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 13th of August, 1844. Hostilities began at 9 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 2 P.M. The 'Gemappes,' 100; 'Suffren,' 99; 'Triton,' 80; ships of the line. 'Belle Poule,' 60, 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 16th, 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 10th, the English frigate, 'Warspite,' on the 13th, 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 outflous(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 15th, 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.)
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 1856 was: British goods, £101,773 6_s_., foreign goods, £33,793.
The goods exported from Tangier during the same year was: For British ports, £63,580 10_s_., for foreign ports, £13,683.
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 203, the united tonnage of which was 10,883; foreign ships 110, the total tonnage of which was 4,780.
Cleared: British ships 207, the united tonnage of which was 10,934; foreign ships 110, the total tonnage of which was 4,780.
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 2,000 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.
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 1855 was: For British ports, £228,112 3_s_. 2_d_., for foreign ports, £55,965 13_s_. 1_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 1855 was: British goods, £136,496 7_s_. 6_d_., foreign goods £31,222 11_s_. 5_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.
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 inRabat 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 £34,860 1_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.
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 1855 was:—Bales of wool, 6,410; almonds, 200 serons; grain, 642,930 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 wilfulcasting into the anchorage-ground of stone-ballast by foreigners.British masters are under control, but foreigners will persist, chieflySardinian masters.
[1] The predecessor of Muley Abd Errahman.
[2] 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. TheMoravediwere "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 theMarabouteenwere 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.
[3] According to others the Sâdia reigned before the Shereefs.
[4] I was greatly astonished to read in Mr. Hay's "Western Barbary," (p. 123), 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.
[5] 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."
[6] 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.
[7] See Appendix at the end of this volume.
[8] The middle Western Region consists of Algiers and part of Tunis.
[9] 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. 2).
[10] In Latin, Mauri, Maurice, Maurici, Maurusci, and it is supposed, so called by the Greeks from their dark complexions.
[11] The more probable derivation of this word is frombar, 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."
[12] Procopius, de Bello Vandilico, lib. ii. cap. 10.
[13] Some derive it fromSarak, an Arabic word which signifies to steal, and hence, call the conquerors thieves. Others, and with more probability, derive it fromSharak, the east, and make them Orientals, and others say there is an Arabic wordSaracini, 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.
[14] Some suppose thatAmayeeghmeans "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, 1799), 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 theAssyrians, 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."
[15] 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.
[16] Xenophon, in his Anabasis, speaks of ostriches in Mesopotamia being run down by fleet horses.
[17] 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 ofRas, head, anddirum, 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.
[18] 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.
[19] Tangier, Mogador, Wadnoun, and Sous have already been described, wholly, or in part.
[20] In 936, Arzila was sacked by the English, and remained for twenty years uninhabited.
[21] 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.
[22] So called, it is supposed, from the quantity of aniseed grown in the neighbourhood.
[23] 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.
[24] 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.
[25] 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.
[26] 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.
[27] I imagine we shall never know the truth of this until the French march an army into Fez, and sack the library.
[28] It is true enough what the governor says aboutquietness, 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.
[29] 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.
[30] A person going to the Emperor without a present, is like a menace at court, for a present corresponds to our "good morning."
[31]Bash, means chief, as Bash-Mameluke, chief of the Mamelukes. It is a Turkish term.
[32] This office answers vulgarly to ourBootsat English inns.
[33] Bismilla, Arabic for "In the name of God!" the Mohammedan grace before meat, and also drink.
[34] 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.
[35] 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.
[36] 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."
[37] 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 acoup-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 ofeuceinte, 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.
[38] Kaemtz's Meteorology, p. 191.
[39] 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.
[40] 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. 3, "Mogrel-el-Aska" was corrected to "Mogrel-el-Aksa"; in ch. 4, "lattely" to "lately"; in ch. 7, "book" to "brook"; in ch. 9, "cirumstances" to "circumstances". Also, "Amabasis" was corrected to "Anabasis" in footnote 16.]
End of Project Gutenberg's Travels in Morocco, Vol. 2., by James Richardson