mercilessly if they broke the rhythm; and there is little doubt that the expert artisans of france, italy and spain were even dearer to the old architectural madman than the friendship of the palace-building despot across the sea. ezziani's chronicle dates from the first part of the nineteenth century, and is an arab's colorless panegyric of a great arab ruler; but john windus, the englishman who accompanied commodore stewart's embassy to meknez in , saw the imperial palaces and their builder with his own eyes, and described them with the vivacity of a foreigner struck by every contrast. moulay-ismaël was then about eighty-seven years old, "a middle-sized man, who has the remains of a good face, with nothing of a negro's features, though his mother was a black. he has a high nose, which is pretty long from the eye-brows downward, and thin. he has lost all his teeth, and breathes short, as if his lungs were bad, coughs and spits pretty often, which never falls to the ground, men being always ready with handkerchiefs to receive it. his beard is thin and very white, his eyes seem to have been sparkling, but their vigor decayed through age, and his cheeks very much sunk in." such was the appearance of this extraordinary man, who deceived, tortured, betrayed, assassinated, terrorized and mocked his slaves, his subjects, his women and children and his ministers like any other half-savage arab despot, but who yet managed through his long reign to maintain a barbarous empire, to police the wilderness, and give at least an appearance of prosperity and security where all had before been chaos. the english emissaries appear to have been much struck by the magnificence of his palaces, then in all the splendor of novelty, and gleaming with marbles brought from volubilis and salé. windus extols in particular the sunken gardens of cypress, pomegranate and orange trees, some of them laid out seventy feet below the level of the palace-courts; the exquisite plaster fretwork; the miles of tessellated walls and pavement made in the finely patterned mosaic work of fez; and the long terrace walk trellised with "vines and other greens" leading from the palace to the famous stables, and over which it was the sultan's custom to drive in a chariot drawn by women and eunuchs. moulay-ismaël received the english ambassador with every show of pomp and friendship, and immediately "made him a present" of a handful of young english captives; but just as the negotiations were about to be concluded commodore stewart was privately advised that the sultan had no intention of allowing the rest of the english to be ransomed. luckily a diplomatically composed letter, addressed by the english envoy to one of the favorite wives, resulted in ismaël's changing his mind, and the captives were finally given up, and departed with their rescuers. as one stands in the fiery sun, among the monstrous ruins of those tragic walls, one pictures the other christian captives pausing for a second, at the risk of death, in the rhythmic beat of their labor, to watch the little train of their companions winding away across the desert to freedom. on the way back through the long streets that lead to the ruins we noticed, lying by the roadside, the shafts of fluted columns, blocks of marble, roman capitals: fragments of the long loot of salé and volubilis. we asked how they came there, and were told that, according to a tradition still believed in the country, when the prisoners and captives who were dragging the building materials toward the palace under the blistering sun heard of the old sultan's death, they dropped their loads with one accord and fled. at the same moment every worker on the walls flung down his trowel or hod, every slave of the palaces stopped grinding or scouring or drawing water or carrying faggots or polishing the miles of tessellated floors; so that, when the tyrant's heart stopped beating, at that very instant life ceased to circulate in the huge house he had built, and in all its members it became a carcass for his carcass. footnotes: [ ] the high plateau-and-hill formation between tangier and fez. [ ] so called to distinguish them from the tent villages of the less settled groups. [ ] sacred college. [ ] the citadal of old meknez. [ ] learned man. iii fez i the first vision many-walled fez rose up before us out of the plain toward the end of the day. the walls and towers we saw were those of the upper town, fez eldjid (the new), which lies on the edge of the plateau and hides from view old fez tumbling down below it into the ravine of the oued fez. thus approached, the city presents to view only a long line of ramparts and fortresses, merging into the wide, tawny plain and framed in barren mountains. not a house is visible outside the walls, except, at a respectful distance, the few unobtrusive buildings of the european colony; and not a village breaks the desolation of the landscape. as we drew nearer, the walls towered close over us, and skirting them we came to a bare space outside a great horseshoe gate, and found ourselves suddenly in the foreground of a picture by carpaccio or bellini. where else had one seen just those rows of white-turbaned majestic figures, squatting in the dust under lofty walls, all the pale faces ringed in curling beards turned to the story-teller in the centre of the group? transform the story-teller into a rapt young venetian, and you have the audience and the foreground of carpaccio's "preaching of st. stephen," even to the camels craning inquisitive necks above the turbans. every step of the way in north africa corroborates the close observation of the early travellers, whether painters or narrators, and shows the unchanged character of the oriental life that the venetians pictured, and leo africanus and windus and charles cochelet described. there was time, before sunset, to go up to the hill, from which the ruined tombs of the merinid sultans look down over the city they made glorious. after the savage massacre of foreign residents in the french encircled the heights commanding fez with one of their admirably engineered military roads, and in a few minutes our motor had climbed to the point from which the great dynasty of artist-sultans dreamed of looking down forever on their capital. nothing endures in islam, except what human inertia has left standing and its own solidity has preserved from the elements. or rather, nothing remains intact, and nothing wholly perishes, but the architecture, like all else, lingers on half-ruined and half-unchanged. the merinid tombs, however, are only hollow shells and broken walls, grown part of the brown cliff they cling to. no one thinks of them save as an added touch of picturesqueness where all is picturesque: they survive as the best point from which to look down at fez. there it lies, outspread in golden light, roofs, terraces, and towers sliding over the plain's edge in a rush dammed here and there by barriers of cypress and ilex, but growing more precipitous as the ravine of the fez narrows downward with the fall of the river. it is as though some powerful enchanter, after decreeing that the city should be hurled into the depths, had been moved by its beauty, and with a wave of his wand held it suspended above destruction. at first the eye takes in only this impression of a great city over a green abyss; then the complex scene begins to define itself. all around are the outer lines of ramparts, walls beyond walls, their crenellations climbing the heights, their angle fortresses dominating the precipices. almost on a level with us lies the upper city, the aristocratic fez eldjid of painted palaces and gardens; then, as the houses close in and descend more abruptly, terraces, minarets, domes, and long reed-thatched roofs of the bazaars, all gather around the green-tiled tomb of moulay idriss, and the tower of the almohad mosque of el kairouiyin, which adjoin each other in the depths of fez, and form its central sanctuary. * * * * * from the merinid hill we had noticed a long façade among the cypresses and fruit-trees of eldjid. this was bou-jeloud, the old summer-palace of the sultan's harem, now the house of the resident-general, where lodgings had been prepared for us. the road descended again, crossing the oued fez by one of the fine old single-arch bridges that mark the architectural link between morocco and spain. we skirted high walls, wayside pools, and dripping mill-wheels; then one of the city gates engulfed us, and we were in the waste spaces of intramural fez, formerly the lines of defense of a rich and perpetually menaced city, now chiefly used for refuse-heaps, open-air fondaks, and dreaming-places for rows of lazaruses rolled in their cerements in the dust. through another gate and more walls we came to an arch in the inner line of defense. beyond that, the motor paused before a green door, where a cadi in a silken caftan received us. across squares of orange-trees divided by running water we were led to an arcaded apartment hung with moroccan embroideries and lined with wide divans; the hall of reception of the resident-general. through its arches were other tiled distances, fountains, arcades; beyond, in greener depths, the bright blossoms of a flower-garden. such was our first sight of bou-jeloud, once the summer-palace of the wives of moulay hafid. upstairs, from a room walled and ceiled with cedar, and decorated with the bold rose-pink embroideries of salé and the intricate old needlework of fez, i looked out over the upper city toward the mauve and tawny mountains. just below the window the flat roofs of a group of little houses descended like the steps of an irregular staircase. between them rose a few cypresses and a green minaret; out of the court of one house an ancient fig-tree thrust its twisted arms. the sun had set, and one after another bright figures appeared on the roofs. the children came first, hung with silver amulets and amber beads, and pursued by negresses in striped turbans, who bustled up with rugs and matting; then the mothers followed more indolently, released from their ashy mufflings and showing, under their light veils, long earrings from the _mellah_[ ] and caftans of pale green or peach color. the houses were humble ones, such as grow up in the cracks of a wealthy quarter, and their inhabitants doubtless small folk; but in the enchanted african twilight the terraces blossomed like gardens, and when the moon rose and the muezzin called from the minaret, the domestic squabbles and the shrill cries from roof to roof became part of a story in bagdad, overheard a thousand years ago by that arch-detective haroun-al-raschid. ii fez eldjid it is usual to speak of fez as very old, and the term seems justified when one remembers that the palace of bou-jeloud stands on the site of an almoravid kasbah of the eleventh century, that when that kasbah was erected fez elbali had already existed for three hundred years, that el kairouiyin is the contemporary of sant' ambrogio of milan, and that the original mosque of moulay idriss ii was built over his grave in the eighth century. fez is, in fact, the oldest city in morocco without a phenician or a roman past, and has preserved more traces than any other of its architectural flowering-time; yet it would be truer to say of it, as of all moroccan cities, that it has no age, since its seemingly immutable shape is forever crumbling and being renewed on the old lines. when we rode forth the next day to visit some of the palaces of eldjid our pink-saddled mules carried us at once out of the bounds of time. how associate anything so precise and occidental as years or centuries with these visions of frail splendor seen through cypresses and roses? the cadis in their multiple muslins, who received us in secret doorways and led us by many passages into the sudden wonder of gardens and fountains; the bright-earringed negresses peering down from painted balconies; the pilgrims and clients dozing in the sun against hot walls; the deserted halls with plaster lace-work and gold pendentives in tiled niches; the venetian chandeliers and tawdry rococo beds; the terraces from which pigeons whirled up in a white cloud while we walked on a carpet of their feathers--were all these the ghosts of vanished state, or the actual setting of the life of some rich merchant with "business connections" in liverpool and lyons, or some government official at that very moment speeding to meknez or casablanca in his sixty h. p. motor? [illustration: _from a photograph from the service des beaux-arts au maroc_ fez eldjid (the upper city)] we visited old palaces and new, inhabited and abandoned, and over all lay the same fine dust of oblivion, like the silvery mould on an overripe fruit. overripeness is indeed the characteristic of this rich and stagnant civilization. buildings, people, customs, seem all about to crumble and fall of their own weight: the present is a perpetually prolonged past. to touch the past with one's hands is realized only in dreams; and in morocco the dream-feeling envelopes one at every step. one trembles continually lest the "person from porlock" should step in. he is undoubtedly on the way; but fez had not heard of him when we rode out that morning. fez eldjid, the "new fez" of palaces and government buildings, was founded in the fourteenth century by the merinid princes, and probably looks much as it did then. the palaces in their overgrown gardens, with pale-green trellises dividing the rose-beds from the blue-and-white tiled paths, and fountains in fluted basins of italian marble, all had the same drowsy charm; yet the oldest were built not more than a century or two ago, others within the last fifty years; and at marrakech, later in our journey, we were to visit a sumptuous dwelling where plaster-cutters and ceramists from fez were actually repeating with wonderful skill and spontaneity, the old ornamentation of which the threads run back to rome and damascus. of really old private dwellings, palaces or rich men's houses, there are surprisingly few in morocco. it is hard to guess the age of some of the featureless houses propping each other's flanks in old fez or old salé; but people rich enough to rebuild have always done so, and the passion for building seems allied, in this country of inconsequences, to the supine indifference that lets existing constructions crumble back to clay. "dust to dust" should have been the motto of the moroccan palace-builders. fez possesses one old secular building, a fine fondak of the fifteenth century; but in morocco, as a rule, only mosques and the tombs of saints are preserved--none too carefully--and even the strong stone buildings of the almohads have been allowed to fall to ruin, as at chella and rabat. this indifference to the completed object--which is like a kind of collective exaggeration of the artist's indifference to his completed work--has resulted in the total disappearance of the furniture and works of art which must have filled the beautiful buildings of the merinid period. neither pottery nor brass-work nor enamels nor fine hangings survive; there is no parallel in morocco to the textiles of syria, the potteries of persia, the byzantine ivories or enamels. it has been said that the moroccan is always a nomad, who lives in his house as if it were a tent; but this is not a conclusive answer to any one who knows the passion of the modern moroccan for european furniture. when one reads the list of the treasures contained in the palaces of the mediæval sultans of egypt one feels sure that, if artists were lacking in morocco, the princes and merchants who brought skilled craftsmen across the desert to build their cities must also have imported treasures to adorn them. yet, as far as is known, the famous fourteenth-century bronze chandelier of tetuan, and the fine old ritual furniture reported to be contained in certain mosques, are the only important works of art in morocco later in date than the roman _sloughi_ of volubilis. iii fez elbali the distances in fez are so great and the streets so narrow, and in some quarters so crowded, that all but saints or humble folk go about on mule-back. in the afternoon, accordingly, the pink mules came again, and we set out for the long tunnel-like street that leads down the hill to the fez elbali. "look out--'ware heads!" our leader would call back at every turn, as our way shrank to a black passage under a house bestriding the street, or a caravan of donkeys laden with obstructive reeds or branches of dates made the passers-by flatten themselves against the walls. on each side of the street the houses hung over us like fortresses, leaning across the narrow strip of blue and throwing out great beams and buttresses to prop each other's bulging sides. windows there were none on the lower floors; only here and there an iron-barred slit stuffed with rags and immemorial filth, from which a lean cat would suddenly spring out, and scuttle off under an archway like a witch's familiar. [illustration: _from a photograph from the service des beaux-arts au maroc_ fez--a reed-roofed street] some of these descending lanes were packed with people, others as deserted as a cemetery; and it was strange to pass from the thronged streets leading to the bazaars to the profound and secretive silence of a quarter of well-to-do dwelling-houses, where only a few veiled women attended by negro slaves moved noiselessly over the clean cobblestones, and the sound of fountains and runnels came from hidden courtyards and over garden-walls. this noise of water is as characteristic of fez as of damascus. the oued fez rushes through the heart of the town, bridged, canalized, built over, and ever and again bursting out into tumultuous falls and pools shadowed with foliage. the central artery of the city is not a street but a waterfall; and tales are told of the dark uses to which, even now, the underground currents are put by some of the dwellers behind the blank walls and scented gardens of those highly respectable streets. the crowd in oriental cities is made up of many elements, and in morocco turks, jews and infidels, berbers of the mountains, fanatics of the confraternities, soudanese blacks and haggard blue men of the souss, jostle the merchants and government officials with that democratic familiarity which goes side by side with abject servility in this land of perpetual contradictions. but fez is above all the city of wealth and learning, of universities and counting-houses, and the merchant and the _oulama_[ ]--the sedentary and luxurious types--prevail. the slippered fazi merchant, wrapped in white muslins and securely mounted on a broad velvet saddle-cloth anchored to the back of a broad mule, is as unlike the arab horseman of the desert as mr. tracy tupman was unlike the musketeers of dumas. ease, music, money-making, the affairs of his harem and the bringing-up of his children, are his chief interests, and his plump pale face with long-lashed hazel eyes, his curling beard and fat womanish hands, recall the portly potentates of hindu miniatures, dreaming among houris beside lotus-tanks. these personages, when they ride abroad, are preceded by a swarthy footman, who keeps his hand on the embroidered bridle; and the government officers and dignitaries of the _makhzen_[ ] are usually escorted by several mounted officers of their household, with a servant to each mule. the cry of the runners scatters the crowd, and even the panniered donkeys and perpetually astonished camels somehow contrive to become two-dimensional while the white procession goes by. then the populace closes in again, so quickly and densely that it seems impossible it could ever have been parted, and negro water-carriers, muffled women, beggars streaming with sores, sinewy and greasy "saints," soudanese sorcerers hung with amulets made of sardine-boxes and hares'-feet, long-lashed boys of the chleuh in clean embroidered caftans, jews in black robes and skull-caps, university students carrying their prayer-carpets, bangled and spangled black women, scrofulous children with gazelle eyes and mangy skulls, and blind men tapping along with linked arms and howling out verses of the koran, surge together in a mass drawn by irresistible suction to the point where the bazaars converge about the mosques of moulay idriss and el kairouiyin. seen from a terrace of the upper town, the long thatched roofing of el attarine, the central bazaar of fez, promises fantastic revelations of native life; but the dun-colored crowds moving through its checkered twilight, the lack of carved shop-fronts and gaily adorned coffee-houses, and the absence of the painted coffers and vivid embroideries of tunis, remind one that morocco is a melancholy country, and fez a profoundly melancholy city. _dust and ashes, dust and ashes_, echoes from the gray walls, the mouldering thatch of the _souks_, the long lamentable song of the blind beggars sitting in rows under the feet of the camels and asses. no young men stroll through the bazaar in bright caftans, with roses and jasmine behind their ears, no pedlars offer lemonade and sweetmeats and golden fritters, no flower-sellers pursue one with tight bunches of orange-blossom and little pink roses. the well-to-do ride by in white, and the rest of the population goes mournfully in earth-color. but gradually one falls under the spell of another influence--the influence of the atlas and the desert. unknown africa seems much nearer to morocco than to the white towns of tunis and the smiling oases of south algeria. one feels the nearness of marrakech at fez, and at marrakech that of timbuctoo. fez is sombre, and the bazaars clustered about its holiest sanctuaries form its most sombre quarter. dusk falls there early, and oil-lanterns twinkle in the merchants' niches while the clear african daylight still lies on the gardens of upper fez. this twilight adds to the mystery of the _souks_, making them, in spite of profane noise and crowding and filth, an impressive approach to the sacred places. until a year or two ago, the precincts around moulay idriss and el kairouiyin were _horm_, that is, cut off from the unbeliever. heavy beams of wood barred the end of each _souk_, shutting off the sanctuaries, and the christian could only conjecture what lay beyond. now he knows in part; for, though the beams have not been lowered, all comers may pass under them to the lanes about the mosques, and even pause a moment in their open doorways. farther one may not go, for the shrines of morocco are still closed to unbelievers; but whoever knows cordova, or has stood under the arches of the great mosque of kairouan, can reconstruct something of the hidden beauties of its namesake, the "mosque kairouan" of western africa. once under the bars, the richness of the old moorish fez presses upon one with unexpected beauty. here is the graceful tiled fountain of nedjarine, glittering with the unapproachable blues and greens of ceramic mosaics; near it, the courtyard of the fondak nedjarine, oldest and stateliest of moroccan inns, with triple galleries of sculptured cedar rising above arcades of stone. a little farther on lights and incense draw one to a threshold where it is well not to linger unduly. under a deep archway, between booths where gay votive candles are sold, the glimmer of hanging lamps falls on patches of gilding and mosaic, and on veiled women prostrating themselves before an invisible shrine--for this is the vestibule of the mosque of moulay idriss, where, on certain days of the week, women are admitted to pray. moulay idriss was not built over the grave of the fatimite prophet, first of the name, whose bones lie in the zerhoun above his sacred town. the mosque of fez grew up around the tomb of his posthumous son, moulay idriss ii, who, descending from the hills, fell upon a camp of berbers on an affluent of the sebou, and there laid the foundations of fez, and of the moroccan empire. [illustration: _from a photograph from the service des beaux-arts au maroc_ fez--the nedjarine fountain] of the original monument it is said that little remains. the _zaouïa_[ ] which encloses it dates from the reign of moulay-ismaël, the seventeenth-century sultan of meknez, and the mosque itself, and the green minaret shooting up from the very centre of old fez, were not built until . but a rich surface of age has already formed on all these disparate buildings, and the over-gorgeous details of the shrines and fountains set in their outer walls are blended into harmony by a film of incense-smoke, and the grease of countless venerating lips and hands. featureless walls of mean houses close in again at the next turn; but a few steps farther another archway reveals another secret scene. this time it is a corner of the jealously guarded court of ablutions in the great mosque el kairouiyin, with the twin green-roofed pavilions that are so like those of the alhambra. those who have walked around the outer walls of the mosque of the other kairouan, and recall the successive doors opening into the forecourt and into the mosque itself, will be able to guess at the plan of the church of fez. the great almohad sanctuary of tunisia is singularly free from parasitic buildings, and may be approached as easily as that of cordova; but the approaches of el kairouiyin are so built up that one never knows at which turn of the labyrinth one may catch sight of its court of fountains, or peep down the endless colonnades of which the arabs say: "the man who should try to count the columns of kairouiyin would go mad." marble floors, heavy whitewashed piers, prostrate figures in the penumbra, rows of yellow slippers outside in the sunlight--out of such glimpses one must reconstruct a vision of the long vistas of arches, the blues and golds of the _mirhab_,[ ] the lustre of bronze chandeliers, and the ivory inlaying of the twelfth-century _minbar_[ ] of ebony and sandalwood. no christian footstep has yet profaned kairouiyin, but fairly definite information as to its plan has been gleaned by students of moroccan art. the number of its "countless" columns has been counted, and it is known that, to the right of the _mirhab_, carved cedar doors open into a mortuary chapel called "the mosque of the dead"--and also that in this chapel, on fridays, old books and precious manuscripts are sold by auction. this odd association of uses recalls the fact that kairouiyin is not only a church but a library, the university of fez as well as its cathedral. the beautiful medersas with which the merinids adorned the city are simply the lodging-houses of the students; the classes are all held in the courts and galleries adjoining the mosque. el kairouiyin was originally an oratory built in the ninth century by fatmah, whose father had migrated from kairouan to fez. later it was enlarged, and its cupola was surmounted by the talismans which protect sacred edifices against rats, scorpions and serpents; but in spite of these precautions all animal life was not successfully exorcised from it. in the twelfth century, when the great gate ech chemmâïn was building, a well was discovered under its foundations. the mouth of the well was obstructed by an immense tortoise; but when the workmen attempted to take the tortoise out she said: "burn me rather than take me away from here." they respected her wishes and built her into the foundations; and since then women who suffer from the back-ache have only to come and sit on the bench above the well to be cured. the actual mosque, or "praying-hall," is said to be formed of a rectangle or double cube of metres by , and this vast space is equally divided by rows of horseshoe arches resting on whitewashed piers on which the lower part is swathed in finely patterned matting from salé. fifteen monumental doorways lead into the mosque. their doors are of cedar, heavily barred and ornamented with wrought iron, and one of them bears the name of the artisan, and the date of the hegira (the first half of the twelfth century). the mosque also contains the two halls of audience of the cadi, of which one has a graceful exterior façade with coupled lights under horseshoe arches; the library, whose , volumes are reported to have dwindled to about a thousand; the chapel where the masters of the koran recite the sacred text in fulfilment of pious bequests; the "museum" in the upper part of the minaret, wherein a remarkable collection of ancient astronomical instruments is said to be preserved; and the _mestonda_, or raised hall above the court, where women come to pray. but the crown of el kairouiyin is the merinid court of ablutions. this inaccessible wonder lies close under the medersa attarine, one of the oldest and most beautiful collegiate buildings of fez; and through the kindness of the director of fine arts, who was with us, we were taken up to the roof of the medersa and allowed to look down into the enclosure. it is so closely guarded from below that from our secret of vantage we seemed to be looking down into the heart of forbidden things. spacious and serene the great tiled cloister lay beneath us, water spilling over from a central basin of marble with a cool sound to which lesser fountains made answer from under the pyramidal green roofs of the twin pavilions. it was near the prayer-hour, and worshippers were flocking in, laying off their shoes and burnouses, washing their faces at the fountains and their feet in the central tank, or stretching themselves out in the shadow of the enclosing arcade. this, then, was the famous court "so cool in the great heats that seated by thy beautiful jet of water i feel the perfection of bliss"--as the learned doctor abou abd allah el maghili sang of it; the court in which the students gather from the adjoining halls after having committed to memory the principals of grammar in prose and verse, the "science of the reading of the koran," the invention, exposition and ornaments of style, law, medicine, theology, metaphysics and astronomy, as well as the talismanic numbers, and the art of ascertaining by calculation the influences of the angels, the spirits and the heavenly bodies, "the names of the victor and the vanquished, and of the desired object and the person who desires it." such is the twentieth-century curriculum of the university of fez. repetition is the rule of arab education as it is of arab ornament. the teaching of the university is based entirely on the mediæval principle of mnemonics; and as there are no examinations, no degrees, no limits to the duration of any given course, nor is any disgrace attached to slowness in learning, it is not surprising that many students, coming as youths, linger by the fountain of kairouiyin till their hair is gray. one well-known _oulama_ has lately finished his studies after twenty-seven years at the university, and is justly proud of the length of his stay. the life of the scholar is easy, the way of knowledge is long, the contrast exquisite between the foul lanes and noisy bazaars outside and this cool heaven of learning. no wonder the students of kairouiyin say with the tortoise: "burn me rather than take me away." iv el andalous and the potters' field outside the sacred precincts of moulay idriss and kairouiyin, on the other side of the oued fez, lies el andalous, the mosque which the andalusian moors built when they settled in fez in the ninth century. it stands apart from the bazaars, on higher ground, and though it is not _horm_ we found it less easy to see than the more famous mosques, since the christian loiterer in its doorways is more quickly noticed. the fazi are not yet used to seeing unbelievers near their sacred places. it is only in the tumult and confusion of the _souks_ that one can linger on the edge of the inner mysteries without becoming aware of attracting sullen looks; and my only impression of el andalous is of a magnificent almohad door and the rich blur of an interior in which there was no time to single out the details. turning from its forbidden and forbidding threshold we rode on through a poor quarter which leads to the great gate of bab f'touh. beyond the gate rises a dusty rocky slope extending to the outer walls--one of those grim intramural deserts that girdle fez with desolation. this one is strewn with gravestones, not enclosed, but, as in most moroccan cemeteries, simply cropping up like nettles between the rocks and out of the flaming dust. here and there among the slabs rises a well-curb or a crumbling _koubba_. a solitary palm shoots up beside one of the shrines. and between the crowded graves the caravan trail crosses from the outer to the inner gate, and perpetual lines of camels and donkeys trample the dead a little deeper into the dusty earth. this bab f'touh cemetery is also a kind of fondak. poor caravans camp there under the walls in a mire of offal and chicken-feathers and stripped date-branches prowled through by wolfish dogs and buzzed over by fat blue flies. camel-drivers squat beside iron kettles over heaps of embers, sorcerers from the sahara offer their amulets to negro women, peddlers with portable wooden booths sell greasy cakes that look as if they had been made out of the garbage of the caravans, and in and out among the unknown dead and sleeping saints circulates the squalid indifferent life of the living poor. a walled lane leads down from bab f'touh to a lower slope, where the fazi potters have their baking-kilns. under a series of grassy terraces overgrown with olives we saw the archaic ovens and dripping wheels which produce the earthenware sold in the _souks_. it is a primitive and homely ware, still fine in shape, though dull in color and monotonous in pattern; and stacked on the red earth under the olives, the rows of jars and cups, in their unglazed and unpainted state, showed their classical descent more plainly than after they have been decorated. this green quiet hollow, where turbaned figures were moving attentively among the primitive ovens, so near to the region of flies and offal we had just left, woke an old phrase in our memories, and as our mules stumbled back over the graves of bab f'touh we understood the grim meaning of the words: "they carried him out and buried him in the potters' field." v medersas, bazaars and an oasis fez, for two centuries and more, was in a double sense the capital of morocco: the centre of its trade as well as of its culture. culture, in fact, came to northwest africa chiefly through the merinid princes. the almohads had erected great monuments from rabat to marrakech, and had fortified fez; but their "mighty wasteful empire" fell apart like those that had preceded it. stability had to come from the west; it was not till the arabs had learned it through the moors that morocco produced a dynasty strong and enlightened enough to carry out the dream of its founders. whichever way the discussion sways as to the priority of eastern or western influences on moroccan art--whether it came to her from syria, and was thence passed on to spain, or was first formed in spain, and afterward modified by the moroccan imagination--there can at least be no doubt that fazi art and culture, in their prime, are partly the reflection of european civilization. fugitives from spain came to the new city when moulay idriss founded it. one part of the town was given to them, and the river divided the elbali of the almohads into the two quarters of kairouiyin and andalous, which still retain their old names. but the full intellectual and artistic flowering of fez was delayed till the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries. it seems as though the seeds of the new springtime of art, blown across the sea from reawakening europe, had at last given the weltering tribes of the desert the force to create their own type of beauty. nine medersas sprang up in fez, six of them built by the princes who were also creating the exquisite collegiate buildings of salé, rabat and old meknez, and the enchanting mosque and minaret of chella. the power of these rulers also was in perpetual flux; they were always at war with the sultans of tlemeen, the christians of spain, the princes of northern algeria and tunis. but during the fourteenth century they established a rule wide and firm enough to permit of the great outburst of art and learning which produced the medersas of fez. until a year or two ago these collegiate buildings were as inaccessible as the mosques; but now that the french government has undertaken their restoration strangers may visit them under the guidance of the fine arts department. all are built on the same plan, the plan of salé and rabat, which (as m. tranchant de lunel[ ] has pointed out) became, with slight modifications, that of the rich private houses of morocco. but interesting as they are in plan and the application of ornament, their main beauty lies in their details: in the union of chiselled plaster with the delicate mosaic work of niches and revêtements; the web-like arabesques of the upper walls and the bold, almost gothic sculpture of the cedar architraves and corbels supporting them. and when all these details are enumerated, and also the fretted panels of cedar, the bronze doors with their great shield-like bosses, and the honeycombings and rufflings of the gilded ceilings, there still remains the general tinge of dry disintegration, as though all were perishing of a desert fever--that, and the final wonder of seeing before one, in such a setting, the continuance of the very life that went on there when the tiles were set and the gold was new on the ceilings. for these tottering medersas, already in the hands of the restorers, are still inhabited. as long as the stairway holds and the balcony has not rotted from its corbels, the students of the university see no reason for abandoning their lodgings above the cool fountain and the house of prayer. the strange men giving incomprehensible orders for unnecessary repairs need not disturb their meditations; and when the hammering grows too loud the _oulamas_ have only to pass through the silk market or the _souk_ of the embroiderers to the mosque of kairouiyin, and go on weaving the pattern of their dreams by the fountain of perfect bliss. * * * * * one reads of the bazaars of fez that they have been for centuries the central market of the country. here are to be found not only the silks and pottery, the jewish goldsmiths' work, the arms and embroidered saddlery which the city itself produces, but "morocco" from marrakech, rugs, tent-hangings and matting from rabat and salé, grain baskets from moulay idriss, daggers from the souss, and whatever european wares the native markets consume. one looks, on the plan of fez, at the space covered by the bazaars; one breasts the swarms that pour through them from dawn to dusk--and one remains perplexed, disappointed. they are less "oriental" than one had expected, if "oriental" means color and gaiety. sometimes, on occasion, it does mean that: as, for instance, when a procession passes bearing the gifts for a jewish wedding. the gray crowd makes way for a group of musicians in brilliant caftans, and following them comes a long file of women with uncovered faces and bejewelled necks, balancing on their heads the dishes the guests have sent to the feast--_kouskous_, sweet creams and syrups, "gazelles' horns" of sugar and almonds--in delicately woven baskets, each covered with several squares of bright gauze edged with gold. then one remembers the marketing of the lady of "the three calendars," and fez again becomes the bagdad of al raschid. [illustration: _from a photograph from the service des beaux-arts au maroc_ fez--the bazaars. a view of the souk el attarine and the quaisarya (silk market)] but when no exceptional events, processions, ceremonies and the like brighten the underworld of the _souks_, their look is uniformly melancholy. the gay bazaars, the gaily-painted houses, the flowers and flute-playing of north africa, are found in her mediterranean ports, in contact with european influences. the farther west she extends, the more she becomes self-contained, sombre, uninfluenced, a gloomy fanatic with her back to the walls of the atlantic and the atlas. color and laughter lie mostly along the trade-routes, where the peoples of the world come and go in curiosity and rivalry. this ashen crowd swarming gloomily through the dark tunnels represents the real moghreb that is close to the wild tribes of the "hinterland" and the grim feudal fortresses of the atlas. how close, one has only to go out to sefrou on a market-day to see. sefrou is a military outpost in an oasis under the atlas, about forty miles south of fez. to most people the word "oasis" evokes palms and sand; but though morocco possesses many oases it has no pure sand and few palms. i remember it as a considerable event when i discovered one from my lofty window at bou-jeloud. the _bled_ is made of very different stuff from the sand-ocean of the sahara. the light plays few tricks with it. its monotony is wearisome rather than impressive, and the fact that it is seldom without some form of dwarfish vegetation makes the transition less startling when the alluvial green is finally reached. one had always half expected it, and it does not spring at a djinn's wave out of sterile gold. but the fact brings its own compensations. moroccan oases differ one from another far more than those of south algeria and tunisia. some have no palms, others but a few, others are real palm-oases, though even in the south (at least on the hither side of the great atlas) none spreads out a dense uniform roofing of metal-blue fronds like the date-oases of biskra or tozeur. as for sefrou, which foucauld called the most beautiful oasis of morocco, it is simply an extremely fertile valley with vineyards and orchards stretching up to a fine background of mountains. but the fact that it lies just below the atlas makes it an important market-place and centre of caravans. though so near fez it is still almost on the disputed border between the loyal and the "unsubmissive" tribes, those that are _blad-makhzen_ (of the sultan's government) and those that are against it. until recently, therefore, it has been inaccessible to visitors, and even now a strongly fortified french post dominates the height above the town. looking down from the fort, one distinguishes, through masses of many-tinted green, a suburb of arab houses in gardens, and below, on the river, sefrou itself, a stout little walled town with angle-towers defiantly thrust forth toward the atlas. it is just outside these walls that the market is held. it was swarming with hill-people the day we were there, and strange was the contrast between the crowd inside the circle of picketed horses and the white-robed cockneys from rabat who fill the market-place of salé. here at last we were in touch with un-arab morocco, with berbers of the _bled_ and the hills, whose women know no veils and no seclusion, and who, under a thin surface of mahometanism, preserve their old stone and animal worship, and all the gross fetichistic beliefs from which mahomet dreamed of freeing africa. the men were lean and weather-bitten, some with negroid lips, others with beaked noses and gaunt cheek-bones, all muscular and fierce-looking. some were wrapped in the black cloaks worn by the blue men of the sahara,[ ] with a great orange sun embroidered on the back; some tunicked like the egyptian fellah, under a rough striped outer garment trimmed with bright tufts and tassels of wool. the men of the rif had a braided lock on the shoulder, those of the atlas a ringlet over each ear, and brown woollen scarfs wound round their temples, leaving the shaven crown bare. the women, squatting among their kids and poultry and cheeses, glanced at us with brilliant hennaed eyes and smiles that lifted their short upper lips maliciously. their thin faces were painted in stripes and patterns of indigo. silver necklets covered their throats, long earrings dangled under the wool-embroidered kerchiefs bound about their temples with a twist of camel's hair, and below the cotton shifts fastened on their shoulders with silver clasps their legs were bare to the knee, or covered with leather leggings to protect them from the thorny _bled_. they seemed abler bargainers than the men, and the play of expression on their dramatic and intensely feminine faces as they wheedled the price of a calf out of a fierce hillsman, or haggled over a heap of dates that a jew with greasy ringlets was trying to secure for his secret distillery, showed that they knew their superiority and enjoyed it. jews abounded in the market-place and also in the town. sefrou contains a large israelite colony, and after we had wandered through the steep streets, over gushing waterfalls spanned by "ass-backed" spanish bridges, and through a thatched _souk_ smelling strong of camels and the desert, the french commissioner (the only european in sefrou) suggested that it might interest us to visit the _mellah_. it was our first sight of a typical jewish quarter in africa. the _mellah_ of fez was almost entirely destroyed during the massacres of (which incidentally included a _pogrom_), and its distinctive character, happily for the inhabitants, has disappeared in the rebuilding. north african jews are still compelled to live in ghettos, into which they are locked at night, as in france and germany in the middle ages; and until lately the men have been compelled to go unarmed, to wear black gabardines and black slippers, to take off their shoes when they passed near a mosque or a saint's tomb, and in various other ways to manifest their subjection to the ruling race. nowhere else do they live in conditions of such demoralizing promiscuity as in some of the cities of morocco. they have so long been subject to unrestricted extortion on the part of the moslems that even the wealthy jews (who are numerous) have sunk to the habits and appearance of the poorest; and sefrou, which has come so recently under french control, offers a good specimen of a _mellah_ before foreign sanitation has lighted up its dark places. dark indeed they were. after wandering through narrow and malodorous lanes, and slipping about in the offal of the _souks_, we were suddenly led under an arch over which should have been written "all light abandon--" and which made all we had seen before seem clean and bright and airy. the beneficent african sun dries up and purifies the immemorial filth of africa; where that sun enters there is none of the foulness of damp. but into the _mellah_ of sefrou it never comes, for the streets form a sort of subterranean rabbit-warren under the upper stories of a solid agglomeration of tall houses--a buried city lit even at midday by oil-lamps hanging in the goldsmiths' shops and under the archways of the black and reeking staircases. it was a jewish feast-day. the hebrew stalls in the _souks_ were closed, and the whole population of the _mellah_ thronged its tunnels in holiday dress. hurrying past us were young women with plump white faces and lovely eyes, turbaned in brilliant gauzes, with draperies of dirty curtain muslin over tawdry brocaded caftans. their paler children swarmed about them, little long-earringed girls like wax dolls dressed in scraps of old finery, little boys in tattered caftans with long-lashed eyes and wily smiles; and, waddling in the rear, their unwieldy grandmothers, huge lumps of tallowy flesh who were probably still in the thirties. with them were the men of the family, in black gabardines and skull-caps: sallow striplings, incalculably aged ancestors, round-bellied husbands and fathers bumping along like black balloons; all hastening to the low doorways dressed with lamps and paper garlands behind which the feast was spread. one is told that in cities like fez and marrakech the hebrew quarter conceals flowery patios and gilded rooms with the heavy european furniture that rich jews delight in. perhaps even in the _mellah_ of sefrou, among the ragged figures shuffling past us, there were some few with bags of gold in their walls and rich stuffs hid away in painted coffers; but for patios and flowers and daylight there seemed no room in the dark _bolgia_ they inhabit. no wonder the babies of the moroccan ghettos are nursed on date-brandy, and their elders doze away to death under its consoling spell. vi the last glimpse it is well to bid good-by to fez at night--a moonlight night for choice. then, after dining at the arab inn of fez eldjid--where it might be inconvenient to lodge, but where it is extremely pleasant to eat _kouskous_ under a grape-trellis in a tiled and fountained patio--this pleasure over, one may set out on foot and stray down the lanes toward fez elbali. not long ago the gates between the different quarters of the city used to be locked every night at nine o'clock, and the merchant who went out to dine in another part of the town had to lodge with his host. now this custom has been given up, and one may roam about untroubled through the old quarters, grown as silent as the grave after the intense life of the bazaars has ceased at nightfall. nobody is in the streets: wandering from ghostly passage to passage, one hears no step but that of the watchman with staff and lantern. presently there appears, far off, a light like a low-flying firefly; as it comes nearer, it is seen to proceed from the _mellah_ lamp of open-work brass that a servant carries ahead of two merchants on their way home from elbali. the merchants are grave men: they move softly and slowly on their fat slippered feet, pausing from time to time in confidential talk. at last they stop before a house wall with a low blue door barred by heavy hasps of iron. the servant lifts the lamp and knocks. there is a long delay; then, with infinite caution, the door is opened a few inches, and another lifted light shines faintly on lustrous tiled walls, and on the face of a woman slave who quickly veils herself. evidently the master is a man of standing, and the house well guarded. the two merchants touch each other on the right shoulder, one of them passes in, and his friend goes on through the moonlight, his servant's lantern dancing ahead. but here we are in an open space looking down one of the descents to el attarine. a misty radiance washes the tall houses, the garden-walls, the archways; even the moonlight does not whiten fez, but only turns its gray to tarnished silver. overhead in a tower window a single light twinkles: women's voices rise and fall on the roofs. in a rich man's doorway slaves are sleeping, huddled on the tiles. a cock crows from somebody's dunghill; a skeleton dog prowls by for garbage. everywhere is the loud rush or the low crooning of water, and over every wall comes the scent of jasmine and rose. far off, from the red purgatory between the walls, sounds the savage thrum-thrum of a negro orgy; here all is peace and perfume. a minaret springs up between the roof like a palm, and from its balcony the little white figure bends over and drops a blessing on all the loveliness and all the squalor. footnotes: [ ] the ghetto in african towns. all the jewellers in morocco are jews. [ ] learned man, doctor of the university. [ ] the sultan's government. [ ] moslem monastery. [ ] niche in the sanctuary of mosques. [ ] movable pulpit. [ ] in _france-maroc_, _no._ . [ ] so called because of the indigo dye of their tunics, which leaves a permanent stain on their bodies. iv marrakech i the way there there are countless arab tales of evil djinns who take the form of sandstorms and hot winds to overwhelm exhausted travellers. in spite of the new french road between rabat and marrakech the memory of such tales rises up insistently from every mile of the level red earth and the desolate stony stretches of the _bled_. as long as the road runs in sight of the atlantic breakers they give the scene freshness and life; but when it bends inland and stretches away across the wilderness the sense of the immensity and immobility of africa descends on one with an intolerable oppression. the road traverses no villages, and not even a ring of nomad tents is visible in the distance on the wide stretches of arable land. at infrequent intervals our motor passed a train of laden mules, or a group of peasants about a well, and sometimes, far off, a fortified farm profiled its thick-set angle-towers against the sky, or a white _koubba_ floated like a mirage above the brush; but these rare signs of life intensified the solitude of the long miles between. at midday we were refreshed by the sight of the little oasis around the military-post of settat. we lunched there with the commanding officer, in a cool arab house about a flowery patio; but that brief interval over, the fiery plain began again. after settat the road runs on for miles across the waste to the gorge of the oued ouem; and beyond the river it climbs to another plain so desperate in its calcined aridity that the prickly scrub of the wilderness we had left seemed like the vegetation of an oasis. for fifty kilometres the earth under our wheels was made up of a kind of glistening red slag covered with pebbles and stones. not the scantest and toughest of rock-growths thrust a leaf through its brassy surface; not a well-head or a darker depression of the rock gave sign of a trickle of water. everything around us glittered with the same unmerciful dryness. a long way ahead loomed the line of the djebilets, the djinn-haunted mountains guarding marrakech on the north. when at last we reached them the wicked glister of their purple flanks seemed like a volcanic upheaval of the plain. for some time we had watched the clouds gathering over them, and as we got to the top of the defile rain was falling from a fringe of thunder to the south. then the vapours lifted, and we saw below us another red plain with an island of palms in its centre. mysteriously, from the heart of the palms, a tower shot up, as if alone in the wilderness; behind it stood the sun-streaked cliffs of the atlas, with snow summits appearing and vanishing through the storm. as we drove downward the rock gradually began to turn to red earth fissured by yellow streams, and stray knots of palms sprang up, lean and dishevelled, about well-heads where people were watering camels and donkeys. to the east, dominating the oasis, the twin peaked hills of the ghilis, fortified to the crest, mounted guard over invisible marrakech; but still, above the palms, we saw only that lonely and triumphant tower. presently we crossed the oued tensif on an old bridge built by moroccan engineers. beyond the river were more palms, then olive-orchards, then the vague sketch of the new european settlement, with a few shops and cafés on avenues ending suddenly in clay pits, and at last marrakech itself appeared to us, in the form of a red wall across a red wilderness. we passed through a gate and were confronted by other ramparts. then we entered an outskirt of dusty red lanes bordered by clay hovels with draped figures slinking by like ghosts. after that more walls, more gates, more endlessly winding lanes, more gates again, more turns, a dusty open space with donkeys and camels and negroes; a final wall with a great door under a lofty arch--and suddenly we were in the palace of the bahia, among flowers and shadows and falling water. ii the bahia whoever would understand marrakech must begin by mounting at sunset to the roof of the bahia. outspread below lies the oasis-city of the south, flat and vast as the great nomad camp it really is, its low roofs extending on all sides to a belt of blue palms ringed with desert. only two or three minarets and a few noblemen's houses among gardens break the general flatness; but they are hardly noticeable, so irresistibly is the eye drawn toward two dominant objects--the white wall of the atlas and the red tower of the koutoubya. foursquare, untapering, the great tower lifts its flanks of ruddy stone. its large spaces of unornamented wall, its triple tier of clustered openings, lightening as they rise from the severe rectangular lights of the first stage to the graceful arcade below the parapet, have the stern harmony of the noblest architecture. the koutoubya would be magnificent anywhere; in this flat desert it is grand enough to face the atlas. the almohad conquerors who built the koutoubya and embellished marrakech dreamed a dream of beauty that extended from the guadalquivir to the sahara; and at its two extremes they placed their watch-towers. the giralda watched over civilized enemies in a land of ancient roman culture; the koutoubya stood at the edge of the world, facing the hordes of the desert. the almoravid princes who founded marrakech came from the black desert of senegal; themselves were leaders of wild hordes. in the history of north africa the same cycle has perpetually repeated itself. generation after generation of chiefs have flowed in from the desert or the mountains, overthrown their predecessors, massacred, plundered, grown rich, built sudden palaces, encouraged their great servants to do the same; then fallen on them, and taken their wealth and their palaces. usually some religious fury, some ascetic wrath against the self-indulgence of the cities, has been the motive of these attacks; but invariably the same results followed, as they followed when the germanic barbarians descended on italy. the conquerors, infected with luxury and mad with power, built vaster palaces, planned grander cities; but sultans and viziers camped in their golden houses as if on the march, and the mud huts of the tribesmen within their walls were but one degree removed from the mud-walled tents of the _bled_. [illustration: _from a photograph from the service des beaux-arts au maroc_ marrakech--the "little garden" (with painted doors) in background, palace of the bahia] this was more especially the case with marrakech, a city of berbers and blacks, and the last outpost against the fierce black world beyond the atlas from which its founders came. when one looks at its site, and considers its history, one can only marvel at the height of civilization it attained. the bahia itself, now the palace of the resident general, though built less than a hundred years ago, is typical of the architectural megalomania of the great southern chiefs. it was built by ba-ahmed, the all-powerful black vizier of the sultan moulay-el-hassan.