Pleasing to wake up under the fig trees with all our cloaks and blankets wet with dew, to find our guard, the Maalem, still sound asleep, and be accosted by a tracker who informed us that many of the cattle of the town had been driven off the night before, and who would hardly believe that all our animals were safe. Soon parties from the town, armed and muffled up in cloaks against the morning air, rode out from underneath the horseshoe gateway, and spread in all directions, trying to strike the trail of the “mad herdsmen,” as they were called along the Highland Border in the days before prosperity had rendered Scotland the home of commonplace.
Though sharp of eye, it did not strike me that the Arabs and Shillah were experienced trackers. They rode about too much, and must have crossed the trail of the lost cattle a hundred times, and I kept thinking that an “ArribeÑo” [119] from the River Plate would have done better work than the whole tribe. Still, as they scattered on the hills, their white clothes just appearing now and then behind the clumps of trees, as they quartered all the ground, they fell effectively into the middle distance, and no doubt if they never found their cattle, on the first fine night they would recoup themselves from some neighbouring village in the hills. Cattle and horse-stealing, with an occasional higher flight into the regions of abduction of young girls, seem to be staple industries in all pastoral countries, and nowhere but in western Texas are taken very seriously; but there the horse-thief hangs. Camped once outside a village called Bel-arosis, on the road from Tangier to Rabat, a raiding party attacked the place upon a rainy night, fought quite a lively action, the bullets coming through my tent, drove off some horses and several yoke of oxen, and in the morning the Kaid rode up on horseback, his followers behind him, in just the spirit that a gentleman at home starts out to hunt. He praised his God for his good luck, and said he reckoned (by Allah’s help) to retake all the “Creagh,” and drive above a thousand dollars’ worth of sheep, of cattle, and horses, from the weakest neighbours of the nearest hostile tribe he met.
In all the actions that take place consequent upon these cattle raids, but few are slain, for though both the Arabs and the Berbers all have guns, their style of fighting is a survival from the time they carried bows. They rarely charge, and never engage hand-to-hand, but gallop to and fro and fire their guns with both eyes shut, or, turning on their horses, fire over the tail; so few are killed, except the prisoners, who generally are butchered in cold blood, if they are not of such account as to be worth a ransom. A merry, pleasant life enough for able-bodied men, and not unhealthy, and one that makes them singularly bad subjects for missionary work. So stony is the ground in the vineyard of the tribes, that up to now I never heard of any missionary so bold or foolish as to attempt to dig. A day will come, no doubt, when their hearts will prove more malleable; but I fear before that time their bodies will have to be much wrought upon by rifles, revolvers, and the other civilising agents which commonly precede the introduction of our faith.Leaving Amsmiz, the road to Sus leads over foothills all of red argillaceous earth and fissured deeply here and there by winter rains. Now and then strange effects of coloured earth, blue, yellow, green, and mauve, diversify the scene. The road leads through a straggling oak wood and emerges at a village, where, in the middle, the county council is assembled in a thatched mosque. Mosques serve for council chambers, meeting places, and in villages for travellers to sleep in, for throughout Morocco the sanctuary is never closed, and thus the people feel their God is always there, and not laid up in lavender for six days in the week.
The Maalem who had accompanied us as guide, and as a guarantee that we were creditable folk—for in the wilder districts of Morocco travellers take a man in every district to convoy them to the next—had reached his limit, and, laying down his gun, entered the mosque to get another man. What he said there I do not know; if he had doubts perhaps he uttered them, at any rate, after a most unseasonable wait, which kept us all on pins and needles, he emerged, bringing a most ill-favoured tribesman, who came up to me and, kissing my clothes, asked for my blessing. I gave it him as well as I was able, but fancied he was not satisfied, as he retired muttering in Shillah, of which I did not understand a word. The Maalem bade us good-bye, and asked for cartridges, which, of course, we gave, but how they benefited him is a moot point, for they were intended for a small-sized Winchester; he drew his charge and crammed the four or five cartridges we gave him into his old Tower gun, but as I did not pass by Amsmiz on my return, I have no information how he fared when he touched off the piece.
Little by little the road got worse until we entered a tremendous gorge, just like a staircase, which made the worst roads in the Sierra Morena look like Piccadilly by comparison. Only a mule, an Iceland pony, or a horse bred in the mountain districts of Morocco could have coped with such a road, and, as it was, the efforts of the poor brutes were pitiable to see. Under our feet, at a great depth below, the Wad el N’fiss boiled furiously amongst the stones, winding and rewinding like a watch spring, and forcing us to cross it many times, when its swift current proved so formidable that, although not more than three feet deep, we had to enter altogether in a group to keep our feet. As we were toiling up a steep incline, a shouting brought our hearts into our mouths, and, looking back, we saw two mountaineers rushing to intercept us, from a neighbouring hill. No time for any consultation, or to do more than cock our miserable guns and sit quite meekly waiting for the worst. On came the mountaineers, bounding from stone to stone till they appeared upon the road and blocked our way. Long guns, curved daggers, and almost naked save for their long woollen shirts, their side locks flying in the wind, they looked most formidable, and poured out at once a volume of guttural Shillah which sounded menacing. Mohammed-el-Hosein, who with Ali the muleteer spoke Shillah, interpreted to Swani, who, half in Arabic and half in Spanish (which he called Turkish) informed me what they said.
