A DAY AT CARTHAGE.
The pious Æneas — A street scene — A nondescript vehicle —
The road to Carthage — A wayside tragedy — Bedouin children —
_Delenda est Carthago_ — An Empire’s dust — Dido’s Palace
— The cisterns of Carthage — A lovely situation — The College
of St. Louis — English ladies in Tunis.
_Tuesday, October 18th._—A trip to Carthage is an event which
recalls one’s earliest memories of classic lore. How many years,
I wonder, is it since I was tearfully engaged in construing the
well-thumbed pages in which the adventures of the lovely Dido and
the “pious” Æneas are recorded? And wherefore, I wonder, _was_
Æneas pious? So far as schoolboys are concerned, that marvellous
faculty of blubbering at will over his own misfortunes which this
particular hero possessed has caused him to be generally regarded as
something very like a milksop. But there has never been any doubt in
the schoolboy’s mind regarding the beauty of Dido. Has he not had
a due sense of it flogged into him in his very earliest struggles
with the Latin tongue? I vow that when I got out of bed this morning
and prepared myself for a trip to Carthage, a slight sensation of
alarm troubled me. The names of Dido and Æneas recalled quite too
painfully the memories of good Dr. Birch, and of the times when
I was at the mercy of his stern assistants. Little did I dream in
those days of ever seeing Carthage itself. Yet here I was, just on
the point of starting for the place where the wonderful city once
stood; and that being so, why should I not find my lovely Dido still
sitting there, watching with tear-dimmed eyes the flying bark of her
faithless lover? I had left the world of sober realities behind me
at Marseilles, and had come into a sort of Arabian Nights’ country
in which anything might happen, and in which it was one of my main
duties to be astonished at nothing.
The big airy bedchamber was hot enough when I awoke, albeit the heavy
wooden shutters were closed and the light excluded. A detestable
mosquito had been buzzing about my ears all through the night, and
now there were certain small swellings on my neck which told where
he had feasted upon my blood. The faithful Afrigan appeared upon the
scene with the welcome tub, a small cup of particularly bad coffee,
and a roll that was supposed to represent the nearest approach to
Parisian bread to be obtained in this quarter of the world. Happily,
he spared me the sight and the smell of the garlic-drenched oily
abomination which passes here for butter. A cigarette, however,
put matters right, and before my not very elaborate toilette was
completed, I found myself standing upon the balcony outside the
window surveying the brilliant street below me. Brilliant, indeed,
it is; not only in the sunshine that lights up everything with an
illumination the startling vividness of which no dweller beneath
the murky skies of England can understand, but in the splendidly
picturesque costumes and figures which go flitting past the house
in an endless procession. There was not a single person in European
costume to be seen in the street when I looked out this morning; but
a hundred Arabs were going to and fro. There were men vending water,
and fruit, and cakes; there were wonderful little shoeblacks, all
aglow with scarlet garments; there were black mule-drivers trudging
onwards with impassive faces, and scores of sleek Moors in ghostly
white marching slowly up and down the broad road regardless of the
terrible sun which was pouring its fiercest rays upon their turbaned
heads. Now and then some camels went past heavily laden; then a beggar
trudged along, in rags and sores, raising a cry for pity in the name
of Allah; then a stout old Jewess and her handsome daughters waddled
slowly past, the latter with strange unwieldy gait, but flashing
eyes and rosy lips; and then our sweet European civilization made
itself visible in the shape of a detachment of French infantry,
briskly marching to the rub-a-dub of the drum.
But meanwhile Afrigan was awaiting me at the door of the hotel with
a curious vehicle, not unlike a small four-post bedstead mounted upon
wheels. Loose curtains hung all round the upper part of the framework,
so that shelter could be obtained in any direction from the heat of
the sun, whilst a pleasant draught of air could also at all times be
admitted. A couple of good horses were attached to this nondescript
conveyance, which was in the charge of a Maltese of most villainous
aspect. Away we went, with much cracking of whips and jingling of
bells, through the crowded streets of the native quarter; past the
coffee-houses, each one of which, with its wonderful, sombre interior,
and its group of dark and sullen faces peering out at us as we drove
by, would have made a delightful picture; under the quaint arches
of the great gateway, and so out into the open yellow plain beyond.