[ ] ba-ahmed was evidently an artist and an archæologist. his ambition was to re-create a palace of beauty such as the moors had built in the prime of arab art, and he brought to marrakech skilled artificers of fez, the last surviving masters of the mystery of chiselled plaster and ceramic mosaics and honeycombing of gilded cedar. they came, they built the bahia, and it remains the loveliest and most fantastic of moroccan palaces. court within court, garden beyond garden, reception halls, private apartments, slaves' quarters, sunny prophets' chambers on the roofs and baths in vaulted crypts, the labyrinth of passages and rooms stretches away over several acres of ground. a long court enclosed in pale-green trellis-work, where pigeons plume themselves about a great tank and the dripping tiles glitter with refracted sunlight, leads to the fresh gloom of a cypress garden, or under jasmine tunnels bordered with running water; and these again open on arcaded apartments faced with tiles and stucco-work, where, in a languid twilight, the hours drift by to the ceaseless music of the fountains. the beauty of moroccan palaces is made up of details of ornament and refinements of sensuous delight too numerous to record; but to get an idea of their general character it is worth while to cross the court of cypresses at the bahia and follow a series of low-studded passages that turn on themselves till they reach the centre of the labyrinth. here, passing by a low padlocked door leading to a crypt, and known as the "door of the vizier's treasure-house," one comes on a painted portal that opens into a still more secret sanctuary: the apartment of the grand vizier's favourite. [illustration: _from a photograph by felix, marrakech_ marrakech--the great court, palace of the bahia] this lovely prison, from which all sight and sound of the outer world are excluded, is built about an atrium paved with disks of turquoise and black and white. water trickles from a central _vasca_ of alabaster into a hexagonal mosaic channel in the pavement. the walls, which are at least twenty-five feet high, are roofed with painted beams resting on panels of traceried stucco in which is set a clerestory of jewelled glass. on each side of the atrium are long recessed rooms closed by vermilion doors painted with gold arabesques and vases of spring flowers; and into these shadowy inner rooms, spread with rugs and divans and soft pillows, no light comes except when their doors are opened into the atrium. in this fabulous place it was my good luck to be lodged while i was at marrakech. in a climate where, after the winter snow has melted from the atlas, every breath of air for long months is a flame of fire, these enclosed rooms in the middle of the palaces are the only places of refuge from the heat. even in october the temperature of the favourite's apartment was deliciously reviving after a morning in the bazaars or the dusty streets, and i never came back to its wet tiles and perpetual twilight without the sense of plunging into a deep sea-pool. from far off, through circuitous corridors, came the scent of citron-blossom and jasmine, with sometimes a bird's song before dawn, sometimes a flute's wail at sunset, and always the call of the muezzin in the night; but no sunlight reached the apartment except in remote rays through the clerestory, and no air except through one or two broken panes. sometimes, lying on my divan, and looking out through the vermilion doors, i used to surprise a pair of swallows dropping down from their nest in the cedar-beams to preen themselves on the fountain's edge or in the channels of the pavement; for the roof was full of birds who came and went through the broken panes of the clerestory. usually they were my only visitors; but one morning just at daylight i was waked by a soft tramp of bare feet, and saw, silhouetted against the cream-coloured walls, a procession of eight tall negroes in linen tunics, who filed noiselessly across the atrium like a moving frieze of bronze. in that fantastic setting, and the hush of that twilight hour, the vision was so like the picture of a "seraglio tragedy," some fragment of a delacroix or decamps floating up into the drowsy brain, that i almost fancied i had seen the ghosts of ba-ahmed's executioners revisiting with dagger and bowstring the scene of an unavenged crime. [illustration: _from a photograph taken by mme. la marquis de segonzac_ marrakech--apartment of the grand vizier's favorite, palace of the bahia] a cock crew, and they vanished ... and when i made the mistake of asking what they had been doing in my room at that hour i was told (as though it were the most natural thing in the world) that they were the municipal lamp-lighters of marrakech, whose duty it is to refill every morning the two hundred acetylene lamps lighting the palace of the resident general. such unforeseen aspects, in this mysterious city, do the most ordinary domestic functions wear. iii the bazaars passing out of the enchanted circle of the bahia it is startling to plunge into the native life about its gates. marrakech is the great market of the south; and the south means not only the atlas with its feudal chiefs and their wild clansmen, but all that lies beyond of heat and savagery: the sahara of the veiled touaregs, dakka, timbuctoo, senegal and the soudan. here come the camel caravans from demnat and tameslout, from the moulouya and the souss, and those from the atlantic ports and the confines of algeria. the population of this old city of the southern march has always been even more mixed than that of the northerly moroccan towns. it is made up of the descendants of all the peoples conquered by a long line of sultans who brought their trains of captives across the sea from moorish spain and across the sahara from timbuctoo. even in the highly cultivated region on the lower slopes of the atlas there are groups of varied ethnic origin, the descendants of tribes transplanted by long-gone rulers and still preserving many of their original characteristics. in the bazaars all these peoples meet and mingle: cattle-dealers, olive-growers, peasants from the atlas, the souss and the draa, blue men of the sahara, blacks from senegal and the soudan, coming in to trade with the wool-merchants, tanners, leather-merchants, silk-weavers, armourers, and makers of agricultural implements. dark, fierce and fanatical are these narrow _souks_ of marrakech. they are mere mud lanes roofed with rushes, as in south tunisia and timbuctoo, and the crowds swarming in them are so dense that it is hardly possible, at certain hours, to approach the tiny raised kennels where the merchants sit like idols among their wares. one feels at once that something more than the thought of bargaining--dear as this is to the african heart--animates these incessantly moving throngs. the souks of marrakech seem, more than any others, the central organ of a native life that extends far beyond the city walls into secret clefts of the mountains and far-off oases where plots are hatched and holy wars fomented--farther still, to yellow deserts whence negroes are secretly brought across the atlas to that inmost recess of the bazaar where the ancient traffic in flesh and blood still surreptitiously goes on. all these many threads of the native life, woven of greed and lust, of fetichism and fear and blind hate of the stranger, form, in the _souks_, a thick network in which at times one's feet seem literally to stumble. fanatics in sheepskins glowering from the guarded thresholds of the mosques, fierce tribesmen with inlaid arms in their belts and the fighters' tufts of wiry hair escaping from camel's-hair turbans, mad negroes standing stark naked in niches of the walls and pouring down soudanese incantations upon the fascinated crowd, consumptive jews with pathos and cunning in their large eyes and smiling lips, lusty slave-girls with earthen oil-jars resting against swaying hips, almond-eyed boys leading fat merchants by the hand, and bare-legged berber women, tattooed and insolently gay, trading their striped blankets, or bags of dried roses and irises, for sugar, tea or manchester cottons--from all these hundreds of unknown and unknowable people, bound together by secret affinities, or intriguing against each other with secret hate, there emanates an atmosphere of mystery and menace more stifling than the smell of camels and spices and black bodies and smoking fry which hangs like a fog under the close roofing of the _souks_. and suddenly one leaves the crowd and the turbid air for one of those quiet corners that are like the back-waters of the bazaars: a small square where a vine stretches across a shop-front and hangs ripe clusters of grapes through the reeds. in the patterning of grape-shadows a very old donkey, tethered to a stone-post, dozes under a pack-saddle that is never taken off; and near by, in a matted niche, sits a very old man in white. this is the chief of the guild of "morocco" workers of marrakech, the most accomplished craftsman in morocco in the preparing and using of the skins to which the city gives its name. of these sleek moroccos, cream-white or dyed with cochineal or pomegranate skins, are made the rich bags of the chleuh dancing-boys, the embroidered slippers for the harem, the belts and harnesses that figure so largely in moroccan trade--and of the finest, in old days, were made the pomegranate-red morocco bindings of european bibliophiles. from this peaceful corner one passes into the barbaric splendor of a _souk_ hung with innumerable plumy bunches of floss silk--skeins of citron yellow, crimson, grasshopper green and pure purple. this is the silk-spinners' quarter, and next to it comes that of the dyers, with great seething vats into which the raw silk is plunged, and ropes overhead where the rainbow masses are hung out to dry. another turn leads into the street of the metalworkers and armourers, where the sunlight through the thatch flames on round flanks of beaten copper or picks out the silver bosses of ornate powder-flasks and pistols; and near by is the _souk_ of the plough-shares, crowded with peasants in rough chleuh cloaks who are waiting to have their archaic ploughs repaired, and that of the smiths, in an outer lane of mud huts where negroes squat in the dust and sinewy naked figures in tattered loincloths bend over blazing coals. and here ends the maze of the bazaars. iv the agdal one of the almohad sultans who, during their hundred years of empire, scattered such great monuments from seville to the atlas, felt the need of coolness about his southern capital, and laid out the olive-yards of the agdal. to the south of marrakech the agdal extends for many acres between the outer walls of the city and the edge of the palm-oasis--a continuous belt of silver foliage traversed by deep red lanes, and enclosing a wide-spreading summer palace and two immense reservoirs walled with masonry; and the vision of these serene sheets of water, in which the olives and palms are motionlessly reflected, is one of the most poetic impressions in that city of inveterate poetry. on the edge of one of the reservoirs a sentimental sultan built in the last century a little pleasure-house called the menara. it is composed of a few rooms with a two-storied loggia looking across the water to the palm-groves, and surrounded by a garden of cypresses and orange-trees. the menara, long since abandoned, is usually uninhabited; but on the day when we drove through the agdal we noticed, at the gate, a group of well-dressed servants holding mules with embroidered saddle-clothes. the french officer who was with us asked the porter what was going on, and he replied that the chief of the guild of wool-merchants had hired the pavilion for a week and invited a few friends to visit him. they were now, the porter added, taking tea in the loggia above the lake; and the host, being informed of our presence, begged that we should do him and his friends the honour of visiting the pavilion. in reply to this amiable invitation we crossed an empty saloon surrounded with divans and passed out onto the loggia where the wool-merchant and his guests were seated. they were evidently persons of consequence: large bulky men wrapped in fresh muslins and reclining side by side on muslin-covered divans and cushions. black slaves had placed before them brass trays with pots of mint-tea, glasses in filigree stands, and dishes of gazelles' horns and sugar-plums; and they sat serenely absorbing these refreshments and gazing with large calm eyes upon the motionless water and the reflected trees. so, we were told, they would probably spend the greater part of their holiday. the merchant's cooks had taken possession of the kitchens, and toward sunset a sumptuous repast of many courses would be carried into the saloon on covered trays, and the guests would squat about it on rugs of rabat, tearing with their fingers the tender chicken wings and small artichokes cooked in oil, plunging their fat white hands to the wrist into huge mounds of saffron and rice, and washing off the traces of each course in the brass basin of perfumed water carried about by a young black slave-girl with hoop-earrings and a green-and-gold scarf about her hips. then the singing-girls would come out from marrakech, squat round-faced young women heavily hennaed and bejewelled, accompanied by gaunt musicians in bright caftans; and for hours they would sing sentimental or obscene ballads to the persistent maddening twang of violin and flute and drum. meanwhile fiery brandy or sweet champagne would probably be passed around between the steaming glasses of mint-tea which the slaves perpetually refilled; or perhaps the sultry air, the heavy meal, the scent of the garden and the vertiginous repetition of the music would suffice to plunge these sedentary worthies into the delicious coma in which every festive evening in morocco ends. the next day would be spent in the same manner, except that probably the chleuh boys with sidelong eyes and clean caftans would come instead of the singing-girls, and weave the arabesque of their dance in place of the runic pattern of the singing. but the result would always be the same: a prolonged state of obese ecstasy culminating in the collapse of huge heaps of snoring muslin on the divans against the wall. finally at the week's end the wool-merchant and his friends would all ride back with dignity to the bazaar. v on the roofs "should you like to see the chleuh boys dance?" some one asked. "there they are," another of our companions added, pointing to a dense ring of spectators on one side of the immense dusty square at the entrance of the _souks_--the "square of the dead" as it is called, in memory of the executions that used to take place under one of its grim red gates. it is the square of the living now, the centre of all the life, amusement and gossip of marrakech, and the spectators are so thickly packed about the story-tellers, snake-charmers and dancers who frequent it that one can guess what is going on within each circle only by the wailing monologue or the persistent drum-beat that proceeds from it. ah, yes--we should indeed like to see the chleuh boys dance; we who, since we had been in morocco, had seen no dancing, heard no singing, caught no single glimpse of merry-making! but how were we to get within sight of them? on one side of the "square of the dead" stands a large house, of european build, but modelled on oriental lines: the office of the french municipal administration. the french government no longer allows its offices to be built within the walls of moroccan towns, and this house goes back to the epic days of the caïd sir harry maclean, to whom it was presented by the fantastic abd-el-aziz when the caïd was his favourite companion as well as his military adviser. at the suggestion of the municipal officials we mounted the stairs and looked down on the packed square. there can be no more oriental sight this side of the atlas and the sahara. the square is surrounded by low mud-houses, fondaks, cafés, and the like. in one corner, near the archway leading into the _souks_, is the fruit-market, where the red-gold branches of unripe dates[ ] for animal fodder are piled up in great stacks, and dozens of donkeys are coming and going, their panniers laden with fruits and vegetables which are being heaped on the ground in gorgeous pyramids: purple egg-plants, melons, cucumbers, bright orange pumpkins, mauve and pink and violet onions, rusty crimson pomegranates and the gold grapes of sefrou and salé, all mingled with fresh green sheaves of mint and wormwood. [illustration: _from a photograph from "france-maroc"_ marrakech--a fondak] in the middle of the square sit the story-tellers' turbaned audiences. beyond these are the humbler crowds about the wild-ringleted snake-charmers with their epileptic gestures and hissing incantations, and farther off, in the densest circle of all, we could just discern the shaved heads and waving surpliced arms of the dancing-boys. under an archway near by an important personage in white muslin, mounted on a handsome mule and surrounded by his attendants, sat with motionless face and narrowed eyes gravely following the movements of the dancers. suddenly, as we stood watching the extraordinary animation of the scene, a reddish light overspread it, and one of our companions exclaimed: "ah--a dust-storm!" in that very moment it was upon us: a red cloud rushing across the square out of nowhere, whirling the date-branches over the heads of the squatting throngs, tumbling down the stacks of fruits and vegetables, rooting up the canvas awnings over the lemonade-sellers' stalls and before the café doors, huddling the blinded donkeys under the walls of the fondak, and stripping to the hips the black slave-girls scudding home from the _souks_. such a blast would instantly have scattered any western crowd, but "the patient east" remained undisturbed, rounding its shoulders before the storm and continuing to follow attentively the motions of the dancers and the turns of the story-tellers. by and bye, however, the gale grew too furious, and the spectators were so involved in collapsing tents, eddying date-branches and stampeding mules that the square began to clear, save for the listeners about the most popular story-teller, who continued to sit on unmoved. and then, at the height of the storm, they too were abruptly scattered by the rush of a cavalcade across the square. first came a handsomely dressed man, carrying before him on his peaked saddle a tiny boy in a gold-embroidered orange caftan, in front of whom he held an open book; and behind them a train of white-draped men on showily harnessed mules, followed by musicians in bright dresses. it was only a circumcision procession on its way to the mosque; but the dust-enveloped rider in his rich dress, clutching the bewildered child to his breast, looked like some oriental prince trying to escape with his son from the fiery embraces of desert erl-maidens. as swiftly as it rose the storm subsided, leaving the fruit-market in ruins under a sky as clear and innocent as an infant's eye. the chleuh boys had vanished with the rest, like marionettes swept into a drawer by an impatient child; but presently, toward sunset, we were told that we were to see them after all, and our hosts led us up to the roof of the caïd's house. the city lay stretched before us like one immense terrace circumscribed by palms. the sky was pure blue, verging to turquoise green where the atlas floated above mist; and facing the celestial snows stood the koutoubya, red in the sunset. people were beginning to come out on the roofs: it was the hour of peace, of ablutions, of family life on the house-tops. groups of women in pale tints and floating veils spoke to each other from terrace to terrace, through the chatter of children and the guttural calls of bedizened negresses. and presently, on the roof adjoining ours, appeared the slim dancing-boys with white caftans and hennaed feet. the three swarthy musicians who accompanied them crossed their lean legs on the tiles and set up their throb-throb and thrum-thrum, and on a narrow strip of terrace the youths began their measured steps. it was a grave static dance, such as david may have performed before the ark; untouched by mirth or folly, as beseemed a dance in that sombre land, and borrowing its magic from its gravity. even when the pace quickened with the stress of the music the gestures still continued to be restrained and hieratic; only when, one by one, the performers detached themselves from the round and knelt before us for the _peseta_ it is customary to press on their foreheads, did one see, by the moisture which made the coin adhere, how quick and violent their movements had been. the performance, like all things oriental, like the life, the patterns, the stories, seemed to have no beginning and no end: it just went monotonously and indefatigably on till fate snipped its thread by calling us away to dinner. and so at last we went down into the dust of the streets refreshed by that vision of white youths dancing on the house-tops against the gold of a sunset that made them look--in spite of ankle-bracelets and painted eyes--almost as guileless and happy as the round of angels on the roof of fra angelico's nativity. vi the saadian tombs on one of the last days of our stay in marrakech we were told, almost mysteriously, that permission was to be given us to visit the tombs of the saadian sultans. though marrakech has been in the hands of the french since , the very existence of these tombs was unknown to the authorities till . then the sultan's government privately informed the resident general that an unsuspected treasure of moroccan art was falling into ruin, and after some hesitation it was agreed that general lyautey and the director of fine arts should be admitted to the mosque containing the tombs, on the express condition that the french government undertook to repair them. while we were at rabat general lyautey had described his visit to us, and it was at his request that the sultan authorized us to see the mosque, to which no travellers had as yet been admitted. with a good deal of ceremony, and after the customary _pourparlers_ with the great pasha who controls native affairs at marrakech, an hour was fixed for our visit, and we drove through long lanes of mud-huts to a lost quarter near the walls. at last we came to a deserted square on one side of which stands the long low mosque of mansourah with a turquoise-green minaret embroidered with traceries of sculptured terra cotta. opposite the mosque is a gate in a crumbling wall; and at this gate the pasha's cadi was to meet us with the keys of the mausoleum. but we waited in vain. oriental dilatoriness, or a last secret reluctance to admit unbelievers to a holy place, had caused the cadi to forget his appointment; and we drove away disappointed. the delay drove us to wondering about these mysterious saadian sultans, who, though coming so late in the annals of morocco, had left at least one monument said to be worthy of the merinid tradition. and the tale of the saadians is worth telling. they came from arabia to the draa (the fruitful country south of the great atlas) early in the fifteenth century, when the merinid empire was already near disintegration. like all previous invaders they preached the doctrine of a pure islamism to the polytheistic and indifferent berbers, and found a ready hearing because they denounced the evils of a divided empire, and also because the whole of morocco was in revolt against the christian colonies of spain and portugal, which had encircled the coast from ceuta to agadir with a chain of fortified counting-houses. to _bouter dehors_ the money-making unbeliever was an object that found adherents from the rif to the sahara, and the saadian cherifs soon rallied a mighty following to their standard. islam, though it never really gave a creed to the berbers, supplied them with a war-cry as potent to-day as when it first rang across barbary. the history of the saadians is a foreshortened