It seemed the desperadoes wanted us to stop until a little boy brought down some Indian corn and milk, for it appeared it was the custom of those hills never to let a well-dressed Moor pass without some little offering. Of course a poor man, or anyone to whom the maize and milk would have been of great service, passed by unnoticed, as in other lands. I graciously assented, and in due course a boy appeared carrying a wooden bowl, from which I drank and passed it to my followers after the usual grace. [123a] The tribesmen would accept no money, but asked me to say a word for them about their taxes, which were not paid, to their liege lord. As might be expected of me I said I would, and should have done so had I known who their lord was or where he lived, or had I chanced to meet the lord in a more seasonable place. Little by little we entered the zone of Arar trees (Callitris Quadrivalvis) about which Hooker says: “This tree has no congener, its nearest ally being a South African genus of Cupressus (Widdingtoniana).” [123b] Various writers, as Shaw [123c] and Daubeny, [123d] have attempted to identify this tree with the “T??a,” of Theophrastus, and the Thyine Wood of the Apocalypse. Daubeny makes both Martial and Lucian refer to it under the name of Citrus, and Hooker is of opinion that the “Citrea mensa” of Petronius Arbiter was made of Arar-wood. An ingenious writer (Captain Cook, “Sketches in Spain”) is almost certain that the roof of the Mosque of Cordova is of Arar, because the Spaniards refer to it as being made of Alerce. Alerce happens to mean larch in Spanish, but when did a derivation hunter ever allow that the people of any country really understood the meaning of words in their own paltry language? It is perhaps well not to question too closely the dogmas of science, and what prudent man would aver that anything might not be found in the veracious pages of the Apocalypse?
The Arars spread all over the mountains in a dense low scrub, rarely attaining more than ten feet high, on account of the frequent fires which the inhabitants light in the spring to obtain pasture for their goats and sheep. In an angle of the road I passed four fine old trees, perhaps forty feet in height, immensely branchy, and with trunks measuring possibly two-and-a-half feet in diameter. In the glades between the cedars patches of Indian corn were ripening; some was dead ripe, but no one dared to gather it, for the Kaid of Kintafi, into whose territory we now had passed, had issued orders that he would give the signal for the harvest, and had not yet seen fit to give the word. Well do the Spaniards say that, “fear, not walls protect the vineyard,” [124] for not a house stood within several miles of some of the maize patches and still not a head of corn was touched.
The Kaid of Kintafi, who was destined to be my captor, had some years before waged war with Muley-el-Hassan, the late Sultan of Morocco. The Sultan had invaded the mountain territory of Kintafi, and destroyed most of the villages, but not being able to reduce the fortress of the Kaid had won him to his side by offering him the hand of either his sister or his daughter, and had departed after having brought the war to a conclusion, on the peace-with-honour plan. The Kaid rendered him henceforth a limited obedience, responding to his overlord’s demands for taxes, and for assistance in the field when he thought fit, but taking care not to rebuild his villages, so that the aforesaid overlord might find a desert through which to pass if the fit took him to again commence hostilities. El Kintafi, for after the Scottish fashion he is designated territorially, is of the Berber race, and although speaking Arabic he speaks it as foreigner. He is reckoned one of the greatest chieftains of the Berber people in the south.
Eight or nine months of drought had rendered the plain country through which I passed up to Amsmiz almost a desert, and it was pitiful to see the people digging for a kind of earth-nut, locally known as Yerna, white in colour and semi-poisonous till after many washings. The plant I have not been able to identify, but the leaves are something like one of the umbelliferÆ. Hooker does not seem to notice it in his Botany of Morocco, and perhaps, when he was in the south, famine had not forced the people to dig for it, or the small thin leaves had all been withered by the heat.
Crawling along the mountain roads I found myself trying to estimate which of the two entailed most misery upon Mankind, the old-time famine, which I saw going on all round me in Morocco, caused by want of water and failure of the crops, or the artificial modern and economic famine so familiar in all large towns, where in the West End the rich die from a plethora of food, and in the East End the poor exist just at subsistence limit by continual work. No doubt, in modern towns, the poor enjoy the blessings of improved sanitation, gas, and impure water, laid on in insufficient quantities to every house; of education, that is, illusory instruction to the fifth standard, to fit them to drive carts and tend machines; but, on the other hand, they have but little sun, either external or internal, in their lives, and know their misery by the help of the education which they pay for through the rates.
The sufferer by famine, as in Morocco, suffers enough, God knows, stalks about like a skeleton, dies behind a saint’s tomb; but in the sun. He believes in Allah to the last, and dies a man, his eyesight not impaired by watching wheels whirr round to make a sweater rich, his hands not gnarled with useless toil (for what can be more useless than to work all through your life for some one else?), and his emaciated face still human, and not made gnomish by work, drink, and east wind, like the poor Christian scarecrows of Glasgow, Manchester, and those accursed “solfataras,” the Yorkshire manufacturing towns. But place it where you will, either in tents, on some oasis in the desert, wandering as the Indians used to wander before America was but one vast advertisement for pills, or in the sweaty, sooty noisy “centre of industry,” mankind is made to suffer; so, perhaps, Tolstoi has the root of things when he suggests that marrying, giving in marriage, and all licensed or illegitimate propagation should cease, and man by non-existence at last attain to bliss.
