The spell of mystery is still upon Morocco. The Moors are still the people
of romance. Of the land we know comparatively little; of the race as it
exists to-day we know still less. Christendom assumes that the Moorish
Empire expired with the last sigh of Boabdil, leaving the Alhambra as
its only legacy.
Almost novel is the thought that the Moors still live as a nation; that
Morocco is to-day what Spain would have become had the forces of the
Prophet prevailed in the Peninsula. Who would not welcome as a precious
privilege the possibility of turning back the pages of history in Spain,
to revel in the actual Moorish life as it was lived before the Christian
victories of 1492? Who would not gladly leave, at least for a short space,
the familiar round of present-day existence and the hackneyed paths
of travel, to plunge into a past so picturesque, to see a civilization
so refined and yet so utterly unlike our own? No reader of Washington
Irving but has longed to people with white-clad cavaliers the courts
on the Alhambra Hill, to hear the Arab accents in the streets of old
Granada, or the murmuring of the Moslem prayers in the old mosques. But
why persist in holding Spain to be the sole stage on which the Moors
appropriately can play their parts?
[Illustration: ON THE ROAD TO MEQUINEZ]
Morocco was their home ere Spain was conquered for them. When Andalusia
ungratefully cast out the race that brought it light and knowledge at
a time when Europe groped in the blackness of deep ignorance, back to
Morocco went the Empire of the Moors. Empires rise and fall. The Moorish
Empire rose but did not fall; it was shaken but not shattered; it is
still erect. It stands a living skeleton wrapt in the shroud of Islam,
its hollowness concealed by the vague folds of ceremonial observances;
its government a pompous sham; its cities empty imposing shells of former
greatness; its boundless plains the haunts of savage Berber tribes to
whom the Emperor is but a name, the Empire a free space in which to ride
broad-chested chargers and do battle with hereditary enemies.
[Illustration: DIGNITARIES _EN VOYAGE_]
In two preceding lectures I have told the story of a journey into Morocco,
and of a sojourn in Fez, the metropolis of the Moors. There yet remains
to tell a third, concluding chapter of the tale—the narrative of the
return from Fez to the sea, from a remote yesterday back to the world of
to-day. "Out of Morocco" would serve as an appropriate heading for this
chapter,—a chapter rich in adventure and in picturesque experiences.
For ten days we have dwelt in mediæval Moslem Fez—unwelcome visitors,
objects of suspicion to the jealous Moors.
[Illustration: BRIDGES COMPETE UNSUCCESSFULLY WITH FORDS]
Two routes are open to us—the direct road to Tangier and the
less-frequented road to Rabat on the Atlantic Coast. Despite the protest
of the authorities, who warn us of many dangers, we chose the road that
leads westward to Mequinez, the Beni-Hasan Plain, and the Atlantic. But
the word "road" must be regarded only in its Moroccan sense. As has been
said already, there are no roads in this wild land; the slow caravans
and the swift troops of Moorish horsemen have followed the hoofmarks
left by the caravans or troops which have preceded them, until a system
of narrow trails meandering in uncertain parallels has been created
between the inland cities and the sea.
[Illustration: MIDWAY BETWEEN FEZ AND MEQUINEZ]
These Moorish highways were never surveyed and never tended; like
Topsy—who, also, by the way, was an African product—they were never born,
"they just growed;" and like Topsy they are wilfully unreasonable; they
exasperate us by their defiance of conventionality; amuse us with their
peculiar antics, and delight us with preposterous surprises.
As an example, take the highway that leads from Fez to the neighboring
city of Mequinez. As we approach a river, the wandering trails converge
and form a beaten track that grows more and more like a real road as
it winds down toward a substantial bridge. But just as we are about
to compliment the road on its reform, it suddenly grows weary of good
behavior, becomes rebellious, and, like a balky mule, refuses to cross
the bridge. Incredible as it may seem to those who do not know this land
of contradictions, Moorish roads will not cross Moorish rivers by means
of Moorish bridges. The old way is preferred. Fording was good enough in
the old days, and it is good enough to-day. The roads turn sharply from
the bridge abutments, scramble down the muddy banks, and plunge into
the yellow rivers to emerge slimy and dripping on the opposite shore.
The bridges, ponderously useless, studiously neglected, are falling into
decay, and have become almost impassable.
[Illustration: MIDDAY REPOSE]
We pitch our camp not far from one of those disdained reminders of an
attempt at progress. We are midway between Fez and Mequinez in a region
notorious because of the thieving bands with which it is infested. It
appears wholly unpeopled; yet we are not without misgivings, for, of
our caravan, four mules and two men have gone astray. With us are Haj,
the dragoman, Achmedo, the valet, and the muleteers, Abuktayer and
Bokhurmur. The missing are Kaid Lharbi, the military escort, and the new
packer who joined our force in Fez. We have our tent and Haj's kitchen;
the other tents and all the supplies and furniture are in the packs
of the missing mules somewhere on this gloomy plain, possibly already
become the loot of some lawless sheik, or, as we hope, merely delayed
because of broken harness, or gone astray because of a mistaken trail.
Our groundless fears are set at rest an hour later by the safe arrival
of the precious convoy, and once more our palates are delighted by the
delicious dinner cooked by Haj, our thirst quenched by cooled oranges,
and our weary bodies laid to rest upon our comfortable camp-cots.
[Illustration: WIFE, CHILD, AND SLAVE]
After the confinement incident to our residence in city quarters, the
free life of the plains is doubly exhilarating, and we find intense
pleasure in the satisfaction of the simple, keen desires to eat, drink,
and sleep. All food is good, all drink is better, sleep the sweetest
gift of the gods.