record of that of all their predecessors. they overthrew the artistic and luxurious merinids, and in their turn became artistic and luxurious. their greatest sultan, abou-el-abbas, surnamed "the golden," after defeating the merinids and putting an end to christian rule in morocco by the crushing victory of el-ksar ( ), bethought him in his turn of enriching himself and beautifying his capital, and with this object in view turned his attention to the black kingdoms of the south. senegal and the soudan, which had been mohammedan since the eleventh century, had attained in the sixteenth century a high degree of commercial wealth and artistic civilization. the sultanate of timbuctoo seems in reality to have been a thriving empire, and if timbuctoo was not the claude-like vision of carthaginian palaces which it became in the tales of imaginative travellers, it apparently had something of the magnificence of fez and marrakech. the saadian army, after a march of four and a half months across the sahara, conquered the whole black south. senegal, the soudan and bornou submitted to abou-el-abbas, the sultan of timbuctoo was dethroned, and the celebrated negro jurist ahmed-baba was brought a prisoner to marrakech, where his chief sorrow appears to have been for the loss of his library of , volumes--though he declared that, of all the numerous members of his family, it was he who possessed the smallest number of books. besides this learned bibliophile, the sultan abou-el-abbas brought back with him an immense booty, principally of ingots of gold, from which he took his surname of "the golden"; and as the result of the expedition marrakech was embellished with mosques and palaces for which the sultan brought marble from carrara, paying for it with loaves of sugar from the sugar-cane that the saadians grew in the souss. in spite of these brilliant beginnings the rule of the dynasty was short and without subsequent interest. based on a fanatical antagonism against the foreigner, and fed by the ever-wakeful hatred of the moors for their spanish conquerors, it raised ever higher the chinese walls of exclusiveness which the more enlightened almohads and merinids had sought to overthrow. henceforward less and less daylight and fresh air were to penetrate into the _souks_ of morocco. the day after our unsuccessful attempt to see the tombs of these ephemeral rulers we received another message, naming an hour for our visit; and this time the pasha's representative was waiting in the archway. we followed his lead, under the openly mistrustful glances of the arabs who hung about the square, and after picking our way through a twisting land between walls we came out into a filthy nettle-grown space against the ramparts. at intervals of about thirty feet splendid square towers rose from the walls, and facing one of them lay a group of crumbling buildings masked behind other ruins. we were led first into a narrow mosque or praying-chapel, like those of the medersas, with a coffered cedar ceiling resting on four marble columns, and traceried walls of unusually beautiful design. from this chapel we passed into the hall of the tombs, a cube about forty feet square. fourteen columns of colored marble sustain a domed ceiling of gilded cedar, with an exterior deambulatory under a tunnel-vaulting also roofed with cedar. the walls are, as usual, of chiselled stucco, above revêtements of ceramic mosaic, and between the columns lie the white marble cenotaphs of the saadian sultans, covered with arabic inscriptions in the most delicate low-relief. beyond this central mausoleum, and balancing the praying-chapel, lies another long narrow chamber, gold-ceilinged also, and containing a few tombs. it is difficult, in describing the architecture of morocco, to avoid producing an impression of monotony. the ground-plan of mosques and medersas is always practically the same; and the same elements, few in number and endlessly repeated, make up the materials and the form of the ornament. the effect upon the eye is not monotonous, for a patient art has infinitely varied the combinations of pattern and the juxtapositions of color; while the depth of undercutting of the stucco, and the treatment of the bronze doors and of the carved cedar corbels, necessarily varies with the periods which produced them. but in the saadian mausoleum a new element has been introduced which makes this little monument a thing apart. the marble columns supporting the roof appear to be unique in moroccan architecture, and they lend themselves to a new roof-plan which relates the building rather to the tradition of venice or byzantine by way of kairouan and cordova. the late date of the monument precludes any idea of a direct artistic tradition. the most probable explanation seems to be that the architect of the mausoleum was familiar with european renaissance architecture, and saw the beauty to be derived from using precious marbles not merely as ornament, but in the roman and italian way, as a structural element. panels and fountain-basins are ornament, and ornament changes nothing essential in architecture; but when, for instance, heavy square piers are replaced by detached columns, a new style results. it is not only the novelty of its plan that makes the saadian mausoleum singular among moroccan monuments. the details of its ornament are of the most intricate refinement: it seems as though the last graces of the expiring merinid art had been gathered up into this rare blossom. and the slant of sunlight on lustrous columns, the depths of fretted gold, the dusky ivory of the walls and the pure white of the cenotaphs, so classic in spareness of ornament and simplicity of design--this subtle harmony of form and color gives to the dim rich chapel an air of dream-like unreality. [illustration: _from a photograph by m. andré chevrillon_ marrakech--mausoleum of the saadian sultans (sixteenth century) showing the tombs] and how can it seem other than a dream? who can have conceived, in the heart of a savage saharan camp, the serenity and balance of this hidden place? and how came such fragile loveliness to survive, preserving, behind a screen of tumbling walls, of nettles and offal and dead beasts, every curve of its traceries and every cell of its honeycombing? such questions inevitably bring one back to the central riddle of the mysterious north african civilization: the perpetual flux and the immovable stability, the barbarous customs and sensuous refinements, the absence of artistic originality and the gift for regrouping borrowed motives, the patient and exquisite workmanship and the immediate neglect and degradation of the thing once made. revering the dead and camping on their graves, elaborating exquisite monuments only to abandon and defile them, venerating scholarship and wisdom and living in ignorance and grossness, these gifted races, perpetually struggling to reach some higher level of culture from which they have always been swept down by a fresh wave of barbarism, are still only a people in the making. it may be that the political stability which france is helping them to acquire will at last give their higher qualities time for fruition; and when one looks at the mausoleum of marrakech and the medersas of fez one feels that, were the experiment made on artistic grounds alone, it would yet be well worth making. footnotes: [ ] moulay-el-hassan reigned from to . [ ] dates do not ripen in morocco. v harems and ceremonies i the crowd in the street to occidental travellers the most vivid impression produced by a first contact with the near east is the surprise of being in a country where the human element increases instead of diminishing the delight of the eye. after all, then, the intimate harmony between nature and architecture and the human body that is revealed in greek art was not an artist's counsel of perfection but an honest rendering of reality: there were, there still are, privileged scenes where the fall of a green-grocer's draperies or a milkman's cloak or a beggar's rags are part of the composition, distinctly related to it in line and colour, and where the natural unstudied attitudes of the human body are correspondingly harmonious, however hum-drum the acts it is engaged in. the discovery, to the traveller returning from the east, robs the most romantic scenes of western europe of half their charm: in the piazza of san marco, in the market-place of siena, where at least the robes of the procurators or the gay tights of pinturicchio's striplings once justified man's presence among his works, one can see, at first, only the outrage inflicted on beauty by the "plentiful strutting manikins" of the modern world. moroccan crowds are always a feast to the eye. the instinct of skilful drapery, the sense of colour (subdued by custom, but breaking out in subtle glimpses under the universal ashy tints) make the humblest assemblage of donkey-men and water-carriers an ever-renewed delight. but it is only on rare occasions, and in the court ceremonies to which so few foreigners have had access, that the hidden sumptuousness of the native life is revealed. even then, the term sumptuousness may seem ill-chosen, since the nomadic nature of african life persists in spite of palaces and chamberlains and all the elaborate ritual of the makhzen, and the most pompous rites are likely to end in a dusty gallop of wild tribesmen, and the most princely processions to tail off in a string of half-naked urchins riding bareback on donkeys. as in all oriental countries, the contact between prince and beggar, vizier and serf is disconcertingly free and familiar, and one must see the highest court officials kissing the hem of the sultan's robe, and hear authentic tales of slaves given by one merchant to another at the end of a convivial evening, to be reminded that nothing is as democratic in appearance as a society of which the whole structure hangs on the whim of one man. ii aÏd-el-kebir in the verandah of the residence of rabat i stood looking out between posts festooned with gentian-blue ipomeas at the first shimmer of light on black cypresses and white tobacco-flowers, on the scattered roofs of the new town, and the plain stretching away to the sultan's palace above the sea. we had been told, late the night before, that the sultan would allow madame lyautey, with the three ladies of her party, to be present at the great religious rite of the aïd-el-kebir (the sacrifice of the sheep). the honour was an unprecedented one, a favour probably conceded only at the last moment: for as a rule no women are admitted to these ceremonies. it was an opportunity not to be missed; and all through the short stifling night i had lain awake wondering if i should be ready early enough. presently the motors assembled, and we set out with the french officers in attendance on the governor's wife. the sultan's palace, a large modern building on the familiar arab lines, lies in a treeless and gardenless waste enclosed by high walls and close above the blue atlantic. we motored past the gates, where the sultan's black guard was drawn up, and out to the _msalla_,[ ] a sort of common adjacent to all the sultan's residences where public ceremonies are usually performed. the sun was already beating down on the great plain thronged with horsemen and with the native population of rabat on mule-back and foot. within an open space in the centre of the crowd a canvas palissade dyed with a bold black pattern surrounded the sultan's tents. the black guard, in scarlet tunics and white and green turbans, were drawn up on the edge of the open space, keeping the spectators at a distance; but under the guidance of our companions we penetrated to the edge of the crowd. the palissade was open on one side, and within it we could see moving about among the snowy-robed officials a group of men in straight narrow gowns of almond-green, peach-blossom, lilac and pink; they were the sultan's musicians, whose coloured dresses always flower out conspicuously among the white draperies of all the other court attendants. in the tent nearest the opening, against a background of embroidered hangings, a circle of majestic turbaned old men squatted placidly on rabat rugs. presently the circle broke up, there was an agitated coming and going, and some one said: "the sultan has gone to the tent at the back of the enclosure to kill the sheep." a sense of the impending solemnity ran through the crowd. the mysterious rumour which is the voice of the bazaar rose about us like the wind in a palm-oasis; the black guard fired a salute from an adjoining hillock; the clouds of red dust flung up by wheeling horsemen thickened and then parted, and a white-robed rider sprang out from the tent of the sacrifice with something red and dripping across his saddle-bow, and galloped away toward rabat through the shouting. a little shiver ran over the group of occidental spectators, who knew that the dripping red thing was a sheep with its throat so skilfully slit that, if the omen were favourable, it would live on through the long race to rabat and gasp out its agonized life on the tiles of the mosque. the sacrifice of the sheep, one of the four great moslem rites, is simply the annual propitiatory offering made by every mahometan head of a family, and by the sultan as such. it is based not on a koranic injunction, but on the "souna" or record of the prophet's "custom" or usages, which forms an authoritative precedent in moslem ritual. so far goes the moslem exegesis. in reality, of course, the moslem blood-sacrifice comes, by way of the semitic ritual, from far beyond and behind it; and the belief that the sultan's prosperity for the coming year depends on the animal's protracted agony seems to relate the ceremony to the dark magic so deeply rooted in the mysterious tribes peopling north africa long ages before the first phoenician prows had rounded its coast. between the black guard and the tents, five or six horses were being led up and down by muscular grooms in snowy tunics. they were handsome animals, as moroccan horses go, and each of a different colour; and on the bay horse was a red saddle embroidered in gold, on the piebald a saddle of peach-colour and silver, on the chestnut, grass-green encrusted with seed-pearls, on the white mare purple housings, and orange velvet on the grey. the sultan's band had struck up a shrill hammering and twanging, the salute of the black guard continued at intervals, and the caparisoned steeds began to rear and snort and drag back from the cruel arab bits with their exquisite _niello_ incrustations. some one whispered that these were his majesty's horses--and that it was never known till he appeared which one he would mount. presently the crowd about the tents thickened, and when it divided again there emerged from it a grey horse bearing a motionless figure swathed in blinding white. marching at the horse's bridle, lean brown grooms in white tunics rhythmically waved long strips of white linen to keep off the flies from the imperial presence; and beside the motionless rider, in a line with his horse's flank, rode the imperial parasol-bearer, who held above the sovereign's head a great sunshade of bright green velvet. slowly the grey horse advanced a few yards before the tent; behind rode the court dignitaries, followed by the musicians, who looked, in their bright scant caftans, like the slender music-making angels of a florentine fresco. the sultan, pausing beneath his velvet dome, waited to receive the homage of the assembled tribes. an official, riding forward, drew bridle and called out a name. instantly there came storming across the plain a wild cavalcade of tribesmen, with rifles slung across their shoulders, pistols and cutlasses in their belts, and twists of camel's-hair bound about their turbans. within a few feet of the sultan they drew in, their leader uttered a cry and sprang forward, bending to the saddle-bow, and with a great shout the tribe galloped by, each man bowed over his horse's neck as he flew past the hieratic figure on the grey horse. [illustration: _from a photograph from "france-maroc"_ the sultan of morocco under the green umbrella (at meknez, )] again and again this ceremony was repeated, the sultan advancing a few feet as each new group thundered toward him. there were more than ten thousand horsemen and chieftains from the atlas and the wilderness, and as the ceremony continued the dust-clouds grew denser and more fiery-golden, till at last the forward-surging lines showed through them like blurred images in a tarnished mirror. as the sultan advanced we followed, abreast of him and facing the oncoming squadrons. the contrast between his motionless figure and the wild waves of cavalry beating against it typified the strange soul of islam, with its impetuosity forever culminating in impassiveness. the sun hung high, a brazen ball in a white sky, darting down metallic shafts on the dust-enveloped plain and the serene white figure under its umbrella. the fat man with a soft round beard-fringed face, wrapped in spirals of pure white, one plump hand on his embroidered bridle, his yellow-slippered feet thrust heel-down in big velvet-lined stirrups, became, through sheer immobility, a symbol, a mystery, a god. the human flux beat against him, dissolved, ebbed away, another spear-crested wave swept up behind it and dissolved in turn; and he sat on, hour after hour, under the white-hot sky, unconscious of the heat, the dust, the tumult, embodying to the wild factious precipitate hordes a long tradition of serene aloofness. iii the imperial mirador as the last riders galloped up to do homage we were summoned to our motors and driven rapidly to the palace. the sultan had sent word to mme. lyautey that the ladies of the imperial harem would entertain her and her guests while his majesty received the resident general, and we had to hasten back in order not to miss the next act of the spectacle. [illustration: _from a photograph from "france-maroc"_ a clan of mountaineers and their caïd.] we walked across a long court lined with the black guard, passed under a gateway, and were met by a shabbily dressed negress. traversing a hot dazzle of polychrome tiles we reached another archway guarded by the chief eunuch, a towering black with the enamelled eyes of a basalt bust. the eunuch delivered us to other negresses, and we entered a labyrinth of inner passages and patios, all murmuring and dripping with water. passing down long corridors where slaves in dim greyish garments flattened themselves against the walls, we caught glimpses of great dark rooms, laundries, pantries, bakeries, kitchens, where savoury things were brewing and stewing, and where more negresses, abandoning their pots and pans, came to peep at us from the threshold. in one corner, on a bench against a wall hung with matting, grey parrots in tall cages were being fed by a slave. a narrow staircase mounted to a landing where a princess out of an arab fairy-tale awaited us. stepping softly on her embroidered slippers she led us to the next landing, where another golden-slippered being smiled out on us, a little girl this one, blushing and dimpling under a jewelled diadem and pearl-woven braids. on a third landing a third damsel appeared, and encircled by the three graces we mounted to the tall _mirador_ in the central tower from which we were to look down at the coming ceremony. one by one, our little guides, kicking off their golden shoes, which a slave laid neatly outside the door, led us on soft bare feet into the upper chamber of the harem. it was a large room, enclosed on all sides by a balcony glazed with panes of brightly-coloured glass. on a gaudy modern rabat carpet stood gilt armchairs of florid design and a table bearing a commercial bronze of the "art goods" variety. divans with muslin-covered cushions were ranged against the walls and down an adjoining gallery-like apartment which was otherwise furnished only with clocks. the passion for clocks and other mechanical contrivances is common to all unmechanical races, and every chief's palace in north africa contains a collection of time-pieces which might be called striking if so many had not ceased to go. but those in the sultan's harem of rabat are remarkable for the fact that, while designed on current european models, they are proportioned in size to the imperial dignity, so that a dutch "grandfather" becomes a wardrobe, and the box-clock of the european mantelpiece a cupboard that has to be set on the floor. at the end of this avenue of time-pieces a european double-bed with a bright silk quilt covered with nottingham lace stood majestically on a carpeted platform. but for the enchanting glimpses of sea and plain through the lattices of the gallery, the apartment of the sultan's ladies falls far short of occidental ideas of elegance. but there was hardly time to think of this, for the door of the _mirador_ was always opening to let in another fairy-tale figure, till at last we were surrounded by a dozen houris, laughing, babbling, taking us by the hand, and putting shy questions while they looked at us with caressing eyes. they were all (our interpretess whispered) the sultan's "favourites," round-faced apricot-tinted girls in their teens, with high cheek-bones, full red lips, surprised brown eyes between curved-up asiatic lids, and little brown hands fluttering out like birds from their brocaded sleeves. in honour of the ceremony, and of mme. lyautey's visit, they had put on their finest clothes, and their freedom of movement was somewhat hampered by their narrow sumptuous gowns, with over-draperies of gold and silver brocade and pale rosy gauze held in by corset-like sashes of gold tissue of fez, and the heavy silken cords that looped their voluminous sleeves. above their foreheads the hair was shaven like that of an italian fourteenth-century beauty, and only a black line as narrow as a pencilled eyebrow showed through the twist of gauze fastened by a jewelled clasp above the real eye-brows. over the forehead-jewel rose the complicated structure of the head-dress. ropes of black wool were plaited through the hair, forming, at the back, a double loop that stood out above the nape like the twin handles of a vase, the upper veiled in airy shot gauzes and fastened with jewelled bands and ornaments. on each side of the red cheeks other braids were looped over the ears hung with broad earrings of filigree set with rough pearls and emeralds, or gold hoops and pendants of coral; and an unexpected tulle ruff, like that of a watteau shepherdess, framed the round chin above a torrent of necklaces, necklaces of amber, coral, baroque pearls, hung with mysterious barbaric amulets and fetiches. as the young things moved about us on soft hennaed feet the light played on shifting gleams of gold and silver, blue and violet and apple-green, all harmonized and bemisted by clouds of pink and sky-blue; and through the changing group capered a little black picaninny in a caftan of silver-shot purple with a sash of raspberry red. but presently there was a flutter in the aviary. a fresh pair of _babouches_ clicked on the landing, and a young girl, less brilliantly dressed and less brilliant of face than the others, came in on bare painted feet. her movements were shy and hesitating, her large lips pale, her eye-brows less vividly dark, her head less jewelled. but all the little humming-birds gathered about her with respectful rustlings as she advanced toward us leaning on one of the young girls, and holding out her ringed hand to mme. lyautey's curtsey. it was the young princess, the sultan's legitimate daughter. she examined us with sad eyes, spoke a few compliments through the interpretess, and seated herself in silence, letting the others sparkle and chatter. conversation with the shy princess was flagging when one of the favourites beckoned us to the balcony. we were told we might push open the painted panes a few inches, but as we did so the butterfly group drew back lest they should be seen looking out on the forbidden world. salutes were crashing out again from the direction of the _msalla_: puffs of smoke floated over the slopes like thistle-down. farther off, a pall of red vapour veiled the gallop of the last horsemen wheeling away toward rabat. the vapour subsided, and moving out of it we discerned a slow procession. first rode a detachment of the black guard, mounted on black horses, and, comically fierce in their british scarlet and meccan green, a uniform invented at the beginning of the nineteenth century by a retired english army officer. after the guard came the standard-bearers and the great dignitaries, then the sultan, still aloof, immovable, as if rapt in the contemplation of his mystic office. more court officials followed, then the bright-gowned musicians on foot, then a confused irrepressible crowd of pilgrims, beggars, saints, mountebanks, and the other small folk of the bazaar, ending in a line of boys jamming their naked heels into the ribs of world-weary donkeys. [illustration: _from a photograph from "france-maroc"_ the sultan entering marrakech in state] the sultan rode into the court below us, and vizier and chamberlains, snowy-white against the scarlet line of the guards, hurried forward to kiss his draperies, his shoes, his stirrup. descending from his velvet saddle, still entranced, he paced across the tiles between a double line of white servitors bowing to the ground. white pigeons circled over him like petals loosed from a great orchard, and he disappeared with his retinue under the shadowy arcade of the audience chamber at the back of the court. at this point one of the favourites called us in from the _mirador_. the door had just opened to admit an elderly woman preceded by a respectful group of girls. from the newcomer's round ruddy face, her short round body, the round hands emerging from her round wrists, an inexplicable majesty emanated; and though she too was less richly arrayed than the favourites she carried her head-dress of striped gauze like a crown. this impressive old lady was the sultan's mother. as she held out her plump wrinkled hand to mme. lyautey and spoke a few words through the interpretess one felt that at last a painted window of the _mirador_ had been broken, and a thought let into the vacuum of the harem. what thought, it would have taken deep insight into the processes of the arab mind to discover; but its honesty was manifest in the old empress's voice and smile. here at last was a woman beyond the trivial dissimulations, the childish cunning, the idle cruelties of the harem. it was not a surprise to be told that she was her son's most trusted adviser, and the chief authority in the palace. if such a woman deceived and intrigued it would be for great purposes and for ends she believed in: the depth of her soul had air and daylight in it, and she would never willingly shut them out. the empress mother chatted for a while with mme. lyautey, asking about the resident general's health, enquiring for news of the war, and saying, with an emotion perceptible even through the unintelligible words: "all is well with morocco as long as all is well with france." then she withdrew, and we were summoned again to the _mirador_. this time it was to see a company of officers in brilliant uniforms advancing at a trot across the plain from rabat. at sight of the figure that headed them, so slim, erect and young on his splendid chestnut, with a pale blue tunic barred by the wide orange ribbon