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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of In the Tail of the Peacock, by Isabel Savory
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: In the Tail of the Peacock
+
+Author: Isabel Savory
+
+Release Date: February 7, 2009 [EBook #28016]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK IN THE TAIL OF THE PEACOCK ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Michael Ciesielski, the Project Gutenberg
+Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net
+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 48 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 1903
+
+
+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, 1903._
+
+
+
+
+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                                             1
+
+
+CHAPTER II
+
+CAMP OUTFIT--A NIGHT AT A CARAVANSERAI--TETUAN--THE
+BRITISH VICE-CONSUL--MOORISH SHOPS--WE VISIT A MOORISH
+HOUSE AND FAMILY                                                   27
+
+
+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                                  63
+
+
+CHAPTER IV
+
+THE FAST OF RAMADHAN--MOHAMMED--HIS LIFE AND INFLUENCE--THE
+FLOOD AT SAFFI--A WALK OUTSIDE TETUAN--THE
+FRENCH CONSUL'S GARDEN-HOUSE--JEWS IN MOROCCO--EUROPEAN
+PROTECTION                                                         97
+
+
+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                                      121
+
+
+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                                                      153
+
+
+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                                               181
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII
+
+MISSIONARIES AT TETUAN--POISONING IN MOROCCO--FATIMA'S
+RECEPTION--DIVORCE--AN EXPEDITION INTO THE ANJERAS--AN
+EMERALD OASIS                                                     217
+
+
+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                                                         249
+
+
+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                            281
+
+
+CHAPTER XI
+
+A PARTING MONA--FORDING SHESHAOUA RIVER--JARS OF FOOD--FIRST
+SIGHT OF MARRAKESH--A PERILOUS CROSSING--RIDE
+INTO MARRAKESH--THE SLAVE MARKET                                  311
+
+
+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                                     339
+
+
+
+
+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                               6
+
+R. ON A PACK                                 12
+
+TWO SHEIKHS                                  18
+
+TANGIER                                      24
+
+TETUAN                                       30
+    _Photo by A. Cavilla, Tangier._
+
+OURSELVES AND BAGGAGE                        34
+
+CLOUDS OVER TETUAN                           44
+
+ALARBI ABRESHA'S HOUSE                       54
+    _Photo by A. Cavilla, Tangier._
+
+OUR CAMP OUTSIDE TETUAN                      60
+
+A VEILED FIGURE OUTSIDE THE GATE             66
+
+A MOHAMMEDAN CEMETERY                        80
+
+OUT SHOPPING                                 90
+
+SHOPS IN TETUAN                              94
+
+A CLUSTER OF COUNTRY WOMEN                  100
+
+A TYPICAL MOORISH STREET                    108
+    _Photo by A. Cavilla, Tangier._
+
+A STREET IN THE JEWS' QUARTER, TETUAN       116
+    _Photo by A. Cavilla, Tangier._
+
+REFUSE GOING OUT OF TETUAN                  124
+
+A MOORISH PRISON GATE                       130
+
+A PEEP OF TETUAN                            138
+    _Photo by A. Cavilla, Tangier._
+
+A SAINT-HOUSE, TETUAN                       148
+
+JINAN DOLERO                                158
+
+OUR SERVANTS, S`LAM AND TAHARA              164
+
+TWO WOMEN FROM THE RIFF COUNTRY             172
+
+SELLING EARTHENWARE POTS                    178
+
+A FERRY-BOAT ON MARKET DAY                  184
+
+THE AUTHOR FORDING THE WAD-EL-MARTINE       188
+
+THE BASHA GOING TO PRAY                     198
+
+THE FEDDAN, TETUAN                          208
+
+CHARMING SNAKES                             214
+
+MOORS AT HOME                               222
+
+STRAW FOR SALE                              230
+
+A GROUP IN THE FEDDAN, TETUAN               236
+
+A BREEZY CAMPING-GROUND ON A ROOF-TOP       254
+
+ILLUSTRATIVE OF THE WAY WE RODE IN MOROCCO  262
+
+LIGHTERS LOADING                            268
+
+AFTER RAIN IN MOGADOR                       274
+
+WHERE MANCHESTER GOODS ARE SOLD, MOGADOR    284
+
+OUR CAMP AT AIN-EL-HADGER                   290
+
+A BLINDFOLDED CAMEL WORKING A WATER-WHEEL   298
+
+SHIPS OF THE DESERT WE PASS ON THE MARCH    308
+
+TRANSPORTING OUR BAGGAGE                    314
+
+MARRAKESH                                   318
+
+THE OPEN GATE                               324
+
+THE KUTOBEA, MARRAKESH                      328
+  _Photo by A. Cavilla, Tangier._
+
+THE WAD-EL-AZELL                            334
+  _Photo by A. Cavilla, Tangier._
+
+THE SULTAN'S GARDEN                         344
+  _Photo by A. Cavilla, Tangier._
+
+THE RIVER TENSIF OUTSIDE MARRAKESH          346
+  _Photo by A. Cavilla, Tangier._
+
+ONE OF OUR LAST CAMPS. LOADING THE CAMEL    350
+
+
+
+
+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 1902 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 1902 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 13, 1901, 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. 6._]
+
+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 _debris_ 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 1902,
+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 _Bab-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 12.45, 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 Judaea 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. 12._]
+
+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
+L31,000. 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 6, 1684, 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. 18._]
+
+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 24: 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 312 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 _Hyaena
+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 _soupcon_ 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
+5 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 L400 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 attache, 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. 24._]
+
+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. 30._]
+
+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 28.