[Illustration: "YO SOY CHINO, SEÑOR"]
The morning finds us early in the saddle; four hours' westward progress
brings us at noon to one of those rare oases of shadow in this bare land
of sunshine. Here hunger, thirst, and weariness are again assuaged by
food and drink and sleep. Sharp darts of brilliant, blinding sunshine
burn through the leafy masses of the two fig-trees, and with almost
malicious persistence pursue the would-be slumberer, who, to avoid this,
must every now and then crawl after the receding shadows.
But we are not the only travelers who have sought midday shelter in this
forest. On our approach we were greeted by a family group,—a man and
woman with a little child, and a black slave. To our surprise the man
addressed us in Spanish:—
"_Buenos dias, Señor, habla usted Español?_"
"_Si, Señor, un poco_," we reply, and then begins an interesting
conversation.
"Where are your animals?" we ask.
"Stolen with all my goods, last night," he answers. "We must now go on
foot to Fez to report our loss to the authorities."
We learn that our unfortunate friend is a maker of sausage cases, that
he lives in Mequinez, and that he is hospitably inclined; for in return
for our sympathy, he begs us to make use of his house in Mequinez, where
another of his wives will welcome us and give us food and lodging.
[Illustration: OUR DUSKY CHARGE]
This strange offer of hospitality, coupled with a something in the man's
expression leads me to say, "But, Señor, you are not like a Moor."
[Illustration: WALLS THAT DO NOT KEEP EVEN THE SUNSHINE OUT]
"Why should I be?" he smilingly asks. "_Yo, yo soy Chino._" "I, I am a
Chinese."
He is the happy father of a dainty little girl, a type of Chinese beauty,
and two lusty boys, who bear upon their faces maps of Peking and Canton.
The negress, his slave, he is sending back to Mequinez with tidings of
his loss. Haj, with Occidental gallantry, offers the dusky damsel his
place on a pack-mule, and after the exchange of many kindnesses our
little company, made up of individuals so diverse in race, in language,
and in thought, breaks up.
[Illustration: MULAI ISMAIL'S WALL]
Our Chinese Moor with wife and child go trudging off toward Fez, while
the American caravan with its Arab escort and African passenger moves
toward the other great interior city, Mequinez. Long before we come
in sight of Mequinez, we find our progress barred by a huge wall forty
feet or more in height, stretching away in two directions as far as the
eye can reach. But there are ogive archways, through which our caravan
passes as freely as the sunshine or the breeze. There are no gates, no
guards, to hinder us. On we file across vacant fields until we reach a
second wall as forbidding as the first and apparently as interminable.
"What are these walls?" we ask. "Why were they built? what purpose can
they serve?"
And Haj tells us that they were reared to protect the city from the
turbulent surrounding tribes, to cut off, if need be, the approach of
hostile bands.
A third wall, wide and high, beginning at the city gate wanders away
toward the south, its utility not easily divined. As we trace its curving
course over a distant ridge, we think of the Roman aqueducts in the
Campagna, and of the great wall of China, for this unknown Moorish work
vies with those famous masses of masonry in impressiveness of aspect if
not in hugeness and in length of years. It was the creation of the crazy
Sultan, Mulai Ismail, a contemporary of Louis XIV, of France, a Moorish
emperor who suffered from a mania for masonry, and made his people suffer
that he might satisfy his madness for works of colossal inutility.
[Illustration: WANDERING WALLS]
One of his wildest projects was the building of an elevated boulevard,
two hundred miles in length, along which he could ride from Mequinez to
Morocco City, safe from the attack of the rebellious tribesmen who hold
the intervening provinces.
[Illustration: "LIKE THE PORTAL TO A MYSTERIOUS NOWHERE"]
The huge north gate of this his favored city appears to us as we approach
late in the afternoon like the entrance to some "mysterious nowhere." It
seems to be a portal to the empty sky, a door through which the traveler
might pass into the infinity of space. It is, in fact, the gate of an
almost deserted metropolis, a city that was built for a population of
one hundred thousand and contains to-day less than six thousand souls.
Small wonder that we find it empty and forsaken in aspect as we pass from
court to court and through gate after gate. There are in Mequinez more
houses vacant than occupied, more roofs fallen than intact, more palaces
in ruins than huts in good repair. The Sultan is forced to maintain a
palace here, for Mequinez ranks with Fez and Morocco City as one of the
three capitals of the Moorish Empire, each city jealous of its dignity
as the abode of the Imperial master.
[Illustration: THE SULTAN'S PALACE—MEQUINEZ]
[Illustration: "THROUGH GATE AFTER GATE"]
The Sultan always dwells amid the wreck of ages. The snow-white palace
of the actual sovereign may be seen rising above the crumbling walls
of the Imperial Garden. Around it are vague piles of age-worn masonry,
the abandoned palaces of emperors who ruled here in the past. Custom
demands that on the death of a Sultan his palace be abandoned and a new
one built for his successor. It is regarded as a sacrilege for any one
to occupy the abode of a departed emperor. Thus, during the centuries,
these imperial inclosures in all the Moorish cities have become encumbered
with acres of decaying palaces in which bats and owls hold carnival.
[Illustration: "BORN OF AN IMPERIAL MANIA FOR MASONRY"]
[Illustration: AN ARTIFICIAL LAKE]
In Mequinez everything speaks of Mulai Ismail, the tyrant Sultan of the
sixteenth century, that imperial monster whose deeds surpass in horror
those of Nero or Caligula, the ruins of whose palaces and public works
rival in magnitude the Roman mountains of brick and stone upon the
Palatine or in the broad Campagna.
[Illustration: ENDLESS AISLES OF ARCHES]
Mulai Ismail built three miles of stables for his twelve thousand
horses. We see, to-day, the endless aisles of arches where his chargers
were lodged in splendor, every ten horses tended by a negro slave. As
a horseman, he was superb. It is said that he was able, in one graceful
movement, to mount his steed, draw his sword, and neatly decapitate the
slave who held his stirrup. He held that to die by his imperial hand
insured immediate entry into paradise, and throughout the latter part of
his life of eighty-one vigorous years he went about his land dispensing,
with his scimitar, passports to a beatitudinous eternity. Twenty thousand
of his subjects were thus favored, Friday being the day chosen by the
imperial murderer for these executionary exercises. His pet lions were
fed upon the flesh of slaves; his forty cats were treated better than
his children, though one disobedient cat was formally executed by his
order. Workmen caught idling on the walls, at which his myriad slaves
and prisoners were unceasingly engaged, were tumbled into the molds and
rammed down into the concrete.