of the cherifian order, salutes pealed forth again from the slope above the palace and the black guard presented arms. a moment later general lyautey and his staff were riding in at the gates below us. on the threshold of the inner court they dismounted, and moving to the other side of our balcony we followed the next stage of the ceremony. the sultan was still seated in the audience chamber. the court officials still stood drawn up in a snow-white line against the snow-white walls. the great dignitaries advanced across the tiles to greet the general; then they fell aside, and he went forward alone, followed at a little distance by his staff. a third of the way across the court he paused, in accordance with the moroccan court ceremonial, and bowed in the direction of the arcaded room; a few steps farther he bowed again, and a third time on the threshold of the room. then french uniforms and moroccan draperies closed in about him, and all vanished into the shadows of the audience hall. our audience too seemed to be over. we had exhausted the limited small talk of the harem, had learned from the young beauties that, though they were forbidden to look on at the ceremony, the dancers and singers would come to entertain them presently, and had begun to take leave when a negress hurried in to say that his majesty begged mme. lyautey and her friends to await his arrival. this was the crowning incident of our visit, and i wondered with what byzantine ritual the anointed one fresh from the exercise of his priestly functions would be received among his women. the door opened, and without any announcement or other preliminary flourish a fat man with a pleasant face, his djellabah stretched over a portly front, walked in holding a little boy by the hand. such was his majesty the sultan moulay youssef, despoiled of sacramental burnouses and turban, and shuffling along on bare yellow-slippered feet with the gait of a stout elderly gentleman who has taken off his boots in the passage preparatory to a domestic evening. the little prince, one of his two legitimate sons, was dressed with equal simplicity, for silken garments are worn in morocco only by musicians, boy-dancers and other hermaphrodite fry. with his ceremonial raiment the sultan had put off his air of superhuman majesty, and the expression of his round pale face corresponded with the plainness of his dress. the favourites fluttered about him, respectful but by no means awestruck, and the youngest began to play with the little prince. we could well believe the report that his was the happiest harem in morocco, as well as the only one into which a breath of the outer world ever came. moulay youssef greeted mme. lyautey with friendly simplicity, made the proper speeches to her companions, and then, with the air of the business-man who has forgotten to give an order before leaving his office, he walked up to a corner of the room, and while the flower-maidens ruffled about him, and through the windows we saw the last participants in the mystic rites galloping away toward the crenellated walls of rabat, his majesty the priest and emperor of the faithful unhooked a small instrument from the wall and applied his sacred lips to the telephone. iv in old rabat before general lyautey came to morocco rabat had been subjected to the indignity of european "improvements," and one must traverse boulevards scored with tram-lines, and pass between hotel-terraces and cafés and cinema-palaces, to reach the surviving nucleus of the once beautiful native town. then, at the turn of a commonplace street, one comes upon it suddenly. the shops and cafés cease, the jingle of trams and the trumpeting of motor-horns die out, and here, all at once, are silence and solitude, and the dignified reticence of the windowless arab house-fronts. we were bound for the house of a high government official, a moroccan dignitary of the old school, who had invited us to tea, and added a message to the effect that the ladies of his household would be happy to receive me. the house we sought was some distance down the quietest of white-walled streets. our companion knocked at a low green door, and we were admitted to a passage into which a wooden stairway descended. a brother-in-law of our host was waiting for us: in his wake we mounted the ladder-like stairs and entered a long room with a florid french carpet and a set of gilt furniture to match. there were no fretted walls, no painted cedar doors, no fountains rustling in unseen courts: the house was squeezed in between others, and such traces of old ornament as it may have possessed had vanished. but presently we saw why its inhabitants were indifferent to such details. our host, a handsome white-bearded old man, welcomed us in the doorway; then he led us to a raised oriel window at one end of the room, and seated us in the gilt armchairs face to face with one of the most beautiful views in morocco. below us lay the white and blue terrace-roofs of the native town, with palms and minarets shooting up between them, or the shadows of a vine-trellis patterning a quiet lane. beyond, the atlantic sparkled, breaking into foam at the mouth of the bou-regreg and under the towering ramparts of the kasbah of the oudayas. to the right, the ruins of the great mosque rose from their plateau over the river; and, on the farther side of the troubled flood, old salé, white and wicked, lay like a jewel in its gardens. with such a scene beneath their eyes, the inhabitants of the house could hardly feel its lack of architectural interest. after exchanging the usual compliments, and giving us time to enjoy the view, our host withdrew, taking with him the men of our party. a moment later he reappeared with a rosy fair-haired girl, dressed in arab costume, but evidently of european birth. the brother-in-law explained that this young woman, who had "studied in algeria," and whose mother was french, was the intimate friend of the ladies of the household, and would act as interpreter. our host then again left us, joining the men visitors in another room, and the door opened to admit his wife and daughters-in-law. the mistress of the house was a handsome algerian with sad expressive eyes: the younger women were pale, fat and amiable. they all wore sober dresses, in keeping with the simplicity of the house, and but for the vacuity of their faces the group might have been that of a professor's family in an english or american university town, decently costumed for an arabian nights' pageant in the college grounds. i was never more vividly reminded of the fact that human nature, from one pole to the other, falls naturally into certain categories, and that respectability wears the same face in an oriental harem as in england or america. my hostesses received me with the utmost amiability, we seated ourselves in the oriel facing the view, and the interchange of questions and compliments began. had i any children? (they asked it all at once.) alas, no. "in islam" (one of the ladies ventured) "a woman without children is considered the most unhappy being in the world." i replied that in the western world also childless women were pitied. (the brother-in-law smiled incredulously.) knowing that european fashions are of absorbing interest to the harem i next enquired: "what do these ladies think of our stiff tailor-dresses? don't they find them excessively ugly?" "yes, they do;" (it was again the brother-in-law who replied.) "but they suppose that in your own homes you dress less badly." "and have they never any desire to travel, or to visit the bazaars, as the turkish ladies do?" "no, indeed. they are too busy to give such matters a thought. in _our country_ women of the highest class occupy themselves with their household and their children, and the rest of their time is devoted to needlework." (at this statement i gave the brother-in-law a smile as incredulous as his own.) all this time the fair-haired interpretess had not been allowed by the vigilant guardian of the harem to utter a word. i turned to her with a question. "so your mother is french, _mademoiselle_?" "_oui, madame._" "from what part of france did she come?" a bewildered pause. finally: "i don't know ... from switzerland, i think," brought out this shining example of the higher education. in spite of algerian "advantages" the poor girl could speak only a few words of her mother's tongue. she had kept the european features and complexion, but her soul was the soul of islam. the harem had placed its powerful imprint upon her, and she looked at me with the same remote and passive eyes as the daughters of the house. after struggling for a while longer with a conversation which the watchful brother-in-law continued to direct as he pleased. i felt my own lips stiffening into the resigned smile of the harem, and it was a relief when at last their guardian drove the pale flock away, and the handsome old gentleman who owned them reappeared on the scene, bringing back my friends, and followed by slaves and tea. v in fez what thoughts, what speculations, one wonders, go on under the narrow veiled brows of the little creatures destined to the high honour of marriage or concubinage in moroccan palaces? some are brought down from mountains and cedar forests, from the free life of the tents where the nomad women go unveiled. others come from harems in the turreted cities beyond the atlas, where blue palm-groves beat all night against the stars and date-caravans journey across the desert from timbuctoo. some, born and bred in an airy palace among pomegranate gardens and white terraces, pass thence to one of the feudal fortresses near the snows, where for half the year the great chiefs of the south live in their clan, among fighting men and falconers and packs of _sloughis_. and still others grow up in a stifling mellah, trip unveiled on its blue terraces overlooking the gardens of the great, and, seen one day at sunset by a fat vizier or his pale young master, are acquired for a handsome sum and transferred to the painted sepulchre of the harem. worst of all must be the fate of those who go from tents and cedar forests, or from some sea-blown garden above rabat, into one of the houses of old fez. they are well-nigh impenetrable, these palaces of elbali: the fazi dignitaries do not welcome the visits of strange women. on the rare occasions when they are received, a member of the family (one of the sons, or a brother-in-law who has "studied in algeria") usually acts as interpreter; and perhaps it is as well that no one from the outer world should come to remind these listless creatures that somewhere the gulls dance on the atlantic and the wind murmurs through olive-yards and clatters the metallic fronds of palm-groves. we had been invited, one day, to visit the harem of one of the chief dignitaries of the makhzen at fez, and these thoughts came to me as i sat among the pale women in their mouldering prison. the descent through the steep tunnelled streets gave one the sense of being lowered into the shaft of a mine. at each step the strip of sky grew narrower, and was more often obscured by the low vaulted passages into which we plunged. the noises of the bazaar had died out, and only the sound of fountains behind garden walls and the clatter of our mules' hoofs on the stones went with us. then fountains and gardens ceased also, the towering masonry closed in, and we entered an almost subterranean labyrinth which sun and air never reach. at length our mules turned into a _cul-de-sac_ blocked by a high building. on the right was another building, one of those blind mysterious house-fronts of fez that seem like a fragment of its ancient fortifications. clients and servants lounged on the stone benches built into the wall; it was evidently the house of an important person. a charming youth with intelligent eyes waited on the threshold to receive us: he was one of the sons of the house, the one who had "studied in algeria" and knew how to talk to visitors. we followed him into a small arcaded _patio_ hemmed in by the high walls of the house. on the right was the usual long room with archways giving on the court. our host, a patriarchal personage, draped in fat as in a toga, came toward us, a mountain of majestic muslins, his eyes sparkling in a swarthy silver-bearded face. he seated us on divans and lowered his voluminous person to a heap of cushions on the step leading into the court; and the son who had studied in algeria instructed a negress to prepare the tea. across the _patio_ was another arcade closely hung with unbleached cotton. from behind it came the sound of chatter, and now and then a bare brown child in a scant shirt would escape, and be hurriedly pulled back with soft explosions of laughter, while a black woman came out to readjust the curtains. there were three of these negresses, splendid bronze creatures, wearing white djellabahs over bright-coloured caftans, striped scarves knotted about their large hips, and gauze turbans on their crinkled hair. their wrists clinked with heavy silver bracelets, and big circular earrings danced in their purple ear-lobes. a languor lay on all the other inmates of the household, on the servants and hangers-on squatting in the shade under the arcade, on our monumental host and his smiling son; but the three negresses, vibrating with activity, rushed continually from the curtained chamber to the kitchen, and from the kitchen to the master's reception-room, bearing on their pinky-blue palms trays of britannia metal with tall glasses and fresh bunches of mint, shouting orders to dozing menials, and calling to each other from opposite ends of the court; and finally the stoutest of the three, disappearing from view, reappeared suddenly on a pale green balcony overhead, where, profiled against a square of blue sky, she leaned over in a veronese attitude and screamed down to the others like an excited parrot. in spite of their febrile activity and tropical bird-shrieks, we waited in vain for tea; and after a while our host suggested to his son that i might like to visit the ladies of the household. as i had expected, the young man led me across the _patio_, lifted the cotton hanging and introduced me into an apartment exactly like the one we had just left. divans covered with striped mattress-ticking stood against the white walls, and on them sat seven or eight passive-looking women over whom a number of pale children scrambled. the eldest of the group, and evidently the mistress of the house, was an algerian lady, probably of about fifty, with a sad and delicately-modelled face; the others were daughters, daughters-in-law and concubines. the latter word evokes to occidental ears images of sensual seduction which the moroccan harem seldom realizes. all the ladies of this dignified official household wore the same look of somewhat melancholy respectability. in their stuffy curtained apartment they were like cellar-grown flowers, pale, heavy, fuller but frailer than the garden sort. their dresses, rich but sober, the veils and diadems put on in honour of my visit, had a dignified dowdiness in odd contrast to the frivolity of the imperial harem. but what chiefly struck me was the apathy of the younger women. i asked them if they had a garden, and they shook their heads wistfully, saying that there were no gardens in old fez. the roof was therefore their only escape: a roof overlooking acres and acres of other roofs, and closed in by the naked fortified mountains which stand about fez like prison-walls. after a brief exchange of compliments silence fell. conversing through interpreters is a benumbing process, and there are few points of contact between the open-air occidental mind and beings imprisoned in a conception of sexual and domestic life based on slave-service and incessant espionage. these languid women on their muslin cushions toil not, neither do they spin. the moroccan lady knows little of cooking, needlework or any household arts. when her child is ill she can only hang it with amulets and wail over it; the great lady of the fazi palace is as ignorant of hygiene as the peasant-woman of the _bled_. and all these colourless eventless lives depend on the favour of one fat tyrannical man, bloated with good living and authority, himself almost as inert and sedentary as his women, and accustomed to impose his whims on them ever since he ran about the same _patio_ as a little short-smocked boy. the redeeming point in this stagnant domesticity is the tenderness of the parents for their children, and western writers have laid so much stress on this that one would suppose children could be loved only by inert and ignorant parents. it is in fact charming to see the heavy eyes of the moroccan father light up when a brown grasshopper baby jumps on his knee, and the unfeigned tenderness with which the childless women of the harem caress the babies of their happier rivals. but the sentimentalist moved by this display of family feeling would do well to consider the lives of these much-petted children. ignorance, unhealthiness and a precocious sexual initiation prevail in all classes. education consists in learning by heart endless passages of the koran, and amusement in assisting at spectacles that would be unintelligible to western children, but that the pleasantries of the harem make perfectly comprehensible to moroccan infancy. at eight or nine the little girls are married, at twelve the son of the house is "given his first negress"; and thereafter, in the rich and leisured class, both sexes live till old age in an atmosphere of sensuality without seduction. [illustration: _from a photograph from "france-maroc"_ women watching a procession from a roof] the young son of the house led me back across the court, where the negresses were still shrieking and scurrying, and passing to and fro like a stage-procession with the vain paraphernalia of a tea that never came. our host still smiled from his cushions, resigned to oriental delays. to distract the impatient westerners, a servant unhooked from the wall the cage of a gently-cooing dove. it was brought to us, still cooing, and looked at me with the same resigned and vacant eyes as the ladies i had just left. as it was being restored to its hook the slaves lolling about the entrance scattered respectfully at the approach of a handsome man of about thirty, with delicate features and a black beard. crossing the court, he stooped to kiss the shoulder of our host, who introduced him as his eldest son, the husband of one or two of the little pale wives with whom i had been exchanging platitudes. from the increasing agitation of the negresses it became evident that the ceremony of tea-making had been postponed till his arrival. a metal tray bearing a britannia samovar and tea-pot was placed on the tiles of the court, and squatting beside it the newcomer gravely proceeded to infuse the mint. suddenly the cotton hangings fluttered again, and a tiny child in the scantest of smocks rushed out and scampered across the court. our venerable host, stretching out rapturous arms, caught the fugitive to his bosom, where the little boy lay like a squirrel, watching us with great sidelong eyes. he was the last-born of the patriarch, and the youngest brother of the majestic bearded gentleman engaged in tea-making. while he was still in his father's arms two more sons appeared: charming almond-eyed schoolboys returning from their koran-class, escorted by their slaves. all the sons greeted each other affectionately, and caressed with almost feminine tenderness the dancing baby so lately added to their ranks; and finally, to crown this scene of domestic intimacy, the three negresses, their gigantic effort at last accomplished, passed about glasses of steaming mint and trays of gazelles' horns and white sugar-cakes. vi in marrakech the farther one travels from the mediterranean and europe the closer the curtains of the women's quarters are drawn. the only harem in which we were allowed an interpreter was that of the sultan himself; in the private harems of fez and rabat a french-speaking relative transmitted (or professed to transmit) our remarks; in marrakech, the great nobleman and dignitary who kindly invited me to visit his household was deaf to our hint that the presence of a lady from one of the french government schools might facilitate our intercourse. when we drove up to his palace, one of the stateliest in marrakech, the street was thronged with clansmen and clients. dignified merchants in white muslin, whose grooms held white mules saddled with rose-coloured velvet, warriors from the atlas wearing the corkscrew ringlets which are a sign of military prowess, jewish traders in black gabardines, leather-gaitered peasant-women with chickens and cheese, and beggars rolling their blind eyes or exposing their fly-plastered sores, were gathered in oriental promiscuity about the great man's door; while under the archway stood a group of youths and warlike-looking older men who were evidently of his own clan. the caïd's chamberlain, a middle-aged man of dignified appearance, advanced to meet us between bowing clients and tradesmen. he led us through cool passages lined with the intricate mosaic-work of fez, past beggars who sat on stone benches whining out their blessings, and pale fazi craftsmen laying a floor of delicate tiles. the caïd is a lover of old arab architecture. his splendid house, which is not yet finished, has been planned and decorated on the lines of the old imperial palaces, and when a few years of sun and rain and oriental neglect have worked their way on its cedar-wood and gilding and ivory stucco it will have the same faded loveliness as the fairy palaces of fez. in a garden where fountains splashed and roses climbed among cypresses, the caïd himself awaited us. this great fighter and loyal friend of france is a magnificent eagle-beaked man, brown, lean and sinewy, with vigilant eyes looking out under his carefully draped muslin turban, and negroid lips half-hidden by a close black beard. tea was prepared in the familiar setting; a long arcaded room with painted ceiling and richly stuccoed walls. all around were ranged the usual mattresses covered with striped ticking and piled with muslin cushions. a bedstead of brass, imitating a louis xvi cane bed, and adorned with brass garlands and bows, throned on the usual platform; and the only other ornaments were a few clocks and bunches of wax flowers under glass. like all orientals, this hero of the atlas, who spends half his life with his fighting clansmen in a mediæval stronghold among the snows, and the other half rolling in a h.p. motor over smooth french roads, seems unaware of any degrees of beauty or appropriateness in objects of european design, and places against the exquisite mosaics and traceries of his fazi craftsmen the tawdriest bric-à-brac of the cheap department-store. while tea was being served i noticed a tiny negress, not more than six or seven years old, who stood motionless in the embrasure of an archway. like most of the moroccan slaves, even in the greatest households, she was shabbily, almost raggedly, dressed. a dirty _gandourah_ of striped muslin covered her faded caftan, and a cheap kerchief was wound above her grave and precocious little face. with preternatural vigilance she watched each movement of the caïd, who never spoke to her, looked at her, or made her the slightest perceptible sign, but whose least wish she instantly divined, refilling his tea-cup, passing the plates of sweets, or removing our empty glasses, in obedience to some secret telegraphy on which her whole being hung. the caïd is a great man. he and his famous elder brother, holding the southern marches of morocco against alien enemies and internal rebellion, played a preponderant part in the defence of the french colonies in north africa during the long struggle of the war. enlightened, cultivated, a friend of the arts, a scholar and diplomatist, he seems, unlike many orientals, to have selected the best in assimilating european influences. yet when i looked at the tiny creature watching him with those anxious joyless eyes i felt once more the abyss that slavery and the seraglio put between the most europeanized mahometan and the western conception of life. the caïd's little black slaves are well-known in morocco, and behind the sad child leaning in the archway stood all the shadowy evils of the social system that hangs like a millstone about the neck of islam. presently a handsome tattered negress came across the garden to invite me to the harem. captain de s. and his wife, who had accompanied me, were old friends of the chief's, and it was owing to this that the jealously-guarded doors of the women's quarters were opened to mme de s. and myself. we followed the negress to a marble-paved court where pigeons fluttered and strutted about the central fountain. from under a trellised arcade hung with linen curtains several ladies came forward. they greeted my companion with exclamations of delight; then they led us into the usual commonplace room with divans and whitewashed walls. even in the most sumptuous moroccan palaces little care seems to be expended on the fittings of the women's quarters: unless, indeed, the room in which visitors are received corresponds with a boarding-school "parlour," and the personal touch is reserved for the private apartments. the ladies who greeted us were more richly dressed than any i had seen except the sultan's favourites; but their faces were more distinguished, more european in outline, than those of the round-cheeked beauties of rabat. my companions had told me that the caïd's harem was recruited from georgia, and that the ladies receiving us had been brought up in the relative freedom of life in constantinople; and it was easy to read in their wistfully smiling eyes memories of a life unknown to the passive daughters of morocco. they appeared to make no secret of their regrets, for presently one of them, with a smile, called my attention to some faded photographs hanging over the divan. they represented groups of plump provincial-looking young women in dowdy european ball-dresses; and it required an effort of the imagination to believe that the lovely creatures in velvet caftans, with delicately tattooed temples under complicated head-dresses, and hennaed feet crossed on muslin cushions, were the same as the beaming frumps in the photographs. but to the sumptuously-clad exiles these faded photographs and ugly dresses represented freedom, happiness, and all they had forfeited when fate (probably in the shape of an opulent hebrew couple "travelling with their daughters") carried them from the bosphorus to the atlas. as in the other harems i had visited, perfect equality seemed to prevail between the ladies, and while they chatted with mme de s. whose few words of arabic had loosed their tongues, i tried to guess which was the favourite, or at least the first in rank. my choice wavered between the pretty pale creature with a _ferronnière_ across her temples and a tea-rose caftan veiled in blue gauze, and the nut-brown beauty in red velvet hung with pearls whose languid attitudes and long-lidded eyes were so like the keepsake portraits of byron's haïdee. or was it perhaps the third, less pretty but more vivid and animated, who sat behind the tea-tray, and mimicked so expressively a soldier shouldering his rifle, and another falling dead, in her effort to ask us "when the dreadful war would be over"? perhaps ... unless, indeed, it