+
+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 _fondak_ (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 L12 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. 34._]
+
+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 1902: 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
+_detours_ 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 _fondak_ 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 _detour_ of the fondak 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 fondak--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 fondak 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
+fondak 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 Wad
+Martil. The Wad Martil is the proud possessor of one of the seven bridges
+which the Empire of Morocco can show--a somewhat quaint construction, but
+a _bona-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. 44._]
+
+Southwards Tetuan faces the Riff country, range after range of mountains,
+inhabited by that indomitable tribe, whose "highlands" are closed to
+Europeans. The river Wad Martil, 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 Wad Martil 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 fondak, 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 cafe"
+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 anaemic copy of a Moorish town, Tetuan has the strength of a
+_bona-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 fondak, 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 cafes 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 cafe. 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 cafes: 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 cafe 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. 54._]
+
+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, cafes, 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 Cordovo 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 cafes 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
+_Bab-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.
+
+Bab-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. 60._]
+
+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 fondak 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 _dak
+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 _pates 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. 66._]
+
+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 Ramadhan 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 _Bab-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 Bab-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 Bab-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. 80._]
+
+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 _Bab-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 Sheshawan,
+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. 90._]
+
+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 L5. 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 cafes 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 12.15 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. 94._]
+
+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 RAMADHAN--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 Ramadhan began.
+Ramadhan, 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.
+
+Ramadhan 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 Ramadhan 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 Ramadhan": this year it was not so.
+During the twenty-eight days of the fast, every night, or rather every
+early morning at 2 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. 100._]
+
+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. Ramadhan 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
+Ramadhan. 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 Ramadhan 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 Ramadhan
+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. Ramadhan 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 role 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 Ramadhan 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. 108._]
+
+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. 116._]
+
+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
+_Bab-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 cortege 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 fondak 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. 124._]
+
+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 cafe 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. 130._]
+
+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. 138._]
+
+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 1492, 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 Caesar
+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 23 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 cafe 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. 148._]
+
+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, 1902, 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. 158._]
+
+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. 164._]
+
+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 2nd Regiment of Tirailleurs
+Algeriens; 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 cafe, 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                    7d.
+Milk                       1d.
+Four eggs                 21/2d.
+Mutton                     6d.
+Apples                     2d.
+Vegetables                 2d.
+Bread three times a week  41/2d.
+Butter twice a week       91/2d.
+
+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, L7 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 10 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 naively
+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. 172._]
+
+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
+Caesar'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 _Bab-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. 178._]
+
+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 L1
+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. 184._]
+
+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,
+cafe-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. 188._]
+
+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 Bab-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. 198._]
+
+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 1902,
+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
+L5 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 L5
+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. 208._]
+
+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 _bona-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. 214._]
+
+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 Ramadhan 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. 222._]
+
+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 L4.
+
+"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
+cafe 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. 230._]
+
+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 Ramadhan 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 _menage_. 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. 236._]
+
+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
+Bab-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 naive 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 _debris_: 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 19 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 fondak 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 fondak 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. 254._]
+
+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 fondak 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 fondak in 1256, 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 fondak, 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. 262._]
+
+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. 268._]
+
+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, 1902,
+and said good-bye to the uneasy _Arpad_ and its primitive _menage_
+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,
+1184."
+
+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. 274._]
+
+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 1581. 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 31st 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. 284._]
+
+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. Said, 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 Said, 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 31st. 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 Said, 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 Said: many tears were flowing,
+and sobs to be heard under the haik. Said 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 Said 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 2 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. 290._]
+
+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 fete 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; Said 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 Said 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 mediaeval 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. 298._]
+
+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 Said 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 Said'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_ (21/2d.).
+
+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 levee 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. 308._]
+
+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. 314._]
+
+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 L3,000 to L5,000.