[Illustration: OUR CAMP IN THE KASBAH]
An incredibly atrocious deed crowned his career of crime. A wife
suspected of infidelity was filled with powder and blown to pieces. The
mere drowning of a wife in the small artificial lake was but a gentle
pastime. He had two thousand wives. As to the number of his children we
must accept the word of an ambassador of Louis XIV, who visited the court
of Mulai Ismail in 1703. He asked the favorite son how many brothers
and sisters he possessed. After two days spent in compiling a catalogue,
the Prince submitted the names of five hundred and twenty-five brothers
and three hundred and forty-two sisters. Later reports give the number
of sons who lived to mount horse the astounding total of seven hundred.
To create palaces and to people them was the life-work of Mulai Ismail.
One incident that makes this impossible man seem real to us is this:
He actually sent ambassadors to France to demand of Louis XIV the hand
of Mlle. de Blois, the natural daughter of the King and Louise de la
Valliére! The honor was declined in polite terms by the Grand Monarque.
[Illustration: HAJ BREAKS THE MOSLEM LAW]
[Illustration: STUDYING THE STRANGERS]
In Mulai's day Europeans were not strangers to Morocco; but they came—not
as we come to-day, as travelers with tents and guides to camp freely
for a few sunny days under the imperial walls—they came as slaves and
captives taken from merchant-ships by pirates; they came with chains
and manacles, to toil for dark, hopeless years in building these same
walls, in piling up these useless miles of mud, brick, and cement. The
thought of the sufferings endured by them makes doubly strange our actual
comfort; the dangers of the living past throw into striking contrast the
security of the dead present. We are not even annoyed by crowds. Perhaps
there are no crowds in Mequinez to-day. The only citizen who deigns to
take an interest in us is an old man who rides up on a tiny donkey and
sits studying the strangers with a plainly puzzled look upon his wrinkled
face. That he may not depart without some mark of our appreciation of
his call, we display our modern arsenal, a shotgun and a rifle, testing
the latter by firing at an eagle that is soaring overhead. By chance
the shot is a successful one. Down comes the big bird like a meteorite,
grazing the donkey's ear, and falling with a thud at his astonished
nose; whereupon our visitor having seen enough rides off in silence to
tell of our prowess in the half-deserted bazaars.
[Illustration: GOOD SHOOTING IN THE HEART OF THE CITY]
From Mequinez we carry away impressions as enduring as its walls and
gates. We know that we shall never forget the sadness of this empty
city, its silence, and its forlorn magnificence. In all Morocco there
is no more artistic structure than the Kasbah Gate of Mequinez. It is as
it was; no restoration has marred it. Time has but softened it, made it
more beautiful. Corinthian pillars, brought from the ruins of the Roman
city of Volubilis, add to its dignity and tell of a civilization that
long antedates that of the Arab conquerors. It, too, like every gate and
every palace in the city of Mulai Ismail recounts its tragedy. The man
whose mind conceived its form, its intricate designs, its unsymmetrical
perfections, fell victim to his artist-pride. For, when the Sultan
complimented him on his achievements, he declared that he could build a
gate more beautiful, more imposing, did the imperial master so desire;
and this boast cost the architect his eyes, for the Sultan was resolved
that this, his favorite gate, should have no rival and no peer. Less
beautiful, but more imposing is the great North Gate by which we enter
and through which we ride out into the black, treacherous country. Our
muleteers have halted at a fountain to drink and pray; for the fountain
marks the burial-place of a great Moslem saint, the founder of the
fraternity of the Hamdouchi, a kindred society to that of the fanatical
Aissaoua, a sect of self-torturers and religious maniacs.
[Illustration: A THOROUGHFARE IN MEQUINEZ]
[Illustration: THE BENI-HASAN PLAIN]
[Illustration: THE NORTH GATE OF MEQUINEZ]
Devotions ended, the caravan reforms, and we find ourselves trailing
across an empty land, which we have been warned on no account to enter.
Two days of uneventful travel over the hills of a rolling region brings
us to the brink of the interior highland, from which we look down upon
the level plain that stretches westward to the wide Atlantic, many miles
away. Below us lies the country of the famous Beni-Hasan tribe. The
"Sons of Hasan" are famous as horsemen, warriors, and pirates of the
plain. Our route lies westward across their territory to the seaport
city called Rabat, where we hope to embark in due time on one of the
infrequent coasting-steamers that ply up and down the western coast of
Africa.
[Illustration: A SOKO IN THE WILDERNESS]
As we descend the steep trail winding down from the hill region, we look
in vain for any sign of town or village. A few clumps of dark green
trees and yellow streams are all that break the dull monotony of the
wide vista,—all, save a patch of gray, which looks at first like a heap
of rags spread out for an airing and a sunning. But as we draw nearer
to it, we observe that the rag-pile is alive, that it swarms and moves
in slow confusion. Each rag enwraps a human-being; there are at least
a thousand of them come together in this desert-place to buy and barter
food and drink and raiment.
A curious feature of commerce in Morocco are these fairs held periodically
in chosen localities, far from any settlement or village. A few days
later this spot, now the scene of picturesque activity, will be brooded
over by the silence and desolation of the surrounding plain. It will
remain unvisited until, at the advent of another fair, the people of the
broad region roundabout will come again to this townless market-place,
with cattle, fruits and vegetables, woolen goods and Manchester
cotton, old flintlock muskets and inlaid Moorish daggers, to meet their
fellow-merchants, to haggle with crafty customers, and to indulge that
desire for social intercourse, innate even in the forgotten people of
this empty, lonely land.
