RAISULI’S TWO HOSTAGES
“Do you know Mr. Harris?” asked Raisuli, one day when we were drinking
green tea. The slaves had poured a perfect bath of orange-water over us,
and our host, holding open his robes, had let the scent trickle down his
chest and back. There had been a great argument as to whether the mint
was fresh, which the Sherif had terminated by growling, “Well, is there
mint or is there not? and if there is, why do you bring me this dung?”
Hoping to avoid one of those fits of morose silence which interfered
with the progress of the memoirs, I remarked that it was a pity that
Europeans could not make such good tea as the Arabs. “You have no
patience,” said the Sherif; “you want to do everything quickly, at once.
Tea is like a man’s acquaintance. It must be made slowly and with care.
Now, Harris,” (pronounced Harrēēs), “is one who knows the ways of the
Arabs, and his conversation is pleasant. He has the gift of speech,
which is admirable.”
It is curious that an Arab will never say of a fellow-countryman that he
is brave, or a good horseman, because he takes these attributes for
granted, but he will praise his eloquence with enthusiasm. Raisuli
continued, “I had known Harris for some time before he was a prisoner,
for he went much into the mountains to shoot, and sometimes he wore the
dress of our country, for he talked our language as well as his own. I
visited his camp one day, and we spoke of many things, for it was under
my protection that he went swiftly through the mountains when he had
need of news for his paper.”
Mr. Harris describes the Raisuli of those days as having a fascinating
personality and being “tall, remarkably handsome, with the whitest of
skins, a short dark beard and moustache, and black eyes, with profile
Greek rather than Semitic, and eyebrows that formed a straight line
across his forehead. He smiled sometimes, but seldom, and I never heard
him laugh. With his followers he was cold and haughty, and they treated
him with all the respect due to his birth.”[26]
A slave approached el Raisuli with a deprecating expression and a bundle
of fresh green-stuff. The Sherif waved him away impatiently. “No, no, it
is finished. I am busy.” He continued his story: “I told you how all the
jebala tribes were with me, and how I ruled as Sultan of the mountains.
When any man had a grievance he came to me for justice, whether it was
against the Sultan or the Europeans. It happened one day that there was
talk of building a cable station for the line from Gibraltar to Tangier,
and it was said the English wished to put it in the territory of the
Anjera tribe outside the town. The Sheikh Abd el Hannan, who was a great
man of Anjera, sent messengers to me, saying, ‘With all my force I shall
fight this new thing that the Christians would do to us. Come to my
assistance with the tribes of El Fahs!’
“It was a good excuse to rise against the Maghsen, which was weak and
full of traitors. The English could do nothing; so they appealed to
Mulai Abdul Aziz, who sent a strong mehalla[27] against us. It camped in
the plain near Tangier, on the banks of a wadi, but, by this time, we
were used to fighting the troops of the Maghsen. We knew that they would
eat first and sleep, and that there would be no danger from them till
they had satisfied their stomachs and were full. So we fell upon them in
the morning while they were unprepared, and killed many, but one party
we did not destroy, and they burned a part of my village at Zinat, and
fled through the land of Anjera, looting and killing as they went. My
people took many captives, and, because of the things that the Sultan’s
troops had done to the tribesmen, burying them alive and hacking off
their limbs, all the prisoners were killed. My people cut off their
heads and other portions of them, which they put in the mouths, so that
the women would laugh when they saw the bodies. This was a common
custom.
“It was on that day that Harris was captured, for, having no fear and
much curiosity, he had ridden out near to the battle to see the burning
of Zinat. The tribesmen took him by surprise, for they were fifty or a
hundred armed men. I was sitting under the trees, when I heard a great
noise and much shouting. Men came to me, running, and said, ‘Sidi, they
have taken a Christian, a European, and they are going to destroy him.’
So I went quickly to stop them, for I have always protected the
Europeans. When I saw that the man was Harris, my friend, I said to the
tribesmen, ‘No—give him to me, for he is my friend; he shall be my share
of the loot of this battle.’ They refused, and there was much argument.