So in a pass between two walls of earth, with bands of shale crossing them transversely, and roots of long dead Arars sticking through the ground, I came upon the human comedy fairly played out by representative marionettes of every age and sex. First, the father, a fine old Arab, gaunt, miserable, grey-headed, ragged, hollow-cheeked, without a turban, shoes, or waist-belt, and carrying a child which looked over his shoulder, with enormous black and starving eyes; the mother on foot, in rags and shoeless, and still holding between her teeth a ragged haik to veil her misery from the passer by, a baby at her back, and in her hand a branch torn from an olive-tree to switch off flies; then three ophthalmic children, with flies buzzing about their eyelids; lastly, the eldest son stolidly sitting in despair beside a fallen donkey carrying salt, and rubbed by girth, by crupper, and by pack ropes, and an epitome of the last stage of famine and of overwork. And as we came upon them, from a saint’s tomb near by, a quavering call to prayers rang out, and the whole family fell to giving praise to him who sendeth hunger, famine, withholds the rain, and shows his power upon the sons of men, infidel or believer, Turk, Christian, Moor, and Jew, with such impartiality that at times one thinks indeed that he is God. As for the donkey; Bible, Koran, and all the rest of sacred books were writ for man, and the galled jade may wince until the end of time for all Jehovah, Allah, Obi, and the rest of the Olympians seem to care. All our bread, dates, and tea went to the owners of the donkey, and had I been in European clothes I should have bought the starveling beast and put a bullet through his head.
Cistus and heath, with mignonette, dwarf arbutus and stunted algarrobas, with thyme and sweet germander, made a thick underwood upon the hills; and yet, as is the case in all Morocco, and, I think, everywhere throughout the East, footpaths crossed here and there, men seemed to be eternally coming and going, donkeys, more or less wretched in appearance, wandered here and there, and in the air, above the scent of flowers, hung the stench of human excrement, the “bouquet d’Orient,” the perfume which, I fancy, scents the breeze in Araby the blest.
Along the desert trails, in the Sahara [127a] and the Soudan, I fancy, man is rarely long unseen, and camels and donkeys must have been struggling across the sands before the first instant of uselessly recorded time. Still, as in India, wild beasts thrive almost alongside cultivated fields, and in the sandy paths which ran through the thick undergrowth tracks of wild boar appeared; whilst, on the borders of the bare hills, above the vegetation, “moufflon” [127b] skipped, looking so like to goats that I could scarcely credit they were wild.All the streams we crossed had whitish beds, and a white sediment clung to the grass upon their banks. It seemed there was a salt mine in the neighbourhood which supplied all the province, and underneath us far below, looking like ants, we saw long strings of mules and donkeys meandering along the paths towards the mine. The road gradually got worse and worse, and in few places averaged more than four feet wide, so that I rode one stirrup brushing the mountain and in great terror that I should lose my yellow slipper down the precipice, five or six hundred feet in depth upon the other side, which went sheer down into the Wad N’fiss. Occasionally we had to call to trains of mules advancing to stop till we could get into one of the hollows scooped here and there into the hillside to allow the travellers to pass. The mules in nearly every instance had their packs covered up in the striped blankets made in Sus, and woven in a pattern of alternate black and white bars, with fringed edges, and curious cabalistic-looking figures in the corner of the web. Now and again a Sheikh’s house, perched upon a hill and built like a castle, with turrets, battlements, and Almenas, [128] all in mud, and looking as like a properly constituted fortalice as the difference of income of their owners and that of the owners of the modern stucco fortalice outside an English town permits. Along the road one constant interchange of “Peace be with you” was kept up, as we met other parties of believers going or coming from the Sus, for the other two main highways being closed by the outbreak of hostilities, all traffic had converged upon the road which started from Amsmiz.Rounding a corner and dipping down a steep incline, almost before we were aware of it, we found ourselves between a castle and a small mosque; all round the “perron” which led to the gate groups of muleteers sat resting; by a side door were lounging several attendants armed with long guns, the barrels hooped with silver and with brass, and, to complete the picture the Sheikh himself in shirt sleeves, so to speak, that is, without a haik, and dressed in a long white garment, sat in the shade studying the Koran. His air of patriarchal simplicity so impressed me that only with an effort I remembered that I too was one of the same faith, and rather rudely I fear, according to Moorish ideas of etiquette, I mumbled a low “Peace be with you” as I passed. From the mosque windows and the door came out a sound of voices as of children shouting all at once, it was the children of the place learning to read, for amongst Arabs no place, however small, no Duar of six tents, lost in some far, remote oasis of the Soudan, is without its schoolmaster. About a league farther along the road, and leaving the castle, which rejoiced in the appellation of Taguaydirt-el-Bur, we got off under some oleander and olive trees by the side of a clear stream to wash and eat.
Mohammed-el-Hosein swears by Allah no infidel has ever seen the place, and asks, if so, let him describe it. A thing indeed which Maupassant himself could hardly have achieved without inspection.