It was a hot, a very hot drive of nearly two hours to Carthage. All
the way our road lay across that sandy desert. The only things now
growing upon it are the gnarled and twisted olive-trees, and enormous
tangles of prickly pear, the leaves of which have attained so vast
a size that if I were to venture upon figures I should no doubt
have the eternal verities of Baron Munchausen flung at my head by
the sceptical. But though the country through which we thus passed
is so dreary just now, in the spring, when it is covered by a veil
of living green, it must be wonderfully beautiful. And even as it
is there are picturesque sights in abundance to compensate for the
barrenness of the soil. Here we pass a kitchen garden. Perhaps a few
stunted vegetables are growing in it; more probably it only shows you
a few sticks rising two or three inches from the soil. But a couple
of Arabs are hard at work gardening, and mark the cunning care with
which they are constructing little canals of the loose soil, by means
of which the water which the ox is pumping out of yonder well may be
carried in any desired direction. Here a whole party of Arabs are
engaged in building a wall round some native house that stands by
the road-side, and even the bricklayers in this part of the world
are picturesque. Then there are the carts, the mules, the camels
without end which we meet upon the road. It is noticeable that no
salutation is given as we roll past. A curious or sullen glance is
the only intimation of the fact that we are seen by the wayfarers.
Up to this point we have been driving along the road which leads to
Goletta, and the great lake has been glittering in the sunlight to our
right. Now, however, we turn into the direct road for Carthage. There
are few people to be met with here. A chance shepherd tending his
flock, or a Bedouin man and woman resting beneath some olive or
palm-tree, alone break the solitude of the scene. My companion
points out to me a stately date-palm, with magnificent feathered
top, standing a little away from the sandy track which serves as a
road. It marks the precise spot where a couple of weeks ago a foul
murder was committed. The victim was one of the unfortunate Maltese
coachmen of Tunis; the murderer a major in the service of the Bey. The
major engaged the coachman to drive him to Carthage, and when opposite
this palm-tree shot him through the heart. There were plenty of Arabs
upon the road at the time, but none of them interfered. It was only
a wretched infidel who had met with his deserts: why should they
trouble themselves in the matter? So the assassin got clean off,
and has not since been heard of; nor does anybody believe that he
is likely to be punished. As for his motives, they were apparently,
as in the case of most murderers, a little mixed. There was a good
deal of religious fanaticism and political hatred at the bottom
of the crime; but there was also one ugly fact in connexion with
it which tends to deprive the murderer of the crown of glory to
which he would be entitled in the eyes of his co-religionists if he
had taken the man’s life out of a pure hatred of the abominable
Christian. That is the fact that he had previously shown himself not
above borrowing money from the aforesaid Christian, and that he had
forgotten to repay that money. Such is the tale with which Afrigan
beguiles the way, as my carriage rolls rapidly onwards towards the
hill once crowned by the towers of Carthage, and now marked by the
imposing pile of the College of St. Louis.