were the handsome octoroon, slightly older than the others, but even more richly dressed, so free and noble in her movements, and treated by the others with such friendly deference. i was struck by the fact that among them all there was not a child; it was the first harem without babies that i had seen in that prolific land. presently one of the ladies asked mme. de s. about her children; in reply, she enquired for the caïd's little boy, the son of his wife who had died. the ladies' faces lit up wistfully, a slave was given an order, and presently a large-eyed ghost of a child was brought into the room. instantly all the bracelet-laden arms were held out to the dead woman's son; and as i watched the weak little body hung with amulets and the heavy head covered with thin curls pressed against a brocaded bosom, i was reminded of one of the coral-hung child-christs of crivelli, standing livid and waxen on the knee of a splendidly dressed madonna. the poor baby on whom such hopes and ambitions hung stared at us with a solemn unamused gaze. would all his pretty mothers, his eyes seemed to ask, succeed in bringing him to maturity in spite of the parched summers of the south and the stifling existence of the harem? it was evident that no precaution had been neglected to protect him from maleficent influences and the danger that walks by night, for his frail neck and wrists were hung with innumerable charms: koranic verses, soudanese incantations, and images of forgotten idols in amber and coral and horn and ambergris. perhaps they will ward off the powers of evil, and let him grow up to shoulder the burden of the great caïds of the south. footnotes: [ ] the _msalla_ is used for the performance of religious ceremonies when the crowd is too great to be contained in the court of the mosque. vi general lyautey's work in morocco i it is not too much to say that general lyautey has twice saved morocco from destruction: once in , when the inertia and double-dealing of abd-el-hafid abandoned the country to the rebellious tribes who had attacked him in fez, and the second time in august, , when germany declared war on france. in , in consequence of the threatening attitude of the dissident tribes and the generally disturbed condition of the country, the sultan abd-el-hafid had asked france to establish a protectorate in morocco. the agreement entered into, called the "convention of fez," stipulated that a french resident-general should be sent to morocco with authority to act as the sultan's sole representative in treating with the other powers. the convention was signed in march, , and a few days afterward an uprising more serious than any that had gone before took place in fez. this sudden outbreak was due in part to purely local and native difficulties, in part to the intrinsic weakness of the french situation. the french government had imagined that a native army commanded by french officers could be counted on to support the makhzen and maintain order; but abd-el-hafid's growing unpopularity had estranged his own people from him, and the army turned on the government and on the french. on the th of april, , the moroccan soldiers massacred their french officers after inflicting horrible tortures on them; the population of fez rose against the european civilians, and for a fortnight the oued fez ran red with the blood of harmless french colonists. it was then that france appointed general lyautey resident-general in morocco. when he reached fez it was besieged by twenty thousand berbers. rebel tribes were flocking in to their support, to the cry of the holy war; and the terrified sultan, who had already announced his intention of resigning, warned the french troops who were trying to protect him that unless they guaranteed to get him safely to rabat he would turn his influence against them. two days afterward the berbers attacked fez and broke in at two gates. the french drove them out and forced them back twenty miles. the outskirts of the city were rapidly fortified, and a few weeks later general gouraud, attacking the rebels in the valley of the sebou, completely disengaged fez. the military danger overcome, general lyautey began his great task of civilian administration. his aim was to support and strengthen the existing government, to reassure and pacify the distrustful and antagonistic elements, and to assert french authority without irritating or discouraging native ambitions. meanwhile a new mahdi (ahmed-el-hiba) had risen in the south. treacherously supported by abd-el-hafid, he was proclaimed sultan at tiznit, and acknowledged by the whole of the souss. in marrakech, native unrest had caused the europeans to fly to the coast, and in the north a new group of rebellious tribes menaced fez. el-hiba entered marrakech in august, , and the french consul and several other french residents were taken prisoner. el-hiba's forces then advanced to a point half way between marrakech and mazagan, where general mangin, at that time a colonial colonel, met and utterly routed them. the disorder in the south, and the appeals of the native population for protection against the savage depredations of the new mahdist rebels, made it necessary for the french troops to follow up their success; and in september marrakech was taken. such were the swift and brilliant results of general lyautey's intervention. the first difficulties had been quickly overcome; others, far more complicated, remained. the military occupation of morocco had to be followed up by its civil reorganization. by the franco-german treaty of germany had finally agreed to recognize the french protectorate in morocco; but in spite of an apparently explicit acknowledgment of this right, germany, as usual, managed to slip into the contract certain ambiguities of form that were likely to lead to future trouble. to obtain even this incomplete treaty france had had to sacrifice part of her colonies in equatorial africa; and in addition to the uncertain relation with germany there remained the dead weight of the spanish zone and the confused international administration of tangier. the disastrously misgoverned spanish zone has always been a centre for german intrigue and native conspiracies, as well as a permanent obstacle to the economic development of morocco. such were the problems that general lyautey found awaiting him. a long colonial experience, and an unusual combination of military and administrative talents, prepared him for the almost impossible task of dealing with them. swift and decisive when military action is required, he has above all the long views and endless patience necessary to the successful colonial governor. the policy of france in morocco has been weak and spasmodic; in his hands it became firm and consecutive. a sympathetic understanding of the native prejudices, and a real affection for the native character, made him try to build up an administration which should be, not an application of french ideas to african conditions, but a development of the best native aspirations. the difficulties were immense. the attempt to govern as far as possible through the great chiefs was a wise one; but it was hampered by the fact that these powerful leaders, however loyal to the protectorate, knew no methods of administration but those based on extortion. it was necessary at once to use them and to educate them; and one of general lyautey's greatest achievements has been the successful employment of native ability in the government of the country. ii the first thing to do was to create a strong frontier against the dissident tribes of the blad-es-siba. to do this it was necessary that the french should hold the natural defenses of the country, the foothills of the little and of the great atlas, and the valley of the moulouya, which forms the corridor between western algeria and morocco. this was nearly accomplished in when war broke out. at that moment the home government cabled the resident-general to send all his available troops to france, abandoning the whole of conquered territory except the coast towns. to do so would have been to give france's richest colonies[ ] outright to germany at a moment when what they could supply--meat and wheat--was exactly what the enemy most needed. general lyautey took forty-eight hours to consider. he then decided to "empty the egg without breaking the shell"; and the reply he sent was that of a great patriot and a great general. in effect he said: "i will give you all the troops you ask, but instead of abandoning the interior of the country i will hold what we have already taken, and fortify and enlarge our boundaries." no other military document has so nearly that ring as marshal foch's immortal marne despatch (written only a few weeks later): "my centre is broken, my right wing is wavering, the situation is favorable and i am about to attack." general lyautey had framed his answer in a moment of patriotic exaltation, when the soul of every frenchman was strung up to a superhuman pitch. but the pledge once made, it had to be carried out; and even those who most applauded his decision wondered how he would meet the almost insuperable difficulties it involved. morocco, when he was called there, was already honey-combed by german trading interests and secret political intrigue, and the fruit seemed ready to fall when the declaration of war shook the bough. the only way to save the colony for france was to keep its industrial and agricultural life going, and give to the famous "business as usual" a really justifiable application. general lyautey completely succeeded, and the first impression of all travellers arriving in morocco two years later was that of suddenly returning to a world in normal conditions. there was even, so complete was the illusion, a first moment of almost painful surprise on entering an active prosperous community, seemingly absorbed in immediate material interests to the exclusion of all thought of the awful drama that was being played out in the mother country; and it was only on reflection that this absorption in the day's task, and this air of smiling faith in the future, were seen to be morocco's truest way of serving france. for not only was france to be supplied with provisions, but the confidence in her ultimate triumph was at all costs to be kept up in the native mind. german influence was as deep-seated as a cancer: to cut it out required the most drastic of operations. and that operation consisted precisely in letting it be seen that france was strong and prosperous enough for her colonies to thrive and expand without fear while she held at bay on her own frontier the most formidable foe the world has ever seen. such was the "policy of the smile," consistently advocated by general lyautey from the beginning of the war, and of which he and his household were the first to set the example. iii the general had said that he would not "break the egg-shell"; but he knew that this was not enough, and that he must make it appear unbreakable if he were to retain the confidence of the natives. how this was achieved, with the aid of the few covering troops left him, is still almost incomprehensible. to hold the line was virtually impossible: therefore he pushed it forward. an anonymous writer in _l'afrique française_ (january, ) has thus described the manoeuvre: "general henrys was instructed to watch for storm-signals on the front, to stop up the cracks, to strengthen weak points and to rectify doubtful lines. thanks to these operations, which kept the rebels perpetually harassed by always forestalling their own plans, the occupied territory was enlarged by a succession of strongly fortified positions." while this was going on in the north, general lamothe was extending and strengthening, by means of pacific negotiations, the influence of the great chiefs in the south; and other agents of the residency were engaged in watching and thwarting the incessant german intrigues in the spanish zone. general lyautey is quoted as having said that "a work-shop is worth a battalion." this precept he managed to put into action even during the first dark days of , and the interior development of morocco proceeded side by side with the strengthening of its defenses. germany had long foreseen what an asset northwest africa would be during the war; and general lyautey was determined to prove how right germany had been. he did so by getting the government, to whom he had given nearly all his troops, to give him in exchange an agricultural and industrial army, or at least enough specialists to form such an army out of the available material in the country. for every battle fought a road was made;[ ] for every rebel fortress shelled a factory was built, a harbor developed, or more miles of fallow land ploughed and sown. but this economic development did not satisfy the resident. he wished morocco to enlarge her commercial relations with france and the other allied countries, and with this object in view he organized and carried out with brilliant success a series of exhibitions at casablanca, fez and rabat. the result of this bold policy surpassed even its creator's hopes. the moroccans of the plain are an industrious and money-loving people, and the sight of these rapidly improvised exhibitions, where the industrial and artistic products of france and other european countries were shown in picturesque buildings grouped about flower-filled gardens, fascinated their imagination and strengthened their confidence in the country that could find time for such an effort in the midst of a great war. the voice of the bazaar carried the report to the farthest confines of moghreb, and one by one the notabilities of the different tribes arrived, with delegations from algeria and tunisia. it was even said that several rebel chiefs had submitted to the makhzen in order not to miss the exhibition. at the same time as the "miracle of the marne" another, less famous but almost as vital to france, was being silently performed at the other end of her dominions. it will not seem an exaggeration to speak of general lyautey's achievement during the first year of the war as the "miracle of morocco" if one considers the immense importance of doing what he did at the moment when he did it. and to understand this it is only needful to reckon what germany could have drawn in supplies and men from a german north africa, and what would have been the situation of france during the war with a powerful german colony in control of the western mediterranean. general lyautey has always been one of the clear-sighted administrators who understand that the successful government of a foreign country depends on many little things, and not least on the administrator's genuine sympathy with the traditions, habits and tastes of the people. a keen feeling for beauty had prepared him to appreciate all that was most exquisite and venerable in the arab art of morocco, and even in the first struggle with political and military problems he found time to gather about him a group of archæologists and artists who were charged with the inspection and preservation of the national monuments and the revival of the languishing native art-industries. the old pottery, jewelry, metal-work, rugs and embroideries of the different regions were carefully collected and classified; schools of decorative art were founded, skilled artisans sought out, and every effort was made to urge european residents to follow native models and use native artisans in building and furnishing. at the various exhibitions much space was allotted to these revived industries, and the matting of salé, the rugs of rabat, the embroideries of fez and marrakech have already found a ready market in france, besides awakening in the educated class of colonists an appreciation of the old buildings and the old arts of the country that will be its surest safeguard against the destructive effects of colonial expansion. it is only necessary to see the havoc wrought in tunisia and algeria by the heavy hand of the colonial government to know what general lyautey has achieved in saving morocco from this form of destruction, also. all this has been accomplished by the resident-general during five years of unexampled and incessant difficulty; and probably the true explanation of the miracle is that which he himself gives when he says, with the quiet smile that typifies his moroccan war-policy: "it was easy to do because i loved the people." the work of the french protectorate, - ports owing to the fact that the neglected and roadless spanish zone intervened between the french possessions and tangier, which is the natural port of morocco, one of the first pre-occupations of general lyautey was to make ports along the inhospitable atlantic coast, where there are no natural harbours. since , in spite of the immense cost and the difficulty of obtaining labour, the following has been done: _casablanca._ a jetty metres long has been planned: metres finished december, . small jetty begun , finished : length metres. small harbour thus created shelters small boats ( tons) in all weathers. quays metres long already finished. steam-cranes working. warehouses and depots covering , square metres completed. _rabat._ work completed december, . a quay metres long, to which boats with a draught of three metres can tie up. two groups of warehouses, steam-cranes, etc., covering , square metres. a quay metres long on the salé side of the river. _kenitra._ the port of kenitra is at the mouth of the sebou river, and is capable of becoming a good river port. the work up to december, , comprises: a channel metres long and three metres deep, cut through the bar of the sebou. jetties built on each side of the channel. quay metres long. building of sheds, depots, warehouses, steam-cranes, etc. at the ports of fedalah, mazagan, safi, mogador and agadir similar plans are in course of execution. commerce comparative tables total commerce total commerce fcs. , , fcs. , , exports exports fcs. , , fcs. , , roads built national roads , kilometres secondary roads " railways built kilometres land cultivated approximate area approximate area , . hectares , , . hectares justice . creation of french courts for french nationals and those under french protection. these take cognizance of civil cases where both parties, or even one, are amenable to french jurisdiction. . moroccan law is moslem, and administered by moslem magistrates. private law, including that of inheritance, is based on the koran. the sultan has maintained the principle whereby real property and administrative cases fall under native law. these courts are as far as possible supervised and controlled by the establishment of a cherifian ministry of justice to which the native judges are responsible. special care is taken to prevent the alienation of property held collectively, or any similar transactions likely to produce political and economic disturbances. . criminal jurisdiction is delegated to pashas and cadis by the sultan, except of offenses committed against, or in conjunction with, french nationals and those under french protection. such cases come before the tribunals of the french protectorate. education the object of the protectorate has been, on the one hand, to give to the children of french colonists in morocco the same education as they would have received at elementary and secondary schools in france; on the other, to provide the indigenous population with a system of education that shall give to the young moroccans an adequate commercial or manual training, or prepare them for administrative posts, but without interfering with their native customs or beliefs. before there existed in morocco only a few small schools supported by the french legation at tangier and by the alliance française, and a group of hebrew schools in the mellahs, maintained by the universal israelite alliance. . total number of schools . " " " " . total number of pupils . " " " " , . total number of teachers . " " " " in addition to the french and indigenous schools, sewing-schools have been formed for the native girls and have been exceptionally successful. moslem colleges have been founded at rabat and fez in order to supplement the native education of young mahometans of the upper classes, who intend to take up wholesale business or banking, or prepare for political, judicial or administrative posts under the sultan's government. the course lasts four years and comprises: arabic, french, mathematics, history, geography, religious (mahometan) instruction, and the law of the koran. the "ecole supérieure de la langue arabe et des dialectes berbères" at rabat receives european and moroccan students. the courses are: arabic, the berber dialects, arab literature, ethnography, administrative moroccan law, moslem law, berber customary law. medical aid the protectorate has established medical centres for the native population, ranging from simple dispensaries and small native infirmaries to the important hospitals of rabat, fez, meknez, marrakech, and casablanca. mobile sanitary formations supplied with light motor ambulances travel about the country, vaccinating, making tours of sanitary inspection, investigating infected areas, and giving general hygienic education throughout the remoter regions. native patients treated in over , " " " " " , , night-shelters in towns. every town is provided with a shelter for the indigent wayfarers so numerous in morocco. these shelters are used as disinfection centres, from which suspicious cases are sent to quarantine camp at the gates of the towns. _central laboratory at rabat._ this is a kind of pasteur institute. in , , persons were vaccinated throughout the country and patients treated at the laboratory for rabies. _clinics for venereal diseases_ have been established at casablanca, fez, rabat, and marrakech. more than , cases were treated in . _ophthalmic clinics_ in the same cities gave in , , consultations. _radiotherapy._ clinics have been opened at fez and rabat for the treatment of skin diseases of the head, from which the native children habitually suffer. the french department of health distributes annually immense quantities of quinine in the malarial districts. madame lyautey's private charities comprise admirably administered child-welfare centres in the principal cities, with dispensaries for the native mothers and children. footnotes: [ ] the loss of morocco would inevitably have been followed by that of the whole of french north africa. [ ] during the first year of the war roads were built in morocco by german prisoners; and it was because germany was so thoroughly aware of the economic value of the country, and so anxious not to have her prestige diminished, that she immediately protested, on the absurd plea of the unwholesomeness of the climate, and threatened reprisals unless the prisoners were withdrawn. vii a sketch of moroccan history note.--in the chapters on moroccan history and art i have tried to set down a slight and superficial outline of a large and confused subject. in extenuation of this summary attempt i hasten to explain that its chief merit is its lack of originality. its facts are chiefly drawn from the books mentioned in the short bibliography at the end of the volume; in addition to which i am deeply indebted for information given on the spot to the group of remarkable specialists attached to the french administration, and to the cultivated and cordial french officials, military and civilian, who, at each stage of my rapid journey, did their best to answer my questions and open my eyes. i the berbers in the briefest survey of the moroccan past account must first of all be taken of the factor which, from the beginning of recorded events, has conditioned the whole history of north africa: the existence, from the sahara to the mediterranean, of a mysterious irreducible indigenous race with which every successive foreign rule, from carthage to france, has had to reckon, and which has but imperfectly and partially assimilated the language, the religion, and the culture that successive civilizations have tried to impose upon it. this race, the race of berbers, has never, modern explorers tell us, become really islamite, any more than it ever really became phenician, roman or vandal. it has imposed its habits while it appeared to adopt those of its invaders, and has perpetually represented, outside the ismalitic and hispano-arabic circle of the makhzen, the vast tormenting element of the dissident, the rebellious, the unsubdued tribes of the blad-es-siba. who were these indigenous tribes with whom the phenicians, when they founded their first counting-houses on the north and west coast of africa, exchanged stuffs and pottery and arms for ivory, ostrich-feathers and slaves? historians frankly say they do not know. all sorts of material obstacles have hitherto hampered the study of berber origins; but it seems clear that from the earliest historic times they were a mixed race, and the ethnologist who attempts to define them is faced by the same problem as the historian of modern america who should try to find the racial definition of an "american." for centuries, for ages, north africa has been what america now is: the clearing-house of the world. when at length it occurred to the explorer that the natives of north africa were not all arabs or moors, he was bewildered by the many vistas of all they were or might be: so many and tangled were the threads leading up to them, so interwoven was their pre-islamite culture with worn-out shreds of older and richer societies. m. saladin, in his "manuel d'architecture musulmane," after attempting to unravel the influences which went to the making of the mosque of kairouan, the walls of marrakech, the medersas of fez--influences that lead him back to chaldæan branch-huts, to the walls of babylon and the embroideries of coptic egypt--somewhat despairingly sums up the result: "the principal elements contributed to moslem art by the styles preceding it may be thus enumerated: from india, floral ornament; from persia, the structural principles of the acheminedes, and the sassanian vault. mesopotamia contributes a system of vaulting, incised ornament, and proportion; the copts, ornamental detail in general; egypt, mass and unbroken wall-spaces; spain, construction and romano-iberian ornament; africa, decorative detail and romano-berber traditions (with byzantine influences in persia); asia minor, a mixture of byzantine and persian characteristics." as with the art of north africa, so with its supposedly indigenous population. the berber dialects extend from the lybian desert to senegal. their language was probably related to coptic, itself related to the ancient egyptian and the non-semitic dialects of abyssinia and nubia. yet philologists have discovered what appears to be a far-off link between the berber and semitic languages, and the chleuhs of the draa and the souss, with their tall slim egyptian-looking bodies and hooked noses, may have a strain of semitic blood. m. augustin bernard, in speaking of the natives of north africa, ends, much on the same note as m. saladin in speaking of moslem art: "in their blood are the sediments of many races, phenician, punic, egyptian and arab." they were not, like the arabs, wholly nomadic; but the tent, the flock, the tribe always entered into their conception of life. m. augustin bernard has pointed out that, in north africa, the sedentary and nomadic habit do not imply a permanent difference, but rather