“Give me the signs of such a place” is a common Arab question if, in talking of some place, he doubts you have been there. Most of the famous places in the Mohammedan world are well known by description to all believers, and nothing is more common than to hear one man “giving the signs” of Mecca, Medinah, or some other holy spot with the minuteness of a lady novelist describing scenery. As we sat eating under our olive trees, people kept passing on the road continuously. Thus in the heart of one of the most unknown ranges of mountains (to the Nazarene) in the whole world, there is no solitude, no sense of loneliness in spite of all the grandeur of the hills, the snow, the precipices and the brawling streams.
Though I know no single Oriental country but Morocco, and that is known to all Mohammedans as Mogreb-el-Acksa (the Far West) I yet imagine that throughout the East the interest lies entirely in mankind, for nature, at least to judge by what is seen throughout Morocco, is as dominated by man as is the docile soil of England, which gives its crop year in year out, suffers and has endured a thousand years of ploughing, dunging, reaping, draining, and the like, and thinks as little of rebellion as does the mouthy Radical who on his cart thunders against the Queen, and slavers doggishly before a new created lord. Still, for a thousand (perhaps ten thousand) years the Oriental life has altered little, nothing having been done to “improve” the land, as the Americans ingenuously say. And so may Allah please, bicycles, Gatling guns, and all the want of circumstance of modern life not intervening, it may yet endure when the remembrance of our shoddy paradise has fallen into well-merited contempt.
Our local guide, a long, thin, scrofulous-looking Berber, dressed in a single garment like a nightgown, but most intelligent, said that close to where we sat, two hundred years ago lived El Kalsadi, a writer on arithmetic. Casting about the corners of my recollection I recalled having seen the name in Quaritch’s Catalogue of Arab books; thus Gentile, Jew, and True Believer for once concurred about one circumstance. I took my saddle cloth and under some oleanders by the stream fell fast asleep, but fifty yards removed away from the men and animals, and, waking, found two Berber tribesmen sitting near to me washing their feet. They turned upon my moving and said something in their own tongue. I, not understanding, put on a grave demeanour and answered, Allah, which seemed to satisfy them as entirely as if I had been able to rejoin as St. Paul advises, with my understanding; but no doubt, the gift of tongues and all duly allowed for, he had often found himself similarly situated when on the tramp. Just at the crossing of this stream we paid and dismissed the guide who had accompanied us from the wayside mosque; he straight departed by a road fit for but partridges alone, across the hills, and I think somehow or other in conjunction with the Maalem from Amsmiz, contrived to pass the word along the road, of their opinion of my adherence to the Christian faith.
Struggling along over the shingly bed of the Wad N’fiss for about two miles, we came again to a funnel-shaped gorge, which led by degrees to a terrific staircase of rocks, known to the local muleteers as N’fad Abu Hamed, the Knees of Father Hamed, as being so steep that no one could ascend it except upon all fours, or from its effects, upon the knees of the unlucky mules, or from some other reason as to which commentators have disagreed. Just at the top I looked back over the finest range of mountain scenery I remember to have seen, and thought that with good luck and patriotism some few score Afridis in such a place might hold in check a regiment of marauding Britishers, but on reflection I saw clearly that the word patriotism was out of place when used against ourselves. To the west towards the Sus the mountains seemed to dip, and Ouichidan, the highest peak in all the Southern Atlas, towered right above us a little to the east of where we stood, whilst far away in the dim distance rose the far distant mountains of the anti-Atlas, which rise above the province of the Draa, and on whose snow no Christian has ever trod. Descending rapidly we passed a strath in which some country people were engaged in burning down a tree, an ancient poplar which the wind had partly shifted from its place, and which, when it fell, must fall inevitably across the road. In a small patch of Indian corn an aged negro was at work, dressed all in white with a red fez, and illustrating (in the middle distance) the mystery of creation in a fantastic fashion of his own.
Stumbling and tripping, leading our exhausted beasts, we came long after nightfall to a miserable house perched on a ledge of rocks over a river, and with a garden between the hillside and the stream; the place is called in Shillah, Imgordim. Nothing was to be had either for love or money, and we went supperless to bed save for green tea, sadly reflecting that had I been a Moor indeed, food would have been obtainable, for I could have sent a man to take it in the usual way, by force; and as it was, perhaps the people thought me a fool for not following out the course adopted by all respectable Sherifs when travelling about. Throughout Morocco Sherifs, especially from Fez, are a positive curse to the poorer class of Moors; for being “holy” they behave exactly in the same way that the two Jewish Sherifs Hophni and Phinehas behaved in Holy Writ; but most unfortunately, the people are so unresisting, that punishment which overtook their prototypes seldom is meted out to them, and they pervade the land, begging and taking contributions from the poor, for Allah’s sake. One of the really wise laws the French have made in Algeria is that forbidding the Sherifs to go round sorning on the people. Imagine if religion had the same hold in England as it has in Morocco, and recognised descendants of St. Paul [132] perambulated up and down, taking by force when the faithful were disinclined to give, and you may have an inkling of how onerous the burden was upon the poorer villages before the French put down the practice in Algeria. All the night long the people keep passing on the road, and a small black mosquito, resembling the Jejen of Paraguay, was most impertinent.