As we approach that hill we have occasion to pass close to an
encampment of Bedouins. The savage dogs from the tents rush out,
barking furiously: the scarcely less savage children, tawny, naked,
with long hair streaming in the wind, follow them, and fly towards us,
shrieking out, “_Caroub, caroub!_” I fling them some small coins;
they pick them up eagerly, and then, without a word or a gesture
of thanks, but much after the fashion in which a hungry dog takes
himself off with a bone, dart back towards their rude dwellings. And
now the horses toil through a sandy cutting up a steep hill-side,
and I find myself actually upon the site of Carthage. The impression
which follows the first look round upon this spot, once so important
in the world’s affairs and still so famous in the records of
history, is one of intense disappointment. Remembering what I saw
a year ago at Ephesus, I had hoped to find here, as on the site of
the famous city of Asia Minor, some striking and extensive remains of
the ancient town. But _delenda est Carthago_! The Roman’s wish has
been fulfilled, and of the once glorious city of Carthage it may now
be said with literal accuracy that not one stone remains standing
upon another above ground. Yet you tread here, in no figurative
sense but in very truth, upon an Empire’s dust. The whole
site of the city is strewn with the broken fragments of pottery,
mosaic, sculptured marbles, pillars, and tiles. Everywhere, too,
huge fallen masses of masonry are lying prone upon the earth. The
site of Carthage, I believe, has not yet been explored with modern
thoroughness. Day by day men come here from the College of St. Louis
or the neighbourhood and dig for an hour or two; and sometimes the
treasures which they turn up as the result of their desultory labour
are of great value. The best of these treasures have been carried
away to enrich the museums of Europe; but no one can doubt that much
still remains to be discovered, and I doubt not that thorough and
systematic investigations carried on upon this spot would reveal
many objects of value and interest which once adorned the streets
and palaces of Carthage.
Stumbling over the broken blocks of masonry, among which the lizards,
sole inhabitants of the city, were running swiftly, I walked a short
distance seaward past the site of Dido’s palace, and came thus
to the place where the only extensive remains of the greatness of
Carthage are to be found. These are the cisterns which once furnished
a portion of the water-supply of the city. Just as Professor Owen can
reconstruct an extinct animal if only a single bone of its skeleton
has been preserved, so it is an easy matter for those who have seen
these wonderful cisterns to form an approximate idea of the grandeur
of the city to which they belonged. They are vast subterranean
structures, with heavy vaulted roofs, intended to shut out from the
cool water in the mighty tanks the heat of the African sun. But time
has made many a breach in these great arches, and the light of day
in consequence streams in upon corridors and chambers which eighteen
hundred years ago were jealously shrouded in midnight gloom.
Some of the cisterns are circular in shape, and look like nothing so
much as enormous wells; the majority, however, are of oblong form. In
every case the masonry is of the most substantial description, showing
how well the Phœnicians did their work. Even more remarkable,
however, than the quality of the masonry, is that of the lining
of cement upon the walls of the cisterns. It is as perfect to-day
as on the day, probably more than two thousand years distant, when
it was spread upon these walls. The very marks of the trowels used
in spreading it are quite distinct, and here and there may be seen
the coarse imprint of some workman’s thumb—a sight to ponder
over at one’s leisure. I had a strange “eerie” feeling upon
me as I trod the long covered corrider that runs the length of the
whole series of cisterns, and thought of the time when above where
I now walked the tumultuous life of a great city had rolled in its
majestic fulness of power. Most of the cisterns were half filled
with rubbish that had fallen when the arches of the roof gave way;
but presently I came to some which seemed to be comparatively little
injured, and at last to one that—so far as I could tell—was as
perfect as on the day when the Phœnician workmen left it and the
cool waters were first allowed to flow into it. It was a beautiful,
dimly-lighted chamber, with walls and roof and floor white and clean;
and it contained pure crystal water to the depth of five or six
feet. So bright and refreshing was that water, so delightful the
contrast which this cool, shady apartment presented to the burning
heat and glare outside, that I looked about to see if there were any
means by which I could descend and bathe in this vast tank. None,
however, were visible; and after a while I had to leave the arched
corridor and to return to the blaze of the sunshine.