[Illustration: A TOWNLESS MARKET-PLACE]
We spend an hour or two at this Soko in the wilderness, watching the
ant-hill-like activity of the gray-clad sons of Hasan. The water-sellers
do a thriving business, for the sun beats down relentlessly on this
unsheltered mart. From tented restaurants are wafted odors which may
be appetizing to the native epicure. The butchers are at their work out
in the full glare of the midday sun. There is but little delay between
the abattoir and the pot or frying-pan. In fact, the fresh meat might
almost be broiled without the aid of any fire whatever when the sun is
high and hot.
[Illustration: WATER BY THE CUPFUL]
It is but natural that we should be objects of curiosity, but so reserved
and proud are the Moslems that even in this remote place they refrain
from paying us the compliment of popular attention. We are neither
courted nor insulted. Indifferent glances are all that they vouchsafe
us. Whatever of hostility they feel toward the "dog of a Christian" is
vented upon our servants. A man attempted to steal a knife from Haj.
Haj strikes at him, the crowd sides with the would-be thief, and begins
to rain blows upon our guide and muleteers, but they defend themselves
until lazy Kaid Lharbi can be induced to make haste slowly to the rescue.
The appearance of our soldier quells the tumult. The dispute is referred
to a young sheik of the tribe, who, as one in authority, listens to our
story and to the clamor of the crowd, and like a righteous judge, orders
Haj's assailant put in chains. Before leaving, in order to propitiate
the crowd, we beg the sheik to release the culprit. This done, we depart
amid approving murmurs.
[Illustration: "AS ONE IN AUTHORITY"]
[Illustration: APPETIZING ODORS]
Just before sunset we reach a narrow, turbid river. There is no bridge.
Our pack-mules glissade down the slippery bank and trudge unhesitatingly
across the shallow ford. Fortunately, we have crossed the many rivers
without inconvenience; but had we entered Morocco a month earlier,
while the rivers are swollen by the April rain, we should have suffered
tedious and dangerous delays at every ford. The yellow flood respects
not even the caravans of ambassadors and ministers. Official pack-mules
have been swept away, official bedding soaked in Moorish rivers, and
many a diplomat traveling in state to Fez on some important mission has
been compelled to doff his uniform and dignity, and to breast the turgid
waters of the River Sebu or the Wad Makhazan. Half regretting that we
are deprived of similar experiences, we ride on till we reach a place
called Boghari, where we apply for the protection of the Kaid of the
village. The traveler should lose no time in taking advantage of the
laws of hospitality. In them he finds his surest safeguard. The person
and property of a guest are sacred. A robber Kaid becomes an ideal host,
answering for your safety with his life, guarding your property better
than he guards his own. But the very man who shelters you one night may,
on the morrow, after you have passed beyond the territory for the peace
of which he is held responsible, swoop down upon your caravan with a cloud
of gaily arrayed followers and seize such of your possessions as may have
attracted his fancy while you were enjoying his protection. By so doing
he also gets the neighboring chieftain into hot water, for failing to
protect you. Our official letters from the Moorish authorities at Tangier
command all Kaids and bashas to give us hospitality and protection and,
when necessary, to provide an escort for our safe-conduct across their
respective territories.
[Illustration: FRESH MEAT]
Kaid Absalam of Bogari is pleased to order our camp pitched in his
front-yard. We should have preferred an isolated site beyond the village
amid the freshness and the flowers of the plain, but we feel more
secure under the eaves of the official residence, a mud-brick hut, with
disheveled thatch.
Kaid Absalam grants us the use of his front-yard, including the dirt,
dust, and flies, imposing only one condition upon us. He has been informed
by men familiar with the ways of Christians that they invariably travel
with "picture-making boxes," or "painting machines," with which they
do sinfully and wilfully break the Mosaic commandment, "Thou shalt not
make unto thyself the likeness of any living thing." The Kaid's will is
that if we possess such inventions of the devil, we shall religiously
refrain from using them in his domain.
[Illustration: NEARING THE LAND OF THE BENI-HASAN]
In this emergency we turn to Haj Abd-er-Rahman Salama, for we know him to
be the most artistic prevaricator in Morocco. He rises to the occasion.
Never was a village more thoroughly photographed than Bogari, never was a
Kaid and a community more blissfully unconscious that crime was rampant
under their very noses. Haj presents us formally as two great American
astronomers traveling in Morocco on a scientific mission. The Moors of
old prided themselves upon their knowledge of the heavens. Astronomy
is still in high esteem. The Kaid begs us to display our astronomical
instruments. We promptly unpack and set up two photographic-cameras,
and arm ourselves with kodaks. One by one, or rather three by three,
the dignified villagers put their heads beneath the focusing cloth, from
the black folds of which come smothered exclamations of delight as they
behold upon the glass inverted images of familiar forms and faces.
[Illustration: IN THE SHEIK'S "FRONT YARD"]
Meantime we are "taking the altitude of the sun" with kodaks. The result
of our first attempt shows an African "son" black as an eclipse; there
are wooly prominences on the disk, and several satellites are visible.
A second experiment reveals a young Phœbus Apollo, dark as Pluto, and
almost as naked as Eros. Later observations show the constellation of
Venus shedding the light of smiles upon this land of darkness.
Meantime my friend wins popularity with the ladies of the galaxy by
performing a series of simple tricks of sleight-of-hand. He catches
money in the air, or pretends to find it in their veils or sleeves.