a temporary one of situation and opportunity. the sedentary berbers are nomadic in certain conditions; and from the earliest times the invading nomad berbers tended to become sedentary when they reached the rich plains north of the atlas. but when they built cities it was as their ancestors and their neighbours pitched tents; and they destroyed or abandoned them as lightly as their desert forbears packed their camel-bags and moved to new pastures. everywhere behind the bristling walls and rock-clamped towers of old morocco lurks the shadowy spirit of instability. every new sultan builds himself a new house and lets his predecessors' palaces fall into decay; and as with the sultan so with his vassals and officials. change is the rule in this apparently unchanged civilization, where "nought may abide but mutability." ii phenicians, romans and vandals far to the south of the anti-atlas, in the yellow deserts that lead to timbuctoo, live the wild touaregs, the veiled men of the south, who ride to war with their faces covered by linen masks. these veiled men are berbers; but their alphabet is composed of lybian characters, and these are closely related to the signs engraved on certain vases of the nile valley that are probably six thousand years old. moreover, among the rock-cut images of the african desert is the likeness of theban ammon crowned with the solar disk between serpents; and the old berber religion, with its sun and animal worship, has many points of resemblance with egyptian beliefs. all this implies trade contacts far below the horizon of history, and obscure comings and goings of restless throngs across incredible distances long before the phenicians planted their first trading posts on the north african coast about b. c. five hundred years before christ, carthage sent one of her admirals on a voyage of colonization beyond the pillars of hercules. hannon set out with sixty fifty-oared galleys carrying thirty thousand people. some of them settled at mehedyia, at the mouth of the sebou, where phenician remains have been found; and apparently the exploration was pushed as far south as the coast of guinea, for the inscription recording it relates that hannon beheld elephants, hairy men and "savages called gorillas." at any rate, carthage founded stable colonies at melilla, larache, salé and casablanca. then came the romans, who carried on the business, set up one of their easy tolerant protectorates over "tingitanian mauretania,"[ ] and built one important military outpost, volubilis in the zerhoun, which a series of minor defenses probably connected with salé on the west coast, thus guarding the roman province against the unconquered berbers to the south. tingitanian mauretania was one of the numerous african granaries of rome. she also supplied the imperial armies with their famous african cavalry; and among minor articles of exportation were guinea-hens, snails, honey, euphorbia, wild beasts, horses and pearls. the roman dominion ceased at the line drawn between volubilis and salé. there was no interest in pushing farther south, since the ivory and slave trade with the soudan was carried on by way of tripoli. but the spirit of enterprise never slept in the race, and pliny records the journey of a roman general--suetonius paulinus--who appears to have crossed the atlas, probably by the pass of tizi-n-telremt, which is even now so beset with difficulties that access by land to the souss will remain an arduous undertaking until the way by imintanout is safe for european travel. the vandals swept away the romans in the fifth century. the lower empire restored a brief period of civilization; but its authority finally dwindled to the half-legendary rule of count julian, shut up within his walls of ceuta. then europe vanished from the shores of africa; and though christianity lingered here and there in vague donatist colonies, and in the names of roman bishoprics, its last faint hold went down in the eighth century before the irresistible cry: "there is no god but allah!" iii the arab conquest the first arab invasion of morocco is said to have reached the atlantic coast; but it left no lasting traces, and the real islamisation of barbary did not happen till near the end of the eighth century, when a descendant of ali, driven from mesopotamia by the caliphate, reached the mountains above volubilis and there founded an empire. the berbers, though indifferent in religious matters, had always, from a spirit of independence, tended to heresy and schism. under the rule of christian rome they had been donatists, as m. bernard puts it, "out of opposition to the empire"; and so, out of opposition to the caliphate, they took up the cause of one moslem schismatic after another. their great popular movements have always had a religious basis, or perhaps it would be truer to say, a religious pretext; for they have been in reality the partly moral, partly envious revolt of hungry and ascetic warrior tribes against the fatness and corruption of the "cities of the plain." idriss i became the first national saint and ruler of morocco. his rule extended throughout northern morocco, and his son, idriss ii, attacking a berber tribe on the banks of the oued fez, routed them, took possession of their oasis and founded the city of fez. thither came schismatic refugees from kairouan and moors from andalusia. the islamite empire of morocco was founded, and idriss ii has become the legendary ancestor of all its subsequent rulers. the idrissite rule is a welter of obscure struggles between rapidly melting groups of adherents. its chief features are: the founding of moulay idriss and fez, and the building of the mosques of el andalous and kairouiyin at fez for the two groups of refugees from tunisia and spain. meanwhile the caliphate of cordova had reached the height of its power, while that of the fatimites extended from the nile to western morocco, and the little idrissite empire, pulverized under the weight of these expanding powers, became once more a dust of disintegrated tribes. it was only in the eleventh century that the dust again conglomerated. two arab tribes from the desert of the hedjaz, suddenly driven westward by the fatimites, entered morocco, not with a small military expedition, as the arabs had hitherto done, but with a horde of emigrants reckoned as high as , families; and this first colonizing expedition was doubtless succeeded by others. to strengthen their hold in morocco the arab colonists embraced the dynastic feuds of the berbers. they inaugurated a period of general havoc which destroyed what little prosperity had survived the break-up of the idrissite rule, and many berber tribes took refuge in the mountains; but others remained and were merged with the invaders, reforming into new tribes of mixed berber and arab blood. this invasion was almost purely destructive; it marks one of the most desolate periods in the progress of the "wasteful empire" of moghreb. iv almoravids and almohads while the hilalian arabs were conquering and destroying northern morocco another but more fruitful invasion was upon her from the south. the almoravids, one of the tribes of veiled men of the south, driven by the usual mixture of religious zeal and lust of booty, set out to invade the rich black kingdoms north of the sahara. thence they crossed the atlas under their great chief, youssef-ben-tachfin, and founded the city of marrakech in . from marrakech they advanced on idrissite fez and the valley of the moulouya. fez rose against her conquerors, and youssef put all the male inhabitants to death. by he was master of tangier and the rif, and his rule stretched as far west as tlemcen, oran and finally algiers. his ambition drove him across the straits to spain, where he conquered one moslem prince after another and wiped out the luxurious civilization of moorish andalusia. in , at zallarca, youssef gave battle to alphonso vi of castile and leon. the almoravid army was a strange rabble of arabs, berbers, blacks, wild tribes of the sahara and christian mercenaries. they conquered the spanish forces, and youssef left to his successors an empire extending from the ebro to senegal and from the atlantic coast of africa to the borders of tunisia. but the empire fell to pieces of its own weight, leaving little record of its brief and stormy existence. while youssef was routing the forces of christianity at zallarca in spain, another schismatic tribe of his own people was detaching marrakech and the south from his rule. the leader of the new invasion was a mahdi, one of the numerous saviours of the world who have carried death and destruction throughout islam. his name was ibn-toumert, and he had travelled in egypt, syria and spain, and made the pilgrimage to mecca. preaching the doctrine of a purified monotheism, he called his followers the almohads or unitarians, to distinguish them from the polytheistic almoravids, whose heresies he denounced. he fortified the city of tinmel in the souss, and built there a mosque of which the ruins still exist. when he died, in , he designated as his successor abd-el-moumen, the son of a potter, who had been his disciple. abd-el-moumen carried on the campaign against the almoravids. he fought them not only in morocco but in spain, taking cadiz, cordova, granada as well as tlemcen and fez. in his african dominion reached from tripoli to the souss, and he had formed a disciplined army in which christian mercenaries from france and spain fought side by side with berbers and soudanese. this great captain was also a great administrator, and under his rule africa was surveyed from the souss to barka, the country was policed, agriculture was protected, and the caravans journeyed safely over the trade-routes. abd-el-moumen died in and was followed by his son, who, though he suffered reverses in spain, was also a great ruler. he died in , and his son, yacoub-el-mansour, avenged his father's ill-success in spain by the great victory of alarcos and the conquest of madrid. yacoub-el-mansour was the greatest of moroccan sultans. so far did his fame extend that the illustrious saladin sent him presents and asked the help of his fleet. he was a builder as well as a fighter, and the noblest period of arab art in morocco and spain coincides with his reign. after his death, the almohad empire followed the downward curve to which all oriental rule seems destined. in spain, the berber forces were beaten in the great christian victory of las-navas-de tolosa; and in morocco itself the first stirrings of the beni-merins (a new tribe from the sahara) were preparing the way for a new dynasty. v the merinids the beni-merins or merinids were nomads who ranged the desert between biskra and the tafilelt. it was not a religious upheaval that drove them to the conquest of morocco. the demoralized almohads called them in as mercenaries to defend their crumbling empire; and the merinids came, drove out the almohads, and replaced them. they took fez, meknez, salé, rabat and sidjilmassa in the tafilelt; and their second sultan, abou-youssef, built new fez (eldjid) on the height above the old idrissite city. the merinids renewed the struggle with the sultan of tlemcen, and carried the holy war once more into spain. the conflict with tlemcen was long and unsuccessful, and one of the merinid sultans died assassinated under its walls. in the fourteenth century the sultan abou hassan tried to piece together the scattered bits of the almohad empire. tlemcen was finally taken, and the whole of algeria annexed. but in the plain of kairouan, in tunisia, abou hassan was defeated by the arabs. meanwhile one of his brothers had headed a revolt in morocco, and the princes of tlemcen won back their ancient kingdom. constantine and bougie rebelled in turn, and the kingdom of abou hassan vanished like a mirage. his successors struggled vainly to control their vassals in morocco, and to keep their possessions beyond its borders. before the end of the fourteenth century morocco from end to end was a chaos of antagonistic tribes, owning no allegiance, abiding by no laws. the last of the merinids, divided, diminished, bound by humiliating treaties with christian spain, kept up a semblance of sovereignty at fez and marrakech, at war with one another and with their neighbours; and spain and portugal seized this moment of internal dissolution to drive them from spain, and carry the war into morocco itself. the short and stormy passage of the beni-merins seems hardly to leave room for the development of the humaner qualities; yet the flowering of moroccan art and culture coincided with those tumultuous years, and it was under the merinid sultans that fez became the centre of moroccan learning and industry, a kind of oxford with birmingham annexed. vi the saadians meanwhile, behind all the berber turmoil a secret work of religious propaganda was going on. the arab element had been crushed but not extirpated. the crude idolatrous wealth-loving berbers apparently dominated; but whenever there was a new uprising or a new invasion it was based on the religious discontent perpetually stirred up by mahometan agents. the longing for a mahdi, a saviour, the craving for purification combined with an opportunity to murder and rob, always gave the moslem apostle a ready opening; and the downfall of the merinids was the result of a long series of religious movements to which the european invasion gave an object and a war-cry. the saadians were cherifian arabs, newcomers from arabia, to whom the lax berber paganism was abhorrent. they preached a return to the creed of mahomet, and proclaimed the holy war against the hated portuguese, who had set up fortified posts all along the west coast of morocco. it is a mistake to suppose that hatred of the christian has always existed among the north african moslems. the earlier dynasties, and especially the great almohad sultans, were on friendly terms with the catholic powers of europe, and in the thirteenth century a treaty assured to christians in africa full religious liberty, excepting only the right to preach their doctrine in public places. there was a catholic diocese at fez, and afterward at marrakech under gregory ix, and there is a letter of the pope thanking the "miromilan" (the emir el moumenin) for his kindness to the bishop and the friars living in his dominions. another bishop was recommended by innocent iv to the sultan of morocco; the pope even asked that certain strongholds should be assigned to the christians in morocco as places of refuge in times of disturbance. but the best proof of the friendly relations between christians and infidels is the fact that the christian armies which helped the sultans of morocco to defeat spain and subjugate algeria and tunisia were not composed of "renegadoes" or captives, as is generally supposed, but of christian mercenaries, french and english, led by knights and nobles, and fighting for the sultan of morocco exactly as they would have fought for the duke of burgundy, the count of flanders, or any other prince who offered high pay and held out the hope of rich spoils. any one who has read "villehardouin" and "joinville" will own that there is not much to choose between the motives animating these noble freebooters and those which caused the crusaders to loot constantinople "on the way" to the holy sepulchre. war in those days was regarded as a lucrative and legitimate form of business, exactly as it was when the earlier heroes started out to take the rich robber-town of troy. the berbers have never been religious fanatics, and the vicomte de foucauld, when he made his great journey of exploration in the atlas in , remarked that antagonism to the foreigner was always due to the fear of military espionage and never to religious motives. this equally applies to the berbers of the sixteenth century, when the holy war against catholic spain and portugal was preached. the real cause of the sudden deadly hatred of the foreigner was twofold. the spaniards were detested because of the ferocious cruelty with which they had driven the moors from spain under ferdinand and isabella; and the portuguese because of the arrogance and brutality of their military colonists in the fortified trading stations of the west coast. and both were feared as possible conquerors and overlords. there was a third incentive also: the moroccans, dealing in black slaves for the european market, had discovered the value of white slaves in moslem markets. the sultan had his fleet, and each coast-town its powerful pirate vessels, and from pirate-nests like salé and tangier the raiders continued, till well on into the first half of the nineteenth century, to seize european ships and carry their passengers to the slave-markets of fez and marrakech.[ ] the miseries endured by these captives, and so poignantly described in john windus's travels, and in the "naufrage du brick sophie" by charles cochelet,[ ] show how savage the feeling against the foreigner had become. with the advent of the cherifian dynasties, which coincided with this religious reform, and was in fact brought about by it, morocco became a closed country, as fiercely guarded as japan against european penetration. cut off from civilizing influences, the moslems isolated themselves in a lonely fanaticism, far more racial than religious, and the history of the country from the fall of the merinids till the french annexation is mainly a dull tale of tribal warfare. the religious movement of the sixteenth century was led and fed by zealots from the sahara. one of them took possession of rabat and azemmour, and preached the holy war; other "feudal fiefs" (as m. augustin bernard has well called them) were founded at tameslout, ilegh, tamgrout: the tombs of the _marabouts_ who led these revolts are scattered all along the west coast, and are still objects of popular veneration. the unorthodox saint worship which marks moroccan moslemism, and is commemorated by the countless white _koubbas_ throughout the country, grew up chiefly at the time of the religious revival under the saadian dynasty, and almost all the "moulays" and "sidis" venerated between tangier and the atlas were warrior monks who issued forth from their fortified _zaouïas_ to drive the christians out of africa. the saadians were probably rather embarrassed by these fanatics, whom they found useful to oppose to the merinids, but troublesome where their own plans were concerned. they were ambitious and luxury-loving princes, who invaded the wealthy kingdom of the soudan, conquered the sultan of timbuctoo, and came back laden with slaves and gold to embellish marrakech and spend their treasure in the usual demoralizing orgies. their exquisite tombs at marrakech commemorate in courtly language the superhuman virtues of a series of rulers whose debaucheries and vices were usually cut short by assassination. finally another austere and fanatical mountain tribe surged down on them, wiped them out, and ruled in their stead. vii the hassanians the new rulers came from the tafilelt, which has always been a troublesome corner of morocco. the first two hassanian sultans were the usual tribal chiefs bent on taking advantage of saadian misrule to loot and conquer. but the third was the great moulay-ismaël, the tale of whose long and triumphant rule ( to ) has already been told in the chapter on meknez. this savage and enlightened old man once more drew order out of anarchy, and left, when he died, an organized and administered empire, as well as a progeny of seven hundred sons and unnumbered daughters.[ ] the empire fell apart as usual, and no less quickly than usual, under his successors; and from his death until the strong hand of general lyautey took over the direction of affairs the hassanian rule in morocco was little more than a tumult of incoherent ambitions. the successors of moulay-ismaël inherited his blood-lust and his passion for dominion without his capacity to govern. in sidi-mohammed, one of his sons, tried to put order into his kingdom, and drove the last portuguese out of morocco; but under his successors the country remained isolated and stagnant, making spasmodic efforts to defend itself against the encroachments of european influence, while its rulers wasted their energy in a policy of double-dealing and dissimulation. early in the nineteenth century the government was compelled by the european powers to suppress piracy and the trade in christian slaves; and in the french conquest of algeria broke down the wall of isolation behind which the country was mouldering away by placing a european power on one of its frontiers. at first the conquest of algeria tended to create a link between france and morocco. the dey of algiers was a turk, and, therefore, an hereditary enemy; and morocco was disposed to favour the power which had broken turkish rule in a neighbouring country. but the sultan could not help trying to profit by the general disturbance to seize tlemcen and raise insurrections in western algeria; and presently morocco was engaged in a holy war against france. abd-el-kader, the sultan of algeria, had taken refuge in morocco, and the sultan of morocco having furnished him with supplies and munitions, france sent an official remonstrance. at the same time marshal bugeaud landed at mers-el-kebir, and invited the makhzen to discuss the situation. the offer was accepted and general bedeau and the caïd el guennaoui met in an open place. behind them their respective troops were drawn up, and almost as soon as the first salutes were exchanged the caïd declared the negotiations broken off. the french troops accordingly withdrew to the coast, but during their retreat they were attacked by the moroccans. this put an end to peaceful negotiations, and tangier was besieged and taken. the following august bugeaud brought his troops up from oudjda, through the defile that leads from west algeria, and routed the moroccans. he wished to advance on fez, but international politics interfered, and he was not allowed to carry out his plans. england looked unfavourably on the french penetration of morocco, and it became necessary to conclude peace at once to prove that france had no territorial ambitions west of oudjda. meanwhile a great sultan was once more to appear in the land. moulay-el-hassan, who ruled from to , was an able and energetic administrator. he pieced together his broken empire, asserted his authority in fez and marrakech, and fought the rebellious tribes of the west. in he asked the french government to send him a permanent military mission to assist in organizing his army. he planned an expedition to the souss, but the want of food and water in the wilderness traversed by the army caused the most cruel sufferings. moulay-el-hassan had provisions sent by sea, but the weather was too stormy to allow of a landing on the exposed atlantic coast, and the sultan, who had never seen the sea, was as surprised and indignant as canute to find that the waves would not obey him. his son abd-el-aziz was only thirteen years old when he succeeded to the throne. for six years he remained under the guardianship of ba-ahmed, the black vizier of moulay-el-hassan, who built the fairy palace of the bahia at marrakech, with its mysterious pale green padlocked door leading down to the secret vaults where his treasure was hidden. when the all-powerful ba-ahmed died the young sultan was nineteen. he was intelligent, charming, and fond of the society of europeans; but he was indifferent to religious questions and still more to military affairs, and thus doubly at the mercy of native mistrust and european intrigue. some clumsy attempts at fiscal reform, and a too great leaning toward european habits and associates, roused the animosity of the people, and of the conservative party in the upper class. the sultan's eldest brother, who had been set aside in his favour, was intriguing against him; the usual cherifian pretender was stirring up the factious tribes in the mountains; and the european powers were attempting, in the confusion of an ungoverned country, to assert their respective ascendencies. the demoralized condition of the country justified these attempts, and made european interference inevitable. but the powers were jealously watching each other, and germany, already coveting the certain agricultural resources and the conjectured mineral wealth of morocco, was above all determined that a french protectorate should not be set up. in another son of moulay-hassan, abd-el-hafid, was proclaimed sultan by the reactionary islamite faction, who accused abd-el-aziz of having sold his country to the christians. abd-el-aziz was defeated in a battle near marrakech, and retired to tangier, where he still lives in futile state. abd-el-hafid, proclaimed sultan at fez, was recognized by the whole country; but he found himself unable to cope with the factious tribes (those outside the blad-el-makhzen, or _governed country_). these rebel tribes besieged fez, and the sultan had to ask france for aid. france sent troops to his relief, but as soon as the dissidents were routed, and he himself was safe, abd-el-hafid refused to give the french army his support, and in , after the horrible massacres of fez, he abdicated in favour of another brother, moulay youssef, the actual ruler of morocco. footnotes: [ ] east of the moulouya, the african protectorate (now west algeria and the sud oranais) was called the mauretania of cæsar. [ ] the moroccans being very poor seamen, these corsair-vessels were usually commanded and manned by christian renegadoes and turks. [ ] cochelet was wrecked on the coast near agadir early in the nineteenth century and was taken with his fellow-travellers overland to el-ksar and tangier, enduring terrible hardships by the way. [ ] moulay-ismaël was a learned theologian and often held religious discussions with the fathers of the order of mercy and the trinitarians. he was scrupulously orthodox in his religious observances, and wrote a treatise in defense of his faith which he sent to james ii of england, urging him to become a mahometan. he invented most of the most exquisite forms of torture which subsequent sultans have applied to their victims (see loti, _au maroc_), and was fond of flowers, and extremely simple and frugal in his personal habits. viii note on moroccan architecture i m. h. saladin, whose "manual of moslem architecture" was published in , ends his chapter on morocco with the words: "it is especially urgent that we should know, and penetrate into, morocco as soon as possible, in order to study its monuments. it is the only country but persia where moslem art actually survives; and the tradition handed down to the present day will doubtless clear up many things." m. saladin's wish has been partly realized. much has been done since , when general lyautey was appointed resident-general, to clear up and classify the history of moroccan art; but since , though the work has never been dropped, it has necessarily been much delayed, especially as regards its published record; and as yet only a few monographs and articles have summed up some of the interesting investigations of the last five years. ii when i was in marrakech word was sent to captain de s., who was with me, that a caïd of the atlas, whose prisoner he had been several years before, had himself been taken by the pasha's troops, and was in marrakech. captain de s. was asked to identify several rifles which his old enemy had taken from him, and on receiving them found