These cisterns of Carthage certainly suffice to give one some idea of
what the great city must have been in its prime. Nor are these the
only traces of the efforts put forth by the inhabitants to obtain
a constant supply of good water. Other cisterns, similar to those
I have described, lie at a short distance from the shore. They are
now, however, occupied by a tribe of Bedouins, and it is dangerous
to visit them without an escort. Then, again, for miles across the
sandy plain between Carthage and Tunis, a crumbling line of huge
blocks of masonry may be seen. These are the remnants of the aqueduct
which in later days brought the water from the Zaghouan hills to
Carthage. Nowadays the Tunisians are supplied with water from these
same hills, and it was but the other day that the Arabs, in order
to avenge themselves upon the French, cut the existing aqueduct,
and for a time deprived Tunis of one of the great necessaries of life.
Upon one point nobody who has visited Carthage can be in any doubt,
and that is as to the surpassing loveliness of its situation. I know
of no city, with the exception of Constantinople, that occupies
a site which can be compared with this. Even that of Ephesus is
inferior in splendour, if not in interest. The great city occupied
an amphitheatre sloping gently down to the edge of the gulf. The
blue waters of the Mediterranean must have washed against the
marble steps of its palaces. Indeed, looking down to-day from the
spot where, according to tradition, Dido’s palace once stood, I
could distinctly perceive beneath the surface of the sea the vast
blocks which once marked out the site of the jetties and quays of
the ancient port. Beyond the glorious expanse of sparkling waves,
there were the fine masses of the Lead Mountains, encircling the
gulf; inland could be seen the silver sheet of the Lake of Tunis,
whilst in the dim distance the hoary crests of the ever-present
Zaghouan range pierced the cloudless sky. Amid the lassitude produced
by the intense heat which everywhere prevailed, both mind and body
were refreshed by the exquisite loveliness of the scene, and by the
delicious breeze which swept down from the mountains, and came to
us laden with the briny odours of the gulf.
Absolutely desolate as is the particular part of the site of
Carthage where the principal remains are to be found, it must
not be supposed that the entire space once occupied by the great
city now lies waste. On the top of the chief hill enclosed within
the boundaries of the place stands the College of St. Louis, an
establishment conducted by the Jesuits under the protection of
the French Government, where the children of most of the European
residents in the Regency are educated. Down below, on the edge of
the shore, are the houses of some Moorish notabilities—beautiful
water-palaces, reminding me by their situation and architecture
of those which line the Bosphorus. In other directions a few Arab
farm-houses are scattered, each enclosed in its impregnable hedge of
prickly pear; whilst hanging on the sharp crest of the hill to the
west, which once looked down upon Carthage, is the walled Arab town
of Sidi-bou-Said, now occupied by men so fanatical that the life of
no European who ventured within it would be safe. It was with real
regret that I turned away from this beautiful scene—so striking in
itself, so interesting in all its associations—and began the long
drive back to Tunis. There were many interesting spectacles along
the way, one of the most curious being the appearance of the Caid or
Judge of Tunis, clad in gorgeous raiment, and riding in a handsome
brougham, escorted by Arab outriders. But the effects of the heat
and the fatigue I had undergone were too great to be resisted, and
before half the distance had been traversed I was sleeping soundly,
unconscious even of the terrible jolting of my carriage in the deep
ruts of an African highway.
“Adventures,” says Lord Beaconsfield, “are to the adventurous.” I have
often consoled myself with the saying when, in the course of my little
wanderings, I have met with personal adventures of a trying character.