[Illustration: "A PLACE CALLED BOGHARI"]
[Illustration: FORDING]
Encouraged by his success, I bring into play the skill acquired in my
schoolboy days, when Hermann, not Stoddard, was the man whose career
appeared most tempting to me. I, too, win smiles of surprise and
wonder-struck expressions from the simple folk of Bogari by swallowing
coins and corks, performing card-tricks, or picking pennies from the folds
of ragged garments. The last trick is the most popular, for the pennies
are invariably claimed by those from whom they have been plucked into
visibility. Fond mothers bring forward several lots of Berber babies,
and present them, one by one, to the magician, that he may deftly extract
the latent wealth from their scant clothing.
[Illustration: THE KAID AND THE CAMERA]
But not only did we succeed in fooling the fledglings and the female
birds, our magic powers won us the respect and reverence even of the grim,
hawk-like cavaliers. We gave a matinée for the Kaid and his chief men.
They were deeply impressed and murmured compliments with bated breath;
for that which he cannot understand the Moor regards as supernatural. The
man with occult powers is to be feared, respected, and propitiated. We had
not counted upon this; but Haj, the clever rascal who was under contract
to furnish all provisions for our larder, encouraged us thereafter to
give daily performances, for every performance elicited substantial
tokens of respect in the form of chickens, baskets of eggs, haunches of
fine mutton, pails of goats' milk, and plates of honey.
[Illustration: INSPECTING "ASTRONOMICAL" INSTRUMENTS]
[Illustration: ALMOST A "COON"]
Our reputation as conjurors once established, Haj paid out no more money
to the villagers, exacting everywhere a willing tribute or "mouna" from
the Sheiks or Kaids.
But one more achievement crowned our perfidy to the kind people of
Bogari. The Kaid bade us take tea in his mud-house the night before our
departure. We donned our Moorish jelabas, and at the appointed hour sat
with the Hasan tribemen around the steaming samovar—for the Russian
samovar is the "_grande luxe_" of even the pettiest of chieftains.
The situation was rich in its appeal to our love of things remote and
strange. Here were we, robed in white garments made by the tailors of
Fez, crouching on mats, sipping sweetened mint-tea in company with men of
Berber blood, whose profession is plunder, whose relaxation is battle.
The Kaid's brother lies prostrate, undergoing a rough massage treatment
to allay the pain caused by bullet-wounds received in a recent foray.
Grim visaged retainers peer in at the door, keen eyes flash in the outer
darkness. The candle flickers, the samovar sings softly, now and then
a word is spoken, and a few seconds later a guttural reply is heard, or
a grunt of pain from the wounded warrior breaks the hush of the assembly.
[Illustration: A REAL AFRICAN]
Resolved that this scene must be pictured, I appeal to Haj to put his
powers of prevarication once more to the test—to lie us into a favorable
opportunity for discharging one of our flash-lights here and now.
[Illustration: A FLASH OF "MIDNIGHT SUNSHINE"]
[Illustration: POPULAR WITH THE LADIES]
He hesitates. Dare he attempt another fabrication? Success has made him
bold. He speaks, "Oh, Kaid, my masters the astronomers, to whose skill
your village can bear witness, ask of you one more favor. To-morrow they
set out across our unknown country. To lay their course across this wide
land without roads they must take observation of the sun by night as
well as by day. At their command the sun will pierce the veil of night.
Permit them once more to set up their instruments, and they will cause
the brightness of the orb of day to flash for a brief instant even here
between the four walls, beneath thy roof."
Allured by the promise of this miracle, the Kaid consents. The cameras
are placed. The flash-powder is spread. Then with impressive gestures
I invoke the god of day, and Haj ignites the fuse.
A great light fills the chamber, clouds form and roll out into the night,
the sons of Hasan gasp and murmur prayers. The astronomers calmly sit
down and figure out their reckoning, and lay the course for the caravan
voyage for the morrow.
[Illustration: LOTS OF BERBER BABIES]
[Illustration: FOOLING THE FLEDGLINGS]
No suspicion rested on us. Kaid Absalam next day escorted us to the
confines of his territory, and thanked us for having kept our pledge
not to paint pictures of his people.
[Illustration: TIDINGS OF TROUBLE]
[Illustration: THE IMPERIAL POST]
Our caravan files westward across the plain, which is as peaceful as
a summer sea. We traverse patches of color, bigger than townships,
where the earth is steeped in the crimson of anemones, or the yellow
of buttercups. At midday, while the sun hangs almost in the zenith, and
the mules trample on their own shadows at every step, an incident breaks
the monotony of our ever silent progress. A solitary man appears on the
horizon, his hooded head the only thing that rises above the level of
the weeds and flowers. At last he comes within hailing distance, and we
exchange greetings. He is a courier, bearing dispatches to Mequinez. He
speaks excitedly to Haj, who listens to his words with visible anxiety,
for he conveys tidings of trouble from the west. It is the old story of
inter-tribal hostilities, of Beni-Zimour razzias in the Beni-Hasan plain,
of Beni-Hasan retaliatory trips into the hill-country of the Beni-Zimour.
The village of Twazit, where we intend to spend the night, was attacked
early this very morning, the Beni-Zimour troupe was driven off, the
Beni-Hasan horsemen have been called out to defend their frontier. We
press on rapidly until we meet a company of cavaliers led by the young
Kaid of Twazit, who is scouring the country to assemble all the available
fighting men. He halts our caravan and demands to know our destination
and the purpose of our journey. He forbids our advance into the disturbed
region, being responsible to the central government for our safety. But
seeing picturesque possibilities in the adventure, we insist upon our
right to official protection, and Haj demands an escort for us. The Kaid
cannot refuse. Eight men are detached from his troop and detailed for
escort-duty. With eagerness we ride on toward the seat of war, if war be
not too dignified a name for one of these periodic inter-tribal squabbles.
[Illustration: THE KAID FROM TWAZIT]
Peace is upon the plain, calm is in the air; yet danger and suspicion
ride with us, and point across the flowery expanse toward the dark line
far to the south,—a line that indicates the wooded country of the Zimour
tribe, which holds the region between Mequinez and the southern capital
city, Marrakesh (or, as it appears on many maps, Morocco City).