Yet at last they desisted, and I took him to my house; but half of it
was burned, and there was no rest for him. The tribesmen would have
killed him, for the troops of the Maghsen had stolen their goods and
destroyed what they could not carry; but I argued with them at length
and would not leave him. I put a guard at the door of my house, and the
Englishman was safe.”
El Raisuli was evidently determined to present his conduct in the best
possible light, for Mr. Harris’ salvation was, I believe, largely due to
his own wit and presence of mind, and his friendship with some
influential member of the Anjera tribe to whom he had extended
hospitality at Tangier. He describes his imprisonment in Raisuli’s house
in this way: “The room in which I found myself was very dark, light
being admitted only by one small window near the roof, and it was some
time before my eyes became accustomed to the gloom. When I was able to
see more clearly, the first object that attracted my eyes was a body
lying in the middle of the room. It was the corpse of a man who had been
killed there in the morning by the troops, and formed a ghastly
spectacle. Stripped of all clothing and shockingly mutilated, the body
lay with extended arms. The head had been roughly hacked off, and the
floor all round was swimming in blood. The soldiers had carried off the
head as a trophy of war, and they had wiped their gory fingers on the
whitewashed wall, leaving bloodstains everywhere. However, I was not to
suffer the company of the corpse for long, for half-a-dozen men came in,
washed the body, sewed it up in its winding-sheet and carried it away
for burial; and a little later the floor was washed down, though no
attempt was made to move the bloody finger-marks from the walls.”[28]
This episode occurred in June 1903, and the negotiations for Mr. Harris’
release were therefore conducted in the fierce heat of an African
summer. “There was much coming and going,” said el Raisuli, “and, as
some of my people accused me of harbouring a Christian and being in the
pay of a strange Government, I conferred with men of Anjera to arrange
some way of safety for Harris. One night their great men came down from
their villages and took away the Englishman, for they were his friends,
and had promised to treat him as a guest. The Sherif of Wazzan, the same
who had interceded for Abd el Melak, now acted as intermediary for
Harris, but your Government wanted to hurry things, as is the way of
European Governments. At first there was talk of money, but I would not
receive one douro for a friend, and the tribesmen were agreed, so they
asked but the release of certain prisoners, men who had been confined
unjustly in the dungeons of the Maghsen. When this was agreed upon,
Harris was sent in safety to Tangier.
“After this, since the Maghsen still held my lands, and others were
eating my substance, I made myself responsible for the justice that was
denied me. One here, one there, one in the city, one on the plains, I
took men from their houses and held them until they restored to me that
which was mine. There was one who had taken some of my money when I was
in prison, and he had boasted in the suq, ‘See this silver belt and this
dagger set with jewels? These I bought with the gold of Raisuli.’ One
day he fell into my hands, for he could not always watch where he went.
I said to him, ‘Give up the rest of that which you stole, and you shall
go free,’ but he swore, ‘I know nothing of these things.’ Then I ordered
my slaves to beat him with a knotted cord, and they gave him 500 lashes,
but he would not speak, nor even cry out or complain. When he fainted,
they carried him away and washed his wounds. The next day again, I said
to him, ‘Before Allah, I will give you your freedom if you tell me where
my money is hid,’ but he would not open his mouth. Before the 500 lashes
were given, he fainted again, but he did not speak. The third day it was
the same thing, and in silence he died under the whip. Not many men have
conquered el Raisuli in this way.
“Again the Sultan sent a force against me, and I took refuge in Beni
Aros, where all men were my friends. The mehalla established itself at
Suier in Jebel Habib, and ravaged the whole country, so that the
tribesmen came to me to protect them against a government which ate
their harvest and stole their property. They could have given me up and
profited very much from the gratitude of the Sultan, but no man would do
this. Perhaps they feared me. In my life I have been little loved and
much hated, but, above all, I have been feared. I thought, ‘How can I
repay the men of Beni Aros for all that they are losing on my account?’
Then I began capturing strangers and giving the money of their ransom to
the tribesmen whom the troops of the Maghsen despoiled.
“At last I thought I would seize a European, an important man who would
make the world realize my wrongs, so my people watched on the outskirts
of Tangier and, one night, when it was dark, they crept up to the house
of an American, Perdicaris. He was sitting reading, with the light
beside him, and he had no idea of their presence. They rushed in through
the windows, which were open, and dragged him out, with his relative who
was with him. With rifles pressed to their necks—so—the prisoners were
hurried off to the waiting horses, and before morning they were with me
in Beni Aros. At last I could make terms with the Sultan, and show the
nations of Europe what manner of man was el Raisuli. I received
Perdicaris in a tent spread with carpets and sheep-skins. My slaves
waited on him and brought him all that he asked for. Then I spoke to him
as a brother, and I said this and this has the Sultan done to me. At the
end of my speech, Perdicaris shook my hand and said, ‘You have done
right. Had I been in your place I would have acted in the same manner.
From this moment I am no longer your prisoner, I am your advocate.’
After that he wrote a number of letters to Europe and America,
explaining the circumstances, and his family sent me many presents. My
prisoners were my guests, and they lived in comfort, walking about
freely in the mountains and shooting with my guns, for there is much
game in the jebala.”
The Sherif’s eloquence certainly hypnotized the American, for Mr.
Perdicaris wrote of his captor, “El Raisuli is a well-educated man in
every sense of the word. I go so far as to say that I do not regret
having been his prisoner for some time. I think that, had I been in his
place, I should have acted in the same way. He is not a bandit, not a
murderer, but a patriot forced into acts of brigandage to save his
native soil and his people from the yoke of tyranny.”
“While Perdicaris was shooting green plover and eating kous-kous in my
hills,” said Raisuli, “the American Government[29] sent seven men-of-war
to Tangier, and a battleship came also from England. The Sultan was
frightened lest he should lose his throne, but he dare not despatch an
army against me, for the life of the American was in my hands. One of
the messengers who came to me from Mulai Abdul Aziz was an aide-de-camp
famous for his cruelty. When he camped in any country he used to force
the villagers to pay him tribute, the half of what they had, or the
whole. If the money were not forthcoming quickly, he would have the
women of the house seized and dragged out into the road, and beaten
before all the village. If a man came to see him, riding a good horse,
he would say to him, ‘How much will you take for that horse? It pleases
me, and I would like to have it.’ The owner, frightened, would answer,
‘Of course I ask nothing; let my lord take it as a gift.’ The other
would protest. ‘No, no, I must pay you its price. Leave the horse here,
and I will send the money to your house. So the poor man would go away
without his horse, and with no chance of seeing his money.” Apparently
the stealing of a horse and the beating of women ranked in the Sherif’s
eyes as equal crimes.
“When the Sultan sent this man as a messenger to my camp, I said to him,
‘Through you I am going to be very rich.’ He answered, ‘Allah keep you,
Sherif, do you think I am so valuable to my master that he will pay to
get me back?’ ‘No, no, it is not with him that I shall treat, but with
the villages where your name is cursed. Do you not believe that the men
of such-and-such places will be glad to put your head upon their fences
and show your hands and feet to their women?’ ‘It is the will of Allah,’
he said, but I saw his cheeks trembling beneath the jaw.
“To make an end of the matter, I sent news to certain tribesmen that I
had some merchandise to sell them, and, when they came and saw what it
was, they paid me many douros, and I delivered the man to them. They cut
his throat skillfully, while I watched. After that, I think the Sultan
must have had difficulty in finding messengers, but his men were poor
and would do anything for money.
“I had no wish to lose Perdicaris—he had a good heart and much
understanding—but when Mulai Abdul Aziz agreed to my terms, for he was a
weak man and easily distressed, I sent him down from the mountains with
an escort and many gifts. Truly, a high price had been paid for him, and
at last I had vengeance on the Bey of Tangier, for, in addition to a
great ransom (70,000 dollars), my friends were released from prison to
make room for my enemies, and I became Governor of all the districts
round Tangier, in the place of Sidi Abderrahman, who had betrayed me. In
this last thing I was doubly justified, for all the country had
protested against the cruelty and wickedness of the Bey, and had desired
that I should rule in his stead. So at last I gained the power which I
had always wanted. Men think I care about money, but I tell you, it is
only useful in politics. A man of much money has many friends, and often
a man is judged by what he holds in his hand.”
[Illustration: Entry to Raisuli’s palace at Azeila. Prisons on left]