But really I have the strongest objection to being troubled by the
adventures of other adventurous people. Like every other properly
constituted tourist, I look down with a certain measure of contempt
upon all others of my tribe, and am only anxious to give them the
widest possible berth. Imagine, then, my feelings when, upon alighting
at the Grand Hotel on my return, hot, hungry, dusty, and thirsty, from
my trip to Carthage, I was coolly informed by the manager that he had
been compelled to turn me out of my big, airy room, in order to make
way for somebody else. “You see, monsieur, it was a double-bedded room,”
he observed, in answer to my first expostulations. “And where, then,
am I to be put?” “Ah well! monsieur, we cannot say at present;
but you shall have a room before bed-time.” This was a particularly
pleasant announcement to be received by a weary traveller who
was anxious to refresh himself by plentiful ablutions. I kept my
temper, however, until I had asked another question: “Where are
my things?” My “things” were, of course, the contents of my
two portmanteaus, which I had left scattered about my apartment
in the early morning. In reply, the manager pointed to a heap in a
dark corner of the dusty corridor. There were my books, my writing
materials, my linen, my coats, my toilette apparatus, all heaped up
together, promiscuously. Then—the storm broke. I was convinced that
I had been treated in this infamous manner for the benefit of some
French general. It was too much to be borne. I had just five minutes
of it without interruption in the hall of the Grand Hotel—as good
a five minutes of free, unlimited, polyglottic deliverance of one’s
mind as I had ever enjoyed in the course of my life. I had, of course,
the greatest personal satisfaction when I expressed myself in English;
a double satisfaction, because not only had I the fullest command
of words in that tongue, but I could use the strongest epithets
with impunity, as neither the manager, who stood pale and scowling,
receiving my outpouring of wrath with deprecating gestures, nor the
attendants understood a syllable of what I said. But I was pleased to
find that my French also was admirably adapted to convey some idea
of the state of my mind on this occasion; and I chuckled inwardly
as I reflected upon the fact that I had not mastered the _argot_
of Paris uselessly.
Suddenly the door of the room from which I had been so summarily
expelled was opened; I turned with a frown to see the man by whom
I had been supplanted. O, horror! It was no man at all. There stood
a woman, middle-aged, gentle, refined, evidently somewhat alarmed,
and behind her a pretty young girl of seventeen, who was apparently
more amused than frightened by the altercation. What did it mean? From
what quarter of the world could this unexpected apparition in Tunis
have sprung? The frown disappeared with marvellous rapidity from
my face; I took off my hat and began to explain to them volubly
that I was delighted to think that they had got such a good room,
that I hoped they had not been disturbed by my scolding of the
servants, that I should be only too glad to be of service to them,
&c., &c. I said anything I could think of, in fact, to cover my
shame at having been aroused to a somewhat unusual ebullition of
temper by the sacrifice of my comfort to that of a couple of women,
whilst at the same time I rejoiced to think that at least they did
not understand the English I had been pouring out upon the devoted
heads of the people around me. Alas! my confusion was made complete
when the elderly lady said to me, “But you are an Englishman,
are you not? And we are Englishwomen!”
There was nothing for it but to make an ample apology to them in
my native tongue. They received it with the best possible grace,
protesting, indeed, that it was they from whom apologies were
due. And then the elder lady explained to me how it was that she
and her daughter found themselves in Tunis. They were on their way
from Genoa to Malta, where they meant to pass the winter, and they
thought they would like to take Tunis on the way, “it was such a
romantic place.” “But do you not know, madam, that the country
is in a state of war? that the Arabs may rise at any moment, that
even in Tunis one’s life is not safe?” No; they knew nothing
at all upon that subject. They had simply seen that they could get
a steamer from Genoa to Tunis, and another after an interval of
twenty-four hours from Tunis to Malta. So these two unprotected
Englishwomen had coolly come into Tunis, and were quite prepared
to go for a walk by themselves into the very midst of the native
quarter, if they were not warned of their danger! I enjoined upon
them the necessity of taking their meals in their own room, “and a
very comfortable room you’ll find it, ma’am,” I said, with the
best smile I could summon up for the occasion; and then as I was to
dine out by arrangement, at the Hôtel de Paris, to meet B———,
M. Camile Pelletan, the French Deputy, and one or two other gentlemen,
I lent Afrigan to them for the remainder of the day, warning them that
they must upon no account disobey any orders he might give them. It
was really wonderful how my righteous wrath had subsided when I found
that it was for no French general, but for a couple of English ladies,
that I had been turned out of my room. And yet what madness on the
part of Englishwomen to come touring in Tunis at this moment!