[Illustration: WESTWARD UNDER ESCORT]
[Illustration: AN ANXIOUS MOMENT]
[Illustration: "PEERING ACROSS THE PLAIN"]
So successfully have the Beni-Zimour held the Sultan's troops at bay that
it has never been possible for the Imperial master, even with the usual
escort of thirty thousand men, to march by the direct route from city
to city. He has always been forced to go around the very heart of his
own empire, to cross this plain to Rabat, thence travel down the coast,
and finally strike inland along the southern boundary of the possessions
of his rebellious subjects. Thus every state-progress from one of his
capitals to the other becomes a public humiliation of Morocco's ruler,
whose boast is that his throne is his horse's saddle, his canopy the sky,
his palace the great tent in which he spends more than half of every year.
[Illustration: PICTURESQUE PROTECTORS]
The Beni-Hasan, while none too loyal to the Sultan in the season when he
sends to them his Bashas to collect the taxes, are hereditary enemies
of their rebellious neighbors, and therefore nominally supporters of
the Imperial cause.
[Illustration: TOWARD THE SETTING SUN]
[Illustration: "EVEN STERNER THAN THE REST"]
Our picturesque protectors pause every now and then, peering anxiously
toward the south, suspicious of every dot on the horizon, of every patch
that seems to move in the distance upon that sea of heat-waves that rolls
above the plain. Most of our guards are young men under twenty-five, one
only is older. Even sterner than the rest in aspect, he has a cruel face,
thick lips, and wears a gray skull-cap drawn tightly above his furrowed
forehead. We might well have some misgivings for our safety were not
our guards also our hosts, and answerable for us to their chief, who is
answerable to the Sultan. Should we suffer harm, the central government
must make amends to the United States.
[Illustration: TENT OF THE WOUNDED TRIBESMAN]
[Illustration: ATTENTIVE WATCHERS OF THE OPERATION]
As if in preparation for the expected fray, the horsemen are continually
rehearsing sham battles, half the troop dashing furiously ahead, then
returning at full gallop to attack the caravan, which is stoutly defended
by the other half. At first no shots are fired, but when we agree to
pay for all the ammunition used by both friends and mimic enemies, blank
charges are rammed into the elaborate old flintlocks, and the roar and
smoke of harmless battle mark our advance into a hostile territory.
[Illustration: BERBER BELLES]
[Illustration: SIMPLE AS CHILDREN]
At sunset we arrive at Twazit. We expected to find a village. We find
instead a circle of thirty-six Bedouin tents pitched in the open plain.
The men of our escort are here at home, and are greeted by their wives
who ask for news of the chief and the rest of the troop. The women wring
their hands and weep on learning that we are to camp with them. The
reason is that should we be robbed while under the protection of their
chief, the Sultan's government would hold their husbands responsible
for all damages, and bleed even the poorest of them to repay us for our
losses.
An atmosphere of anxiety pervades the village. One man was killed
in the morning's battle; he has just been hastily buried. Another is
lying wounded in his tent, and we are urged to go to his relief; for
every foreigner is supposed to be skilled in surgery and medicine. We
are conducted to a low tent in which the wounded man is lying. He is
surrounded by a stupid crowd, which keeps away fresh air. We strive to
clear the tent, but curiosity is strong, and a score of villagers insist
on witnessing the doctor's visit. The man lies on a rug groaning in
fever, his garments stained with blood. His wound is red with clotted
blood. No one has thought to wash him and give him water. My friend puts
cooling bandages upon his head, and to the best of his ability dresses
the wound. It is ugly, but not fatal; for the ball has glanced along
the ribs and passed out on the side.
[Illustration: "WE EVEN DO A LITTLE VETERINARY SURGERY"]
[Illustration: SUSPICIOUS OF EVERY DOT ON THE HORIZON]
While I am striving to keep the crowd away, two women, smeared with slimy
mud from head to foot, come running from the river. They break into the
tent, and throw themselves upon the prostrate form, uttering loud cries;
and it is with the greatest difficulty that we prevent those miserable
mud-daubed wives from overwhelming the sufferer with their conventional
expressions of grief. They have put on mud and slime as substitutes for
sackcloth and ashes.
[Illustration: THE OLD KAID PREPARES TO SALLY FORTH]
[Illustration: BEYOND THE REACH OF DANGER]
It is insisted that some medicine should be administered internally. "All
doctors make sick people swallow medicine," they say; and to conform to
custom, and yet do no harm, we give our patient a cup of water in which
a little paregoric has been dropped. Then, with a "Trust in Allah!" the
foreign doctors retire amid the blessings of the crowd.
[Illustration: A PORTUGUESE PORTAL]
Could we have cured but one tenth of the maladies, or in any small way
relieved the needless suffering which greets the traveler in Morocco,
we should have been happy; but we were not prepared; we lacked both
knowledge and medical supplies. It grieved us to play the impostor, yet
it was kinder to the people, who in many things are simple as children.
To refuse them advice and treatment would have been cruel, however
worthless the advice and treatment. Our willingness to serve our doses of
paregoric, our injunctions to trust in the one God, pleased and cheered
them. That was all that we could hope to accomplish.
[Illustration: "UP TO THE EYES IN DAISIES"]
We even do a little veterinary surgery for a wounded horse, a fine gray
steed, lamed by a bullet in the leg. The poor beast is held prostrate
while the bullet is cut out with my pocket-knife, and the wound is
cauterized with red-hot iron. The excitement keeps us from a realizing
sense of our situation, and it is only when in the gathering darkness we
have returned to our tent that we begin clearly to recognize the fact
that these little scenes of such a painful interest are not prepared
merely to amuse the curious traveler. There is a stern reality in it
all; and the Beni-Zimour who, this very morning, attacked the village
and laid low men and horses, are not many miles away.
