Ernest Alby

Ruins of Tekedemta—Abd-el-Kader’s schemes—Attempt to convert me—More tribute—Terms of exchange—Tumblers and Singers—Restoration of Tekedemta.

On the morning of the 29th I begged the Sultan to allow Meurice and myself to go and see the ruins of Tekedemta, and the works carried on there by his troops. He told us to go without fear, and ordered one of his negroes to accompany us. We accordingly started, and after walking for half an hour we reached the ruins of Tekedemta. The ground on which the city stood is very broken and without a trace of vegetation; part of the wall of a fort was still standing, it was about ten feet thick at the base, and a few feet from the ground it fell back to the thickness of about seven feet. The wall was defended by nine towers, the foundations of which were still to be seen: they were without the line of the wall, but joined to it. The whole enclosure is one thousand eight hundred feet long, by one thousand one hundred and fifty feet broad. The remains within the fort prove that it was filled with streets, shops, and houses. On a hill a few hundred yards from the citadel, may be traced the foundation of the ancient Casabah or Bey’s palace, surrounded by fortifications: on these foundations Abd-el-Kader is going to build a new one. At the foot of the hill, about ten minutes’ walk from these ruins, flows the Ouet Mina. The site of the town is commanded by lofty mountains on every side, except towards the west, where a gentle ascent leads up to it. A road runs from hence to Mascara.

After examining the ruins, we went towards a redoubt which Abd-el-Kader was constructing at a distance of two hundred yards to the eastward of the Casabah, and there we found the Sultan with his Chief Secretary, Ben Abu, and Milud-Ben-Arrach, reclining on the earth, which had been thrown up in digging a ditch. There was nothing in his costume to distinguish him from the common labourers: he wore a huge hat plaited of the leaves of the dwarf palm tree, with brims full three feet in circumference fastened with a worsted cord and tassels to the crown, which was at least a foot and a half high and pointed at the top.

He greeted us kindly, and motioned us to sit beside him: encouraged by this gracious reception I ventured to ask him what were his projects in rebuilding Tekedemta.

“My predecessors, who dwelt in this city,” replied he, “ruled from Tunis to Morocco, and I will restore it to its ancient splendour; I will gather together the tribes in this place, where we shall be secure from the attacks of the French, and when all my forces are collected I will descend from this steep rock like a vulture from his nest, and drive the Christians out of Algiers, Oran and Bona: if, indeed, you were content with those three cities I would suffer you to remain there, for the sea is not mine and I have no ships; but you want our plains and our inland cities and our mountains; nay, you even covet our horses, our tents, our camels, and our women, and you leave your own country to come and take that in which Mahomed has placed his people. But your Sultan is not a saint and a horseman as I am, and your horses will stumble and fall on our mountains, for they are not sure-footed like our horses, and your soldiers will die of sickness, and those whom the pestilence has spared will fall by the bullets of the Arab horsemen, for you are dogs who never pray to God.”

I made no reply to this pompous harangue, but went to look at the works. The men were digging a ditch to enclose an area of about fifty square yards: they carried the earth which they dug out towards the spot on which the redoubt was to stand, as we do in throwing up blockhouses. This fort was intended to receive a garrison for the protection of the workmen. It stands on a slope and is commanded by the ruins of the ancient citadel and by a hill, so that even without cannon the garrison might easily be forced to evacuate.

After taking a cursory view of these works, we returned to the ruins of the citadel, still accompanied by the negro, who could not understand what pleasure we could find in walking about among old stones, and who kept muttering that we were “dogs” and “asses” all the time that we were exploring.

At sunset we returned to the camp, where we heard a great uproar, and soon discovered a crowd of Arabs fighting and struggling in the midst of a dense cloud of dust: they were all rolling on the ground and wrestling together, screaming, swearing, and abusing each other, while the chaous were showering blows to the right and to the left upon them.

We hastened to our tent somewhat alarmed at the scuffle, and on asking the cause of it, we heard that the chaous had been distributing barley among the horsemen, and that a few measures had been left over: the Arabs instantly rushed upon them, and in their efforts to seize a few handfuls of barley they made the riot we had seen.

I was sitting in the tent waiting for supper, when one of Abd-el-Kader’s cousins, a marabout, hastily entered. “I am sent by the Sultan,” said he, “to ask whether thou wilt embrace the true faith and remain among us, and to tell thee that if thou wilt, he will make thee as powerful as himself.”

I replied, that I wished to return to my own people.

“Thou shalt have women, horses, arms, and plenty of powder, and thou shalt be as rich, as great, and as powerful as the Sultan himself.”

“If,” said I, “the Sultan will give me the command of a ship I will become a Mahomedan, and I will go to the coast of Cherchell to fish for coral with the Italian prisoners, and we will enrich the Sultan.”

I suppose the marabout guessed where I should really go if my conditions were accepted, for he left the tent without saying another word.

While we were at the ruins, the tribes who dwelt at half a day’s march from Tekedemta had brought kuskussu and a roasted sheep, and the people of Milianah, all kinds of fruit. Ben Faka regaled us sumptuously with white bread, fruit, and a roast leg of mutton. The white loaves were brought to the camp every day by the tribes, and were the only pay given to Abd-el-Kader’s workmen.

Just as I was ending my splendid repast, Ben Faka came to me with Abd-el-Kader’s command to go his tent. I hastened to obey the summons, full of the hope of liberty. The Sultan received me as usual, with enquiries after my health, after which he commanded me to write to General Rapatel, and to ask him whether he would give in exchange for me three of the Arab prisoners at Marseilles, to be selected by Abd-el-Kader. I refused to write unless the Sultan would at the same time name a ransom for my fellow-prisoners, and for Lanternier and the four women at Droma. After a very long discussion he agreed to exchange Meurice, the three Italians and myself, against twenty Arabs, but he refused to give up the women at all, and as I knew that poor Lanternier would not thank me for separating him from his wife and daughter I did not mention him in my letter to the General. When I had finished it the Sultan asked me whether I would not write to my family, and perceiving my hesitation, he assured me that I might write without fear for that no one should read my letter. I accordingly put both letters into the same cover, sealed them with a huge seal, and saw the Sultan give them to a man from Milianah, with orders to take them straight to Algiers.

I returned to the tent in high spirits to tell Meurice what I had done; the poor fellow laughed, wept, and thanked me all at once: we talked of our country and of our friends, and promised to stand by each other in good as well as in evil fortune, for we already looked upon our deliverance as certain. We were about to lie down to sleep, full of these delightful thoughts, when we found that our rug was gone. I should have complained to Abd-el-Kader, but he was at his prayers, so we were forced to stretch ourselves on the bare ground. The cold was piercing, and in the middle of the night a violent storm came on, so that before morning we were soaked to the skin.

On the 29th, Abd-el-Kader sent Milud-Ben-Arrach with the cavalry towards Mostaganem to reconnoitre, and gave us leave to revisit the ruins of Tekedemta. Some of the workmen were carting stones to build the Casabah, others preparing clay to serve as mortar, and others again finishing the redoubt. The neighbouring tribes came every day with provisions and oxen laden with wood, and a party of Moors was sent to burn lime at the nearest spot at which it could be found, about half a day’s journey from Tekedemta. At about a hundred and fifty paces to the east of the Casabah, some soldiers were busied in clearing a very large old vaulted cistern, which Abd-el-Kader has since turned into a general ammunition store; in order to avert suspicion, he has bricked up the door and built a sort of guardroom on the top. The tools were all very bad, with the exception of a few picks and shovels that had been stolen from us. The ditch varied in breadth and depth, and the slopes were uneven; and although the redoubt stood on a declivity, there was no opening to carry off the water; the earth was only bound together with branches of gum tree and oleander, and as the winters are very severe in these mountains it is more than probable that by this time the rain has washed the slopes into the ditch and that the Sultan’s redoubt is reduced to a heap of mud.

We saw the three Italians at work here, upon which I expostulated with the Sultan, and represented to him that they were sailors and not labourers, and that moreover he was not at war with the nation to which they belonged; but he replied that they must earn their food, and that he was at war with every nation, for that as he had no seaports their friendship was useless to him, and that he was the greatest and most powerful of all Sultans, and feared no one.

On returning to the camp we found that a party of tumblers had arrived there and were performing for the amusement of the soldiers, who watched them with great attention. But we had other diversions besides this; every evening an Arab crouching in front of Abd-el-Kader’s tent, sang for hour after hour. I never could catch all the words, but the following phrases were constantly repeated to a monotonous tune—

“The Sultan is great, but Mahomed is yet greater.”

“The Sultan is very great, he is generous, brave, and holy.”

“The marabouts of Mecca are very great and holy.”

“The Sultan has fine horses; the Sultan has many horses, and they are all excellent.”

“The Sultan has immense treasures and much powder.”

“The Arabs have fruitful plains; they have mountains covered with trees, and many rivers flow from them.”

“We have beautiful women.”

“Our horses are fleet: no other horses can keep up with them.”

“Our camels are very strong; we have great herds of cattle and sheep.”

“Our guns are very good.”

“We have powder—plenty of powder.”

“Let us pray that all Christian dogs may perish.”

“Plenty of powder.”

The soldiers flocked round the singer and listened with deep interest to this patriotic and religious hymn.

A marabout, a friend of Ben Faka’s, came nearly every evening to our tent, and sang for hours in the same style; but his voice was so harsh and shrill, and the burden of his song so tedious, that one of our chief annoyances was the having our ears assailed for such a length of time by his deafening psalmody.

On the 2nd of October it froze even within the tents in this mountainous region, and there was no grass left for the camels near Tekedemta; accordingly the Sultan sent them to the table land to the southward where there was excellent pasture. These mountains abound in game of every kind, which the soldiers caught and ate unknown to Abd-el-Kader. The market established by the Sultan at Tekedemta is well supplied with game, and with fish from the Ouet Mina which is full of them, and of a sort of tortoise which lives in the mud and is equally disagreeable to the taste and the smell, whereas the land tortoises, which are nearly as numerous, are delicious when properly cooked.

Abd-el-Kader carried on the works at the redoubt with great ardour; fifty workmen were constantly employed upon them. To celebrate the inauguration of the new Tekedemta, the Sultan had the cannon brought to the redoubt, where it was loaded with stones and fired off three times, but so unskilfully that the stones flew into the midst of the camp to the great peril both of man and beast. At each discharge the marabouts and the workmen cried out “The Sultan is great!”

Abd-el-Kader has since sent seven cannons from Mascara to Tekedemta: they were old Spanish six and eight pounders, which had all been spiked, and were mounted on very bad carriages of Arab manufacture. Fifteen or twenty families have emigrated from Mascara to Tekedemta, at the Sultan’s command: but it will not be easy to induce the whole population of Mascara to leave their habitations and to settle in a cold, unhealthy spot to which all provisions must be fetched on mules from the distance of a day’s journey, and where they consequently are very dear. Abd-el-Kader hopes to breathe new life into these remains of past greatness and splendor, but the descendants of the men who founded and built this city are unable to tell the prisoner or the traveller so much as the very name of the Sultans who had their capital in these mountains.