+
+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 fondak, 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. 318._]
+
+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 Said 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.
+Said 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. 324._]
+
+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 Bab-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 Bab-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. 328._]
+
+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 1072, 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--6.30, 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. 334._]
+
+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. 344._]
+
+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. 346._]
+
+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, _via_ 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 Said 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
+Said. 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 Said 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. 350._]
+
+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.
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+
+ON THE "POLAR STAR"
+IN THE ARCTIC SEA.
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+The Story of the First Italian Expedition to the North Pole.
+
+Translated by WILLIAM LE QUEUX.
+
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+Full-page Photogravure Plates, Panoramas, Maps, etc._, 42s. _net._
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+THE SAILOR KING:
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+_In 2 volumes, cloth gilt, with 16 Full-page Illustrations, including 2
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+       *       *       *       *       *
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+From Saxon Times to the Present Day.
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+By the COUNTESS OF WARWICK.
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+_In 2 large volumes, cloth gilt and gilt top_, 32s. _net. With about 150
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+THE LIFE OF THE
+MARQUESS OF DUFFERIN AND AVA.
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+By C. E. BLACK.
+
+_In 1 large handsome volume, cloth gilt, fully illustrated,_ 16s. _net._
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+       *       *       *       *       *
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+CELEBRITIES AND I.
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+_In cloth gilt_, 16s. _net_.
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+     "Hardly one of the 362 pages lacks its illuminative anecdote. A
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+     appreciations are shrewd and spontaneous. The volume forms very
+     agreeable reading."--_Daily Telegraph._
+
+     "Decidedly entertaining, and, moreover, not without a certain
+     measure of instructiveness."--_Globe._
+
+     "Will be drawn upon for its many anecdotes at hundreds of dinner
+     tables during the winter."--_Leeds Mercury._
+
+     "Miss Henriette Corkran shows the way as a writer of
+     reminiscences. A charming volume."--_World._
+
+     "Possesses in a high degree the power to charm and
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+MARIE CORELLI:
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+The Writer and the Woman.
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+MEMOIRS OF A SOCIAL ATOM
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+By W. E. ADAMS.
+
+_In 2 large handsome volumes, cloth gilt_, 24s. _net_.
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+       *       *       *       *       *
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+SIDE LIGHTS ON THE COURT OF FRANCE.
+
+By LT.-COL. ANDREW C. P. HAGGARD, D.S.O.
+
+_In 1 handsome cloth gilt volume_, 12s.
+
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+ROYAL PALACES AND THEIR MEMORIES.
+
+By SARAH A. TOOLEY.
+
+_In 1 large handsome volume, cloth gilt,_ 16s. _net._
+
+With 48 Full-page Plates and a Photogravure Frontispiece.
+
+     "Mrs. Tooley serves up her vast amount of information in a most
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+     the printing is in keeping with the cover."--_St. James's
+     Gazette._
+
+     "The scheme of the work is distinctly a good one, and it has been
+     carried out with a persevering industry and careful research
+     which entitle the author to no small measure of praise. An
+     extremely handsome and profusely illustrated volume."--_World._
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+THE WOBURN LIBRARY OF NATURAL HISTORY.
+
+Edited by his Grace the DUKE OF BEDFORD, K.G.
+
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+_Each volume in crown 4to, handsome cloth gilt and gilt top, fully
+illustrated with Coloured and other Plates,_ 12s. 6d. _net._
+
+THE FIRST VOLUME NOW READY.
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+WILD FRUITS OF THE COUNTRY SIDE.
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+By F. E. HULME, F.L.S., F.S.A.,
+
+Author of "Familiar Wild Flowers," etc.
+
+_With 36 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.,
+
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+_With 16 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."--_Athenaeum._
+
+
+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:
+
+1. Obvious punctuation errors repaired.
+
+2. 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=]
+
+3. List of corrections:
+
+Page 24, "colourness" changed to "colourless"
+
+Page 37, "venalty" changed to "venality"
+
+Page 57, "matresses" changed to "mattresses"
+
+Page 58, "exemple" changed to "example"
+
+Page 70, "Hillali" changed to "Hilalli"
+
+Page 94, "a.m." changed to "p.m."
+
+Page 187, "Morocoo" changed to "Morocco"
+
+Page 197, "trumpter" changed to "trumpeter"
+
+Page 255, "farthur" changed to "farther"
+
+Page 262, "staple" changed to "stable"
+
+Page 324, "floor" changed to "flour"
+
+Page 345, "votex" changed to "vortex"
+
+Page 346, "dozon" changed to "dozen"
+
+
+
+
+
+End of Project Gutenberg's In the Tail of the Peacock, by Isabel Savory
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