[Illustration: AN EMPTY TOWN]
The night is clear. The few men in camp are constantly on the alert. We
see the chief mount and ride outside that circle of flimsy tents, our
only fortification. He goes to see that the patrols are not neglecting
duty, to scan with anxious eyes the southern distance.
All is still till half-past nine. Then comes the most uncomfortable
quarter of an hour that I have ever passed. A shrill, loud cry rings
out; we think it is the call to prayer. Not so; it is the call to arms.
"_Hayel!_"—"to horse," the sentinels have shouted; and that cry of
"_Hayel_" is answered by pandemonium in the village. The tribesmen rush
to loose their shackled steeds, a hundred cowardly dogs begin to bark,
and from every tent women and children rush out terror-stricken and
weeping.
[Illustration:"WHERE THE SEBU MEETS THE SEA"]
Their cries, the tramp of hoofs, the guttural shouts of our wild-eyed
protectors combine to wake us to a sense of personal danger. The sentinels
have seen a moving mass upon the plain, supposedly a band of Zimour
horsemen. They are in expectation of a prompt attack. Our troop hurriedly
assembled, sallies out to meet the coming foe. A troubled silence reigns.
[Illustration: SEAWARD FORTIFICATIONS—MEHEDIA]
We wait and wait. No sound; no clash of arms; no shots exchanged. Five,
ten, twenty minutes pass, then comes tramp of hoofs, a dark mass sweeps
into the vague circle of Bedouin tents, the dogs stop barking, and with
relief we recognize our faithful cavaliers as they dismount, giving
grunts of satisfaction.
The approaching enemy had been frightened off by the unexpected appearance
of our little army. Their force was small, they had believed the village
unprotected, and they did not know that the bravest Beni-Hasan men had
returned to guard their women and their homes. The sentinels are doubled,
and after an hour more of watching, we fall asleep, weary with the day's
excitement.
And as, next day, our journey is peacefully resumed with a smaller escort
than before, we are inclined to laugh at the terrors of the night,
and to chaff one another on our respective preparations for defense
or flight. My warlike friend had spent that anxious hour cleaning his
shotgun, removing bird-shot from his shells, and substituting crude
lumps of lead obtained from Kaid Lharbi's store of ammunition. I had
quietly packed my photographic films into the smallest possible bundle,
and went to bed, ready at a moment's notice to seize the precious packet
and escape—whither, I did not know.
[Illustration: ABANDONED PORTUGUESE PALACES]
[Illustration: THE RIVER BU RAGREG NEAR RABAT
(Photograph by Cavilla)]
By midday on the morrow we are beyond the reach of harm. Making a small
present to the Beni-Hasan guards, we watched them disappear in the
direction of the seat of war, where they will continue their life of
skirmish and pillage until laid low by bullets from their hated Zimour
neighbors.
[Illustration: THE WORTHLESS INHABITANTS]
And as, some hours later, we approach the coast, our caravan plunges into
a veritable ocean of freshness, where the wild daisies are so tall that
our animals appear to be lying down, while in reality they are toiling
on as best they may through a sea of flowers four feet deep. Our pet
mule, the little white one, is almost up to his eyes in daisies, while
the others revenge themselves for many days of dry, short, withered grass
by feasting upon the rich fare so unexpectedly encountered. For several
miles we slowly advance along this curious road (for we are still upon
a road, though one little used) and at last, reaching a hilltop, we are
greeted by a glorious salt breeze, and looking westward we behold the
dim blue stretches of the broad Atlantic.
An hour more and we arrive at Mehedia, formerly a city of the Portuguese,
to-day a vast ruin in the midst of which a miserable Arab hamlet is
concealed. We camp near the decaying walls, where storks and men, gifted
with equal intelligence, observe us with a silent curiosity. This Mehedia
was once a flourishing port, and the fortifications left by the Portuguese
are very stately and must have been at one time thoroughly impregnable.
To-day, however, everything is dilapidated and forsaken.
[Illustration: THE BASHA PROVES HIS PROWESS]
[Illustration: A PART OF THE IMPERIAL HAREM]
[Illustration: THE GREAT WALL OF SALLI]
We descend to the beach and enjoy a dip in the salty waters where the
River Sebu meets the sea. Above us loom the imposing walls and bastions
of Mehedia, silent and abandoned, yet eloquent of the vanished glory of
Portugal. In the thought of this empty fortress, so formidable in aspect,
so monumentally defenseless in its desolation, there is something almost
awe-inspiring. Its few miserable human denizens seem like dejected ghosts
gliding through the crumbling portals, haunting the roofless palaces.
The stork population on the wall-tops and the battlements seems more
real. The Moors declare, "Storks are men who have come from islands
far away to the west upon the great ocean to see Morocco. Like all the
world they know there is no other land to compare with it; they abandon
their outward form of men, and come hither to behold it. Therefore we
give them hospitality and do not harm them." Nay, the Moors do more than
this for the long-legged dwellers on their house-tops—they maintain in
Fez a hospital for invalid storks, founded, so runs the legend, in this
wise: Several hundred years ago a stork came to the Kadi of Fez bringing
a pearl necklace that it had stolen. As the owner could not be found,
with the proceeds from the sale of the necklace, the Kadi bought a house
that is still in existence, called the Stork House, an institution where
storks are received and treated as human beings.[a]
[Illustration: BEFORE ENTERING SALLI]
[Illustration: RABAT]
The Moorish lover looks upon the stork with a peculiar reverence and
affection, for from its haunts on terrace or tower the bird looks down
upon the habitations of the women, and daily beholds the beloved one.
But storks of Mehedia take no more heed of us than do the gray-robed
human inhabitants.
[Illustration: ON THE BEACH AT SALLI]
On the eve of our departure, the Kaid of the village cannot resist
exhibiting his skill with a recently acquired Winchester rifle that,
he tells us, has been taken from smugglers in the performance of his
official duties. Learning that we are Americans and therefore compatriots
of his new gun, he deigns to look with favor upon us and invites us to
his dwelling. There he prepares to astonish us with his marksmanship.