that, in the interval, they had been elaborately ornamented with the arab niello work of which the tradition goes back to damascus. this little incident is a good example of the degree to which the mediæval tradition alluded to by m. saladin has survived in moroccan life. nowhere else in the world, except among the moribund fresco-painters of the greek monasteries, has a formula of art persisted from the seventh or eighth century to the present day; and in morocco the formula is not the mechanical expression of a petrified theology but the setting of the life of a people who have gone on wearing the same clothes, observing the same customs, believing in the same fetiches, and using the same saddles, ploughs, looms, and dye-stuffs as in the days when the foundations of the first mosque of el kairouiyin were laid. [illustration: _from a photograph from the service des beaux-arts au maroc_ marrakech--a street fountain] the origin of this tradition is confused and obscure. the arabs have never been creative artists, nor are the berbers known to have been so. as investigations proceed in syria and mesopotamia it seems more and more probable that the sources of inspiration of pre-moslem art in north africa are to be found in egypt, persia, and india. each new investigation pushes these sources farther back and farther east; but it is not of much use to retrace these ancient vestiges, since moroccan art has, so far, nothing to show of pre-islamite art, save what is purely phenician or roman. in any case, however, it is not in morocco that the clue to moroccan art is to be sought; though interesting hints and mysterious reminiscences will doubtless be found in such places as tinmel, in the gorges of the atlas, where a ruined mosque of the earliest almohad period has been photographed by m. doutté, and in the curious algerian towns of sedrata and the kalaa of the beni hammads. both of these latter towns were rich and prosperous communities in the tenth century and both were destroyed in the eleventh, so that they survive as mediæval pompeiis of a quite exceptional interest, since their architecture appears to have been almost unaffected by classic or byzantine influences. traces of a very old indigenous art are found in the designs on the modern white and black berber pottery; but this work, specimens of which are to be seen in the oriental department of the louvre, seems to go back, by way of central america, greece (sixth century b. c.) and susa (twelfth century b. c.), to the far-off period before the streams of human invention had divided, and when the same loops and ripples and spirals formed on the flowing surface of every current. it is a disputed question whether spanish influence was foremost in developing the peculiarly moroccan art of the earliest moslem period, or whether european influences came by way of syria and palestine, and afterward met and were crossed with those of moorish spain. probably both things happened, since the almoravids were in spain; and no doubt the currents met and mingled. at any rate, byzantine, greece, and the palestine and syria of the crusaders, contributed as much as rome and greece to the formation of that peculiar moslem art which, all the way from india to the pillars of hercules, built itself, with minor variations, out of the same elements. arab conquerors always destroy as much as they can of the work of their predecessors, and nothing remains, as far as is known, of almoravid architecture in morocco. but the great almohad sultans covered spain and northwest africa with their monuments, and no later buildings in africa equal them in strength and majesty. it is no doubt because the almohads built in stone that so much of what they made survives. the merinids took to rubble and a soft tufa, and the cherifian dynasties built in clay like the spaniards in south america. and so seventeenth century meknez has perished while the almohad walls and towers of the tenth century still stand. the principal old buildings of morocco are defensive and religious--and under the latter term the beautiful collegiate houses (the medersas) of fez and salé may fairly be included, since the educational system of islam is essentially and fundamentally theological. of old secular buildings, palaces or private houses, virtually none are known to exist; but their plan and decorations may easily be reconstituted from the early chronicles, and also from the surviving palaces built in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, and even those which the wealthy nobles of modern morocco are building to this day. the whole of civilian moslem architecture from persia to morocco is based on four unchanging conditions: a hot climate, slavery, polygamy and the segregation of women. the private house in mahometan countries is in fact a fortress, a convent and a temple: a temple of which the god (as in all ancient religions) frequently descends to visit his cloistered votaresses. for where slavery and polygamy exist every house-master is necessarily a god, and the house he inhabits a shrine built about his divinity. [illustration: _from a photograph from the service des beaux-arts au maroc_ rabat--gate of the kasbah of the oudayas] the first thought of the moroccan chieftain was always defensive. as soon as he pitched a camp or founded a city it had to be guarded against the hungry hordes who encompassed him on every side. each little centre of culture and luxury in moghreb was an islet in a sea of perpetual storms. the wonder is that, thus incessantly threatened from without and conspired against from within--with the desert at their doors, and their slaves on the threshold--these violent men managed to create about them an atmosphere of luxury and stability that astonished not only the obsequious native chronicler but travellers and captives from western europe. the truth is, as has been often pointed out, that, even until the end of the seventeenth century, the refinements of civilization were in many respects no greater in france and england than in north africa. north africa had long been in more direct communication with the old empires of immemorial luxury, and was therefore farther advanced in the arts of living than the spain and france of the dark ages; and this is why, in a country that to the average modern european seems as savage as ashantee, one finds traces of a refinement of life and taste hardly to be matched by carlovingian and early capetian europe. iii the brief almoravid dynasty left no monuments behind it. fez had already been founded by the idrissites, and its first mosques (kairouiyin and les andalous) existed. of the almoravid fez and marrakech the chroniclers relate great things; but the wild hilalian invasion and the subsequent descent of the almohads from the high atlas swept away whatever the first dynasties had created. the almohads were mighty builders, and their great monuments are all of stone. the earliest known example of their architecture which has survived is the ruined mosque of tinmel, in the high atlas, discovered and photographed by m. doutté. this mosque was built by the inspired mystic, ibn-toumert, who founded the line. following him came the great palace-making sultans whose walled cities of splendid mosques and towers have romanesque qualities of mass and proportion, and, as m. raymond koechlin has pointed out, inevitably recall the "robust simplicity of the master builders who at the very same moment were beginning in france the construction of the first gothic cathedrals and the noblest feudal castles." [illustration: _from a photograph from the service des beaux-arts au maroc_ fez--medersa bouanyana] in the thirteenth century, with the coming of the merinids, moroccan architecture grew more delicate, more luxurious, and perhaps also more peculiarly itself. that interaction of spanish and arab art which produced the style known as moorish reached, on the african side of the straits, its greatest completeness in morocco. it was under the merinids that moorish art grew into full beauty in spain, and under the merinids that fez rebuilt the mosque kairouiyin and that of the andalusians, and created six of its nine _medersas_, the most perfect surviving buildings of that unique moment of sober elegance and dignity. the cherifian dynasties brought with them a decline in taste. a crude desire for immediate effect, and the tendency toward a more barbaric luxury, resulted in the piling up of frail palaces as impermanent as tents. yet a last flower grew from the deformed and dying trunk of the old empire. the saadian sultan who invaded the soudan and came back laden with gold and treasure from the great black city of timbuctoo covered marrakech with hasty monuments of which hardly a trace survives. but there, in a nettle-grown corner of a ruinous quarter, lay hidden till yesterday the chapel of the tombs: the last emanation of pure beauty of a mysterious, incomplete, forever retrogressive and yet forever forward-straining people. the merinid tombs of fez have fallen; but those of their destroyers linger on in precarious grace, like a flower on the edge of a precipice. iv moroccan architecture, then, is easily divided into four groups: the fortress, the mosque, the collegiate building and the private house. [illustration: _from a photograph from the service des beaux-arts au maroc_ fez--the praying-chapel in the medersa el attarine] the kernel of the mosque is always the _mihrab_, or niche facing toward the kasbah of mecca, where the _imam_[ ] stands to say the prayer. this arrangement, which enabled as many as possible of the faithful to kneel facing the _mihrab_, results in a ground-plan necessarily consisting of long aisles parallel with the wall of the _mihrab_, to which more and more aisles are added as the number of worshippers grows. where there was not space to increase these lateral aisles they were lengthened at each end. this typical plan is modified in the moroccan mosques by a wider transverse space, corresponding with the nave of a christian church, and extending across the mosque from the praying niche to the principal door. to the right of the _mihrab_ is the _minbar_, the carved pulpit (usually of cedar-wood incrusted with mother-of-pearl and ebony) from which the koran is read. in some algerian and egyptian mosques (and at cordova, for instance) the _mihrab_ is enclosed in a sort of screen called the _maksoura_; but in morocco this modification of the simpler plan was apparently not adopted. the interior construction of the mosque was no doubt usually affected by the nearness of roman or byzantine ruins. m. saladin points out that there seem to be few instances of the use of columns made by native builders; but it does not therefore follow that all the columns used in the early mosques were taken from roman temples or christian basilicas. the arab invaders brought their architects and engineers with them; and it is very possible that some of the earlier mosques were built by prisoners or fortune-hunters from greece or italy or spain. at any rate, the column on which the arcades of the vaulting rests in the earlier mosques, as at tunis and kairouan, and the mosque el kairouiyin at fez, gives way later to the use of piers, foursquare, or with flanking engaged pilasters as at algiers and tlemcen. the exterior of the mosques, as a rule, is almost entirely hidden by a mushroom growth of buildings, lanes and covered bazaars; but where the outer walls have remained disengaged they show, as at kairouan and cordova, great masses of windowless masonry pierced at intervals with majestic gateways. beyond the mosque, and opening into it by many wide doors of beaten bronze or carved cedar-wood, lies the court of the ablutions. the openings in the façade were multiplied in order that, on great days, the faithful who were not able to enter the mosque might hear the prayers and catch a glimpse of the _mihrab_. in a corner of the courts stands the minaret. it is the structure on which moslem art has played the greatest number of variations, cutting off its angles, building it on a circular or polygonal plan, and endlessly modifying the pyramids and pendentives by which the ground-plan of one story passes into that of the next. these problems of transition, always fascinating to the architect, led in persia, mesopotamia and egypt to many different compositions and ways of treatment; but in morocco the minaret, till modern times, remained steadfastly square, and proved that no other plan is so beautiful as this simplest one of all. surrounding the court of the ablutions are the school-rooms, libraries and other dependencies, which grew as the mahometan religion prospered and arab culture developed. the medersa was a farther extension of the mosque: it was the academy where the moslem schoolman prepared his theology and the other branches of strange learning which, to the present day, make up the curriculum of the mahometan university. the medersa is an adaptation of the private house to religious and educational ends; or, if one prefers another analogy, it is a _fondak_ built above a miniature mosque. the ground-plan is always the same: in the centre an arcaded court with a fountain, on one side the long narrow praying-chapel with the _mihrab_, on the other a class-room with the same ground-plan; and on the next story a series of cell-like rooms for the students, opening on carved cedar-wood balconies. this cloistered plan, where all the effect is reserved for the interior façades about the court, lends itself to a delicacy of detail that would be inappropriate on a street-front; and the medersas of fez are endlessly varied in their fanciful but never exuberant decoration. m. tranchant de lunel has pointed out (in "france-maroc") with what a sure sense of suitability the merinid architects adapted this decoration to the uses of the buildings. on the lower floor, under the cloister, is a revêtement of marble (often alabaster) or of the almost indestructible ceramic mosaic.[ ] on the floor above, massive cedar-wood corbels ending in monsters of almost gothic inspiration support the fretted balconies; and above rise stucco interlacings, placed too high up to be injured by man, and guarded from the weather by projecting eaves. [illustration: _from a photograph from the service des beaux-arts au maroc_ salé--interior court of the medersa] the private house, whether merchant's dwelling or chieftain's palace, is laid out on the same lines, with the addition of the reserved quarters for women; and what remains in spain and sicily of moorish secular architecture shows that, in the merinid period, the play of ornament must have been--as was natural--even greater than in the medersas. the arab chroniclers paint pictures of merinid palaces, such as the house of the favourite at cordova, which the soberer modern imagination refused to accept until the medersas of fez were revealed, and the old decorative tradition was shown in the eighteenth century moroccan palaces. the descriptions given of the palaces of fez and of marrakech in the preceding articles, which make it unnecessary, in so slight a note as this, to go again into the detail of their planning and decoration, will serve to show how gracefully the art of the mosque and the medersa was lightened and domesticated to suit these cool chambers and flower-filled courts. with regard to the immense fortifications that are the most picturesque and noticeable architectural features of morocco, the first thing to strike the traveller is the difficulty of discerning any difference in the probable date of their construction until certain structural peculiarities are examined, or the ornamental details of the great gateways are noted. thus the almohad portions of the walls of fez and rabat are built of stone, while later parts are of rubble; and the touch of european influence in certain gateways of meknez and fez at once situate them in the seventeenth century. but the mediæval outline of these great piles of masonry, and certain technicalities in their plan, such as the disposition of the towers, alternating in the inner and outer walls, continued unchanged throughout the different dynasties; and this immutability of the moroccan military architecture enables the imagination to picture, not only what was the aspect of the fortified cities which the greeks built in palestine and syria, and the crusaders brought back to europe, but even that of the far-off assyrio-chaldæan strongholds to which the whole fortified architecture of the middle ages in europe seems to lead back. [illustration: _from a photograph from the service des beaux-arts au maroc_ marrakech--the gate of the portuguese] footnotes: [ ] the "deacon" or elder of the moslem religion, which has no order of priests. [ ] these moroccan mosaics are called _zellijes_. ix books consulted afrique française (l'), bulletin mensuel du comité de l'afrique française. paris, , rue cassette. bernard, augustin. le maroc. paris, f. alcan, . budgett-meakin. the land of the moors. london, . châtelain, l. recherches archéologiques au maroc. volubilis. (published by the military command in morocco.) les fouilles de volubilis. (extrait du bulletin archéologique, .) chevrillon, a. crépuscule d'islam. cochelet, charles. le naufrage du brick sophie. conférences marocaines. paris, plon-nourrit. doutté, e. en tribu. paris, . foucauld, vicomte de. la reconnaissance au maroc. paris, . france-maroc. revue mensuelle, paris, , rue chauveau-lagarde. gaillard. une ville d'islam, fez. paris, . gayet, al. l'art arabe. paris, . houdas, o. le maroc de à . extrait d'une histoire du maroc intitulée "l'interprète qui s'exprime clairement sur les dynasties de l'orient et de l'occident" par ezziani. paris, e. leroux, . koechlin, raymond. une exposition d'art marocain. (gazette des beaux-arts, juillet-septembre, .) leo africanus, description of africa. loti, pierre. au maroc. migeon, gaston. manuel d'art musulman. ii. les arts plastiques et industriels. paris, a. picard et fils, . saladin, h. manuel d'art musulman. i. l'architecture. paris, a. picard et fils, . segonzac, marquis de. voyages au maroc. paris, . au coeur de l'atlas. paris, . tarde, a. de. les villes du maroc: fez, marrakech, rabat. (journal de l'université des annales, oct., nov., .) windus. a journey to mequinez. london, . index abdallah-ben-aïssa, abd-el-aziz, - abd-el-hafid, - , abd-el-kader, abd-el-moumen, , , abou-el-abbas ("the golden"), , abou hassan, , abou-youssef, agdal, olive-yards of the, ahmed-baba, ahmed-el-hiba, , aïd-el-kebir, the, - aïssaouas, the, of kairouan, dance of, algeria, french conquest of, - almohads, the, invasion of morocco by, - architecture of, , almoravids, the, invasion of morocco by, - destruction of architecture of, , andalusian moors, the, mosque of, , , , , arabs, conquest of morocco by, - architecture, moroccan, four basic conditions of, four groups of, of the almohad dynasty, of the cherifian dynasties, of the merinid dynasty, , , the saadian mausoleum, the collegiate building, - the fortress, the mosque, - the private house, art, moroccan, sources of influence on, , - disappearance of treasures of, , and moorish art, ba-ahmed, builder of the bahia, , , bab f'touh cemetery, at fez, - bahia, the, palace of, at marrakech, - apartment of grand vizier's favourite in, bazaars, of fez, , - of marrakech, - of salé, , beni-merins. _see_ merinids berbers, the, attack of, on fez, , origins of, dialects of, nomadic character of, , heresy and schisms of, bernard, m. augustin, , , , , black guard, the sultan's, - uniform of, moulay-ismaël's method of raising, , - blue men of the sahara, the, bou-jeloud, palace of, , , bugeaud, marshal, carthage, african colonies of, , casablanca, exhibitions at, port of, , catholics, in morocco, , cemetery, el alou, , bab f'touh, - châtelain, m. louis, chella, ruins of, - cherifian dynasties, the, , architecture of, children, moroccan, in the harem, negro, , , - training of, for black guard, - chleuh boys, dance of, christians, captive, and the building of meknez, , , religious liberty to, in africa, , clocks, in sultan's harem at rabat, , cochelet, charles, his "naufrage du brick sophie," colleges, at fez, - , - at salé, - , , moslem, architecture of moroccan, - colors, of north african towns, commerce, moroccan, conti, princesse de, convention of fez, the, courts of justice, moroccan, crowds, moroccan street, , culture, in north africa, - , , dance, of chleuh boys, of the hamadchas, , , - dawn, in africa, djebilets, the, doutté, m., , dust-storm, at marrakech, - education, in morocco, , elakhdar, mosque of, el alou, cemetery of, , el andalous, mosque of, , , , , elbali (old fez), _et seq._ harems of, - eldjid (new fez), , palaces of, - founding of, el kairouiyin, mosque of, , , , - , , , , the praying-hall of, the court of ablutions of, , legend of the tortoise of, el-ksar, , , el-mansour, yacoub, , - elmansour, palace of, empress mother, the, , english emissaries, visit of, to meknez, - exhibitions, planned by general lyautey, - ezziani, chronicler of moulay-ismaël, , , , , , fatimites, the, , fez, the approach to, unchanged character of, ruins of merinid tombs of, , the upper or new, old summer-palace at, - night in, , - antiquity of, palaces of, - the inns at, , , , streets of, - a city of wealth, the merchant of, bazaars of, , , - a melancholy city, , twilight in, the shrines of, mosque of moulay idriss at, , mosque of el kairouiyinat, - the university of, , , medersas of, , - , mosque of el andalous at, , bab f'touh cemetery of, - the potters of, art and culture of, - , the mellah of, harems of old, - the convention of, uprising in, attack of berbers on, exhibitions at, moslem college at, founding of, almoravid conquest of, centre of moroccan learning, catholic diocese at, massacres at, fez elbali, _et seq._, - fez eldjid, , , - , fondak nedjarine, the, at fez, fortifications, moroccan, architecture of, foucauld, vicomte de, , franco-german treaty of , french protectorate in morocco, - work of, - french, conquests in morocco, - at fez, furniture, disappearance of merinid, , ghilis, the, gouraud, general, hamadch, tomb of, , hamadchas, the, ritual dance of, , , - harem, in old fez, - an imperial, - in marrakech, - in old rabat, - hassan, sultan, , , , hassan, tower of, at rabat, , hassanians, the, rule of, - holy war, the, against france, , against spain and portugal, - hospitals, in morocco, , houses, moroccan, architecture of, , color of, plan of, rich private, , ibn-toumert, , idriss i, , idriss ii, , , , , idrissite empire, the, , inns, moroccan, , , , jews, of sefrou, - treatment of north african, kairouan, the alïssaouas of, , great mosque of, , , kairouiyin, mosque of. _see_ el kairouiyin kalaa, ruins of, kenitra, port of, , koechlin, m. raymond, koutoubya, tower of the, , lamothe, general, land, area of cultivated, in morocco, louis xiv, and moulay-ismaël, , , lunel, m. tranchant de, , lyautey, general, , , at sultan's court, appointed resident-general in morocco, military occupation of morocco by, , policy of, _et seq._ economic development of morocco achieved by, - summary of work of, - maclean, sir harry, mamora, forest of, mangin, general, mansourah, mosque of, market, of marrakech, in moulay idriss, of salé, , of sefrou, - marrakech, the road to, - founders of, , , tower of the koutoubya at, , palace of the bahia at, - the lamp-lighters of, mixed population of, bazaars of, - the "morocco" workers of, olive-yards of, the menara of, , a holiday of merchants of, - the square of the dead in, - french administration office at, fruit-market of, dance of chleuh boys in, saadian tombs of, , - , a harem in, - taken by the french, catholic diocese at, chapel of the tombs at, medersa, the, of the oudayas, - attarine, at fez, , - at salé, , architecture of, - mehedyia, phenician colony of, , meknez, building of, - , , the kasbah of, palaces of, stables of, entrance into, ruins of, - sunken gardens of, visit of english emissaries to, - mellah, of fez, of sefrou, - menara, the, in the agdal, , mequinez. _see_ meknez merinids, the, tombs of, at fez, , conquest of morocco by, - architecture of, , , mirador, the imperial, - moorish art, mosque, of elakhador, of el andalous, , , , , of el kairouiyin, , , - , , , , of kairouan, of mansourah, of rabat, of tinmel, , of tunisia, architecture of moroccan, - moulay hafid, moulay-el-hassan, , moulay idriss i, rule of, tomb of, moulay idriss ii, tomb of, , , , rule of, moulay idriss, sacred city of, , , - street of the weavers in, feast of the hamadchas in, - market-place of, whiteness of, founding of, moulay-ismaël, and louis xiv, , , exploits of, - mausoleum of moulay idriss enlarged by, meknez built by, , , , the black guard of, , - description of, palaces of, and english emissaries, , death of, , rule of, successors of, moulay youssef, , , nedjarine, fountain and inn of, night, in fez, - oases, moroccan, , marrakech, _et seq._ sefrou, _et seq._ settat, oudayas, the, kasbah of, , medersa of, - palaces, moroccan, the bahia, - bou-jeloud, - at fez, - at meknez, of moulay-ismaël, phenicians, the, african explorations of, , pilgrimage to salé, a, population, moroccan, varied elements of, , ports, moroccan, , portugal, the holy war against, - pottery, berber, potters' field, the, rabat, , tower of hassan at, , ruins of mosque at, called "camp of victory," sacrifice of the sheep at, _et seq._ sultan's harem of, - visit to a harem in old, - exhibitions at, port of, moslem college at, central laboratory at, railways, moroccan, built by french protectorate, rarb, the, , roads, moroccan, built by french protectorate, romans, the, african explorations of, , saadian sultans, the, history of, - tombs of, , - , rule of, - sacrifice of the sheep, the, - saint-amand, m. de, saladin, m. h., his "manual of moslem architecture," , , salé, first view of, type of untouched moroccan city, , bazaar of, , medersas of, - , , market of, , colors of, schools, in morocco, , sedrata, ruins of, sefrou, - market-place of, - men and women of, , jewish colony of, - senegal, settat, oasis of, sheep, sacrifice of the, - sidi-mohammed, slaves, moroccan, , , - trade in white, _sloughi_, bronze, at volubilis, , soudan, spain, the holy war against, - spanish zone, the, german intrigue in, , stables, of meknez, stewart, commodore, street of the weavers (moulay idriss), streets, moroccan, , - , , tangier, - colors of, taken by the french, tetuan, bronze chandelier of, timbuctoo, the sultanate of, tingitanian mauretania, tinmel, ruins of mosque at, , tlemcen, the conflict for, , touaregs, the, tower, of hassan, , of the koutoubya, , tunisia, almohad sanctuary of, vandals, the, african invasion by, veiled men, the, , versailles and meknez, villages, "sedentary," volubilis, ruins of, - bronze _sloughi_ of, , founded by romans, wedding, jewish, procession bringing gifts for, windus, john, - , women, moroccan, dress of, , of sefrou, , of the harems, - in sultan's harem, - in harems of old fez, , - in harem of marrakech, - in harem of rabat, - negro, , yacoub-el-mansour, , - , youssef-ben-tachfin, * * * * * _by edith wharton_ the greater inclination the touchstone crucial instances the valley of decision sanctuary the descent of man the house of mirth the fruit of the tree the hermit and the wild woman tales of men and ghosts ethan frome the custom of the country xingu * * * * * in morocco fighting france italian backgrounds a motor flight through france artemis to actÆon the decoration of houses _charles scribner's sons_