Next morning (October 20th) we were early upon the road, as is most generally the case in travel when one goes supperless to bed and rises to get on horseback with but a cup of weak green tea for breakfast. The animals had eaten well as we had barley with us, and, as on the day before, we started climbing staircases of rock, crossing and re-crossing the Wad el N’fiss, passing deserted villages, and interchanging greetings with the various parties of travellers upon the road. A precipitous descent over red sandstone rocks and through a thicket of tall oleanders, brought us to an open space, where the bed of the N’fiss spread out about a quarter of a mile in width. To right and left, at the distance of a mile or two, on either hand perched upon hills were fortalices, and farther up the valley a castle which I was destined to become better acquainted with before night. The mountains, about ten miles away, formed a most perfect semi-circle, and Tisi Nemiri, [133] upon our right, appeared to rise sheer from the river into the clouds.
Mohammed el Hosein, who, all the morning, after the fashion of a hungry man, had been exceedingly ill-humoured, now produced from the recesses of his saddle-bags four rather small pomegranates, which all five of us proceeded to devour with great alacrity. Whilst eating, he informed us that the semi-circle in front was the last ridge between us and the Sus, and that with luck we ought to camp well in the province of the Sus by evening.
Again we fell discussing our plan of action on reaching Tarudant. All now depended upon passing the guard at the N’Zala, [134] where an official of the Sultan was reported to be permanently sitting at the receipt of such custom as might come his way. Mohammed el Hosein was confident that, for a dollar, he could get us past without much risk, I shamming ill and sitting a little apart under a tree, whilst he bargained with the official, the danger being that the man should, out of civility, put some question to me which I must answer, and thus, by my poor Arabic, betray myself, for Mohammed el Hosein was sure that no one on the road had for a moment questioned my identity.
In fact, about an hour before we camped, whilst riding along one of the shingly stretches over which the road went following the bed of the N’fiss, I had been put to a pretty strong test, and had emerged triumphantly. About a quarter of a mile in front of us we saw a band of twenty people sitting on a grassy slope and watching apparently for our passing by. Of course we thought it was a detachment of tribesmen who had penetrated my disguise and were about to attack us, but, as to turn back was quite impossible, and even consultation difficult, by reason of a party of travellers who followed us, we had to face the difficulty, after having deliberated briefly upon my dropping my handkerchief to give Mohammed el Hosein the opportunity to get off and ride beside me to consult. As we came closer I saw the people had no arms and were chiefly young men of from eighteen to twenty years of age. Swani passed on the word it was a Tolba, that is, a band of wandering students, in fact, an Estudiantina, and then I knew what line of conduct to adopt. Just as we crossed the river they came all round my horse, wading in the fierce current above knee deep, and, catching my cloak, kissed it most fervently, invoking blessings on the Sherif from Fez, and calling upon Siddi bel Abbas, the patron saint of travellers, to guard me from all harm. I knew of course that that meant money, and blessed them in my best Arabic, whilst luckily for me the splashing of the horses and the men crossing the stream made so much noise I might have spoken in Chinook for all they knew. I signed to Swani who advanced and gave them a peseta, and some of them kissed my knees, which I permitted graciously as to the manner born, and, stooping down, touched with my right hand the head of one who seemed the cleanest, and rode on, looking as ineffable as a man desperately anxious and engaged in crossing a shingly, violent-running river can be supposed to look. Mohammed el Hosein and Swani, the danger past, and the travellers behind us having halted, laughed till they almost fell off their pack saddles; Lutaif, I think, gave thanks after the fashion of the Lebanon, and Ali looked at me, thinking, I verily believe, I really was as holy as I hope I looked.
Naturally, this little passage raised our spirits, as the students of the Tolba, though beggars, were all educated men, had wandered much about the country, and must have seen Christians at the coast towns a thousand times. I recommend to educational reformers a peripatetic university after the Tolba system. The students might beg their way along on bicycles, listen to lectures in convenient places—upon commons, under railway arches, beside canal locks, and the like—play football, as the members of the Tolba in Morocco play, by the roadsides, and thus high thinking with low diet, football, and bicycle, might all conduce to scholarship, to health, and knowledge of the country roads. In Morocco the system works well enough, although some say that in the Tolbas those customs flourish which have led scholars in England to Malebolge. Even of stationary universities ill-natured things have been preferred. Be all that as it may, it seems a merry life to lounge along, to read under the olive trees, camp near some village, write charms for folk who want them, and recite whole chapters from the Koran, at night, yelling them out in chorus, after the way of children learning their lessons in a kindergarten.
So, thinking on the Tolba, our spirits rose, and we determined to send Ali to the nearest house to buy provisions. Lucky we did so, for it provided us with a square meal which we were destined not to enjoy again for several days. It appeared, the N’Zala once passed, that a sharp descent of some three hours led into the plain beyond. There, according to Mohammed el Hosein, the people were all armed and very warlike; and the road to Tarudant led through the main streets of several villages. He did not look forward to much risk in passing them, but thought there might be a chance of falling in with robbers by the way, who naturally would rob a Moor (they being Berbers) quite cheerfully, and would without doubt kill any Christian whom they came across, not being restrained by fear of the authorities, as are the people in the settled parts of the country across the mountain. However, Mohammed el Hosein finished up always by saying, “We are in Allah’s hand; but leave it all to me, for if danger should occur it is not for nothing I am called the cleverest muleteer upon the southern road.” And as he spoke his little Shillah eyes sparkled like live coals, his thin, black, pointed beard wagged to and fro, and his face and muscular arms twitched and contracted as he shook with laughter in the enjoyment of the joke. To deceive anyone is always pleasing to a Moor (sometimes to Christians also), and to take in a town and pass an infidel upon it as a Sherif from Fez appeared to him the greatest piece of humour of his life. To our enquiries as to what was best to do if, in a village, I was recognised, his answer was invariably the same, so that at last I did not bother him, seeing him confident, and feeling almost certain in my mind the worst was past. Ali returned laden with bread and mutton, eggs and fruit, and we sat down to eat our last repast in freedom in the jurisdiction of the Kaid of Kintafi, whom Ali told us lived like a Sultan, and that he had had to wait full half an hour with other travellers before being permitted to purchase food.
Lunch over, we got on the road in great good humour, and for an hour crossed a bare stony plain, till, winding round a little hill, we came suddenly into full view of a deserted house on one side of the road, and about half-a-mile away upon the right an immense castle surrounded by gardens, woods, and cultivated grounds, and with the river El N’fiss flowing just underneath the walls. Mohammed el Hosein knew the place well, and said it was called Talet el Jacub, the summer residence of the Kaid el Kintafi, the governor of the province that we were journeying through. “Please God, he is not on the look out for us,” he said half laughing; and as he spoke a messenger came running to meet us, his clothes tucked into his belt, bare-headed, and a long staff in one hand. We took no notice, and he overtook us and asked where we were going, and Mohammed el Hosein replied, “Towards God’s land,” an Arabic retort to an inquisitive enquiry on the road. The messenger retorted, “This is no laughing matter, a man came to the Kaid’s house this morning and said he had heard there was a Christian on the road disguised as a Mohammedan.” Luckily all this passed in Shillah, and the speaker scarcely knew as much Arabic as I myself. I called up Swani and told him to tell Mohammed el Hosein that I was going to see Basha Hamou, at Tarudant, and that I had not time to call upon the Kaid, as I intended to camp that night in Sus. The man looked at me, at Swani, and at Lutaif, who spoke to him in Arabic, and he said, “Then you are not Christians?” to which Swani replied, “No, burn their fathers;” and the messenger, after profuse apologies, returned towards the castle at a dog-trot.
Who now so certain as ourselves of our arrival at Tarudant? We agreed the Kaid will stop all passers-by and lose much time, and in five hours at most we shall be past his jurisdiction, and it is not in the Sus that he will follow us, even should he discover his mistake.
So we spurred on quite merrily, laughing and talking of the rage the Kaid would fall into when he heard some day how near he had had the Christians in his hand. Past walnut woods, through thickset of scrub oak, by gardens into which the water ran through trunks of hollow trees, upwards steeply ran the road, passing by hedges thick with brambles and dog roses, giving a look of Spain or Portugal, and every step we went we laughed at the discomfiture of the foolish Kaid.
After an hour of steep ascent over the shoulder of a mountain called Tisi in Test (Hill of the Oaks), we struck a steep staircase of rocks, and Mohammed el Hosein said, “In an hour from here we shall pass a castle by the roadside, it is the guard-house of the Kaid, and from thence to the N’Zala is but half an hour. Once there, in a few hours you will see the tall towers of the mosques in Tarudant.” So we determined (it was then about one o’clock) to push on without eating and sleep in Sus. The steep ascent proved steeper than any we had passed, but we cared nothing for it, knowing we were so near our goal.
At last we neared the castle by the roadside, no one seemed stirring near it, and we were just about to pass the gate when a loud shouting just below us made us turn our heads. To our amazement we saw our friend the messenger accompanied by several well-armed men, bounding up the steep road like an Oudad (moufflon), and shouting, in Shillah, in a voice to wake the dead. Men rushed out of the castle and ran for their horses, and the messenger arrived just as we were about to pass the door. We stopped, and putting on an air of quiet citizens, alarmed upon the road, asked what the matter was, although we knew. Men rushed and seized our animals, called out “Arrumin!” that is, “The Christians!” brandished their guns, fingered their daggers, and for a moment things looked ugly. I sat upon my horse hardly quite catching all that was said. Lutaif expostulated and Swani, calling on Allah, asked the Sheikh, who now had come out of his house, and stood waiting till some one brought him his horse, if he looked like a Christian. “No,” said the Sheikh, “you appear to be a cursed sailor from the coast, accustomed to sail upon the black water, and to consort no doubt with Christians.” Swani looked as if he would have liked some private conversation with the Sheikh near Tangier, but prudently said nothing, and the Sheikh turned to Lutaif and asked him who he was. Lutaif replied, “A Syrian and a Taleb, and the attendant of this gentleman,” pointing to me.
“Then,” said the Sheikh, “this is the Rumi,” and, turning to me, said, “Is it not so, or will you swear you are a true believer?” Swearing is easy if you possess a language pretty well, but difficult in “petit nÈgre,” and so, knowing we should be taken back before the Kaid and then found out, I answered “Yes, I am the Christian,” and began to feel my horse’s mouth ready for what might come.
As Allah willed it nothing occurred beyond a little shouting, and some rather tempestuous brandishing of guns, and threatening looks. The Sheikh, who by this time had got upon his horse, rode up to me and looked me in the face. I said, “Have you ever seen a European before?” but his Arabic was at an end, and the rest passed in Shillah between Mohammed el Hosein and the man sent by the Governor.
It appeared the messenger had gone back to the castle and told the Kaid we were not Christians, and that I seemed a reputable man, riding a good black horse. On that the Kaid exclaimed, “Black horse, I was told the Christian bought a black horse in Amsmiz, so after them at once with four or five armed men;” and to teach him circumspection and lightness of foot, had him well beaten before he sent him off. A guard of men advanced and took our bridles and began to lead us back, as downcast a company as you might see upon a long day’s march. I felt like Perkin Warbeck going to the Tower, and rode quite silent, but cursing under my breath, whilst, as I take it, the loud jokes which passed in Shillah were most amusing to our captors, though I feel doubtful, even had I understood them, that they would have amused me in the least. One ragged tribesman tried to snatch my gun, which I had borrowed from the Consul in Mogador, but I kept hold of it and told him that if it no longer belonged to me it was the Kaid’s, and I should tell him of the theft. Nothing takes better with the Arabs and Berbers than an answer of this kind, and when he understood it the man grinned like a baboon and said he was no thief. I had my own opinion about this, but thought it wise not to disclose it, and at that moment a heavy storm of rain swept down from off the hills and wet us to the skin. We now began to press our animals, and the escort bounded like goats beside us, one of them trying to prick my horse with a long knife to make him kick. The headman, seeing the joke, promptly struck him across the head with a thick stick, the blow being enough to have stunned a European, but which did not seem much to annoy him, and he trotted along just like a hound who has received a cut from the second whip for running a false scent.
In about three-quarters of an hour we did that which had taken us two hours to come, our animals rushing down the steep paths in the heavy storm, and the escort shouting and cursing like demoniacs. We plunged into a wood, crossed a flooded stream, rode through a field of standing corn, and, crossing the maidan [141] before the castle, came to a horse-shoe arch. Assembled before the entrance was a crowd of armed retainers, loafers, herdsmen, travellers, and all the riff-raff who, in Morocco, haunt the dwellings of rich men. Boys, and more boys, oxen, and goats, and horses, all pressed into the gateway and the dark winding passage, to escape the storm. Loud rose the cry of “Christians, sons of dogs.” I thought, in the dark passage, that the occasion seemed quite favourable for some believer to strike a quiet blow for Allah’s sake.
Swani pushed forward, and placed himself beside me on his mule; so pushing, striving, cursing, and dripping with the rain, we reached a second gateway, which opened into a court; and here the travellers, herdsmen, and the rest entered, and left us, with our escort, standing in semi-darkness below the arch. For a full hour we waited—I, sitting on my horse, partly from pride and partly from the instinctive feeling of a horseman that he is always safer on his horse; the others dismounted, and sat down on a stucco bench, looking the picture of misery and discontent. We did not talk much—though I felt inclined to laugh—the position striking me as comic enough in all its aspects; and at last a fat man, in immaculate white robes, holding a bunch of keys, came through the rain across the inner court, and asked my name. I told it to him, and he seemed edified, and asked what I was doing, and why I wished to go to Tarudant. This was most difficult to explain, for in Morocco few people journey out of curiosity, so I replied I had business with the Governor. The man then turned towards Lutaif, and said: “You are a Mohammedan, why do you travel with this Christian? You are a taleb, and should know better than to connive at a Christian travelling in Moorish dress.” Lutaif had to explain he was a Christian, and the fat man then turned upon Mohammed el Hosein, and said: “You are no Christian, and the Kaid says he will shave your beard, give you the stick, and put you into prison with some comfortable irons on your feet.” To such a speech there was no very obvious answer but “Allah Kerim,” which poor Mohammed el Hosein mumbled piteously enough; and the fat man, kilting his snow-white robes, waddled across the court, and went into the house, without another word.
And so we waited, as it seemed hours, till again across the court came the fat, snow-white-robed official, accompanied by a short, broad-shouldered man with a full black beard, who, walking up to me, held out a hand, and said, “Bon jour.” I answered, but his French extended no further, and he tried Turkish—of which I did not know a word. Lutaif, who spoke it well, entered into a conversation with him, when it appeared he was a Persian—a sort of wandering minstrel—who was staying with the Kaid and had been sent, upon the strength of his “Bon jour,” to find out who we were. As I was still uncertain if the Globe Venture Syndicate’s steamer was off the coast, we took good care to make it plain we were friends of Basha Hamou, for, had the vessel arrived, we should have been thrown into prison at once, and sent in chains up to the Sultan’s camp. However, no suspicion of this seemed to cross the people’s minds, and we sat on talking to the old Persian in a jargon of mixed Arabic and Turkish for some time, whilst gradually a crowd of people had assembled, who—sitting on the ground, on stones, and on a low divan which ran right round the arches—glared at us silently, like men looking at wild beasts. A boy or two threw a few stones, but they were stopped immediately—the order having evidently gone out to treat us well. Considering all things, and how completely we were in their power, how far removed from any Europeans, and how strong the spirit of dislike is to all strangers, especially amongst the Berber tribes, the conduct of the people was quite wonderful; and I question very much if in a European country we should, in similar conditions, have fared as well. Still, the uncertainty made waiting anxious work, and we were pleased to hear from the old Persian that the Kaid was in a dilemma as to what he should do with us—whether to send us back, let us go on, or write for instructions to the Sultan as to what course to take. At last the Chamberlain, wrapped this time in one of the Atlas brown goat-hair cloaks—called by the Berber an Achnif—came back again, and said the Kaid had made his mind up to extend his hospitality to us, and that he had placed a tent at our disposal on the Maidan. The phrase admitted no discussion; and so following the Chamberlain—and preceded by an attendant with a long gun—we rode to the Maidan, and found a tent pitched on the wet ground above the bank of the N’fiss, into which all of us, with saddles and baggage, were glad to pack, to get out of the rain. The tent was large, and circular in shape, ornamented outside with rows of blue cloth decanters—after the Moorish fashion—and lined with a chintz of the most pre-Morris kind. In addition to its beauties of form and decoration it leaked in several places, and was so loosely pitched that we had to turn to at once to make it safe, and dig a trench to carry off the water, which stood about an inch in depth upon the floor. Five men with packsaddles, bridles, and guns, and all the requisites for camping, left very little room to move about. A forlorn crew we must have looked as we sat, shivering and hungry, on the damp floor. Closing the door, I drew from my saddle-bags a bottle of brandy which I had in reserve for snake-bites, and administering a dose (medicinally) to believers and infidels alike, a better spirit soon prevailed, and we got beds made down—placing some stones to keep the blankets off the ground. A fire was lighted; and as we drank our tea—flavoured with some mint which Ali drew out of his bag, where it had lain for days amongst tobacco, pieces of string, and the “menavellings” of a muleteer’s profession—we set about reviewing our position, after a joke or two, as to the enjoyment of the hospitality so generously provided by the Kaid. For myself, I was not in much trepidation, knowing the worst that could occur was to be sent under a guard to the Sultan’s camp—a matter of from five to six days’ journey. As to Mohammed el Hosein, that was more serious. Already he had been threatened with the stick, imprisonment, and with the loss of beard—the greatest insult which can be put on a Mohammedan. But the poor devil (and we ourselves) knew well that in his case the stick most probably meant death, and that he would not live to undergo the other punishment. Still, he was not so much downcast as might have been expected, but sat in the wet mud—a bellows in his hand—blowing the charcoal for the tea; and said, resignedly, “We are in Allah’s hand; but it is a pity I was but newly married before leaving Mogador.”
Swani, as a man, so to speak, without caste, was safe, and the most he could expect was a few dozen blows with a stout stick, a matter about which he did not seem to care a halfpenny, for he knew that he could plead he came under compulsion as my servant, and the plea would almost certainly be held sufficient at least to save his life.
Ali, of course, could not be held an accessory before the fact, as he left Mogador without the least idea of our intention, and I assured him if he lost his mule that I would buy him one fit for the Sultan’s saddle.
As we sat talking, we perceived that a group of tribesmen, all fully armed, had sat down just outside the tent, the rain having ceased for a little, and were regarding us quite motionless, but with their eyes not losing any action that we made. Of course, we were the strangest spectacle they had ever seen, and after half an hour, their curiosity well satisfied, they moved off silently and sat down in the same manner to watch a game of football, which was proceeding on the Maidan, and in which all the young men, from slaves to the Kaid’s sons, were taking part. So we resumed deliberations, and discussed the position of Lutaif. He was perhaps, of all of us, in the most dangerous case. A Syrian and a Turkish subject, without a paper of protection from any European Consul, as he said himself: “If the Kaid wants to kill me, he will do so as if I were a dog, and you may be certain that my Sultan will not claim compensation for the death of any Christian.” I thought about Armenia, but the time was scarcely opportune for joking; and just as all our spirits and our stomachs were at the lowest ebb, a slave came from the Kaid, bringing a dish of couscousou, [146] which we devoured at once, and could have eaten at least five times as much. The canvas door was lifted, and, with a cheerful but irrelevant Bon jour the Persian entered, sat down without a word and, after looking at me for a moment or two, said “Mezquin” (that is, “poor fellow”), “how far you are from home.” This, though a truism, had not occurred to me, but put thus, À brÛle pourpoint, it seemed to come home with great force to Lutaif, to Swani, and to Mohammed el Hosein, and for a moment they seemed about to weep, after the fashion of the two aged men who wept because they both were orphans.
The Persian promised “to stand before the Kaid and speak for us,” and to return to-morrow and relate his life to us. We all bid him good night with great effusion, as he had been a valued friend, and watched him walk across the Maidan into the castle, and perceived that round our tent, some fifty yards away, on every side, squatted a sentinel.
Whilst we sat trying to dry our clothes, from the castle mosque broke out the call to prayers, called by the Persian in a voice like the last trumpet’s sound, the tower seemed to rock, and the hills gave back God’s name from every crag and hollow, till the whole valley quivered with the sound, and the night air was all pervaded by the echoing cry. If God is God surely Mohammed knew his nature when he appointed men to call by night, bidding the faithful rise to pray, and speaking as it were with Allah face to face, as standing on some tower in the night, they tell his attributes.