An egg is placed upon a wall fifty feet distant. The Kaid seats himself
comfortably on a ledge, takes leisurely aim, amid the respectful silence
of his followers, and then bangs away. The plaster on the wall was badly
damaged, but after the smoke had cleared away, the egg, intact, looked
down upon the humbled Moor, who proceeded to examine and criticise the
sights of the Winchester.
[Illustration: THE RIVER BU RAGREG]
My friend, when his turn came to try the gun, was not considerate enough
to spare the egg. His pride in his marksmanship overcame his politeness,
as a yellow blotch on that old wall may still attest.
From Mehedia it is one day's ride southward to the sister-cities of
Salli and Rabat, sister-cities which have never been on the best of
terms with one another. We follow a sandy trail along the coast—the
monotony of the journey broken by but a single incident, an encounter
with a gaily furnished caravan. Six Moorish women robed in white, with
covered faces, attended by a dozen guards and servants, come slowly
along the dusty track. At their approach Kaid Lharbi, evincing a sudden
bashfulness, dashes off to the right, points his horse's head toward the
sea, and sits there with his back turned to the veiled beauties until the
gay parade has passed. The other men of our escort follow his example,
galloping off to one side or the other, planting their steeds with tails
toward the trail, not venturing to look around until the dust raised
by the passing caravan has settled. We naturally seize our cameras to
record this strange proceeding, whereupon they shout imperatively, "Turn
your backs quickly! These are the Sultan's wives. No man may look upon
them!" Accordingly we, too, conform to a custom which seems to us rude
rather than courteous and turn our backs upon the mysterious beauties, a
contingent of Imperial wives whom Mulai El-Hasan is shipping in advance
to await his arrival at Mehedia or Mequinez.
A few hours later we pass beneath the aqueduct of Salli, which serves
also as an outer city-wall. Then, after watering our animals, we ride
on across vast vacant spaces until the gates of Salli admit us to the
famous city of the old-time "Salli Rovers."
[Illustration: SWITCHING THE "BAGGAGE-CAR" AT THE FERRY]
So hostile is the populace that every attempt at picture-making brings
a volley of stones from howling urchins and threatening murmurs from
savage-looking citizens. All that we remember of our visit to Salli is
a rapid dash through narrow thoroughfares amid a sprinkling of missiles
and maledictions. It is with a sense of relief that we find ourselves
on the broad sandy beach that stretches from the southern walls down
to the River Bu Ragreg, on the opposite shore of which rises the city
of Rabat, our destination. As we look back toward the white line traced
by Salli's gleaming house-tops, our thoughts go back to the hero of our
childhood, Robinson Crusoe who, taken by the Salli Rovers, was there held
in slavery for many months, finally escaping in a small boat belonging
to his Moorish master. Another famous character, Captain John Smith,
came to Salli in 1604; but why he came and what he did there we do not
definitely know. For years the Corsairs of this port were the scourge
of Christian merchant-ships. Piracy was then a recognized profession,
the title "pirate" an honorable one, in fact, the highest naval title
of to-day is but a corruption of that assumed by the old pirate chiefs:
"Lord of the Sea," "Ameer-el-Bahr,"—Admiral!
[Illustration: THE SALLI-RABAT FERRY]
Salli and Rabat, although within gunshot of one another, differ widely
in character. Salli is rabidly anti-foreign. Rabat is commercial and
comparatively cordial to Christians, sheltering a little colony of
European merchants and vice-consuls.
Between the cities flows the Bu Ragreg, "Father of Glittering," across
which we must be ferried in crude flat-bottomed barges. To switch our
baggage-train on to the ferry-boat is a task that calls for much hard
work and not a little Arabic profanity.
[Illustration: HIS FIRST EMBARKATION]
We must wait our turn; for there are other caravans, with camels, mules,
and horses massed upon the sands. At last our animals are all embarked
with the exception of Bokhurmur's burro, who, accustomed only to fording,
requires much persuasion before he will trust himself to this new-fangled
contrivance. During the brief period of calm that intervenes between
the embarkation and subsequent landing on the Rabat beach, we look in
admiration at the scene about us. Above the palisade on the south bank
rises a noble half-completed tower. We have long since heard reports of
it. We know it as the Beni-Hasan tower, a sister to the famed Giralda
of Seville and to the Kutubiya of Morocco City. The same Sultan, Yakub
el Mansur, the great builder, reared this trinity of towers about eight
hundred years ago. To-day they prove the vast extent of his dominion;
to him owed allegiance all the lands which lie between Andalusia in the
south of Spain, and Marrakesh, on the borders of the Great Sahara. But
the Beni-Hasan pile was never finished. It stands to-day as the workmen
left it in the year 1200.
[Illustration: RABAT—THE CITY AND THE CITADEL]
Rabat owes its existence to the builder of the tower, who late in
the twelfth century founded on this promontory his "Camp of Victory,"
"Rabat el Fatih." The frowning citadel sits darkly on the crest between
the harbor and the sea, the smiling city lies gleaming just below. We
follow the broad, animated beach, enter at the water-gate, present our
credentials to the governor, and after some delay a camping-ground is
assigned us on the crest within the shadow of the citadel, under the
very walls of the powder magazine. It is not until our outfit is here
unpacked, that we remark the fact that we are pitching our tents in a
graveyard. All roundabout us are neglected graves, tombstones inclined
at most distressing angles, with hollows where there should be mounds,
and weeds and rubbish in place of greens and flowers.
Poor Abuktayer, sick from fatigue and bad water drunk on the journey, is
excused from work, and sits amid the mossy mortuary tablets, a picture
of weariness and woe, watching the other servants as they wedge tent-pegs
into the cracks of tombstones.
[Illustration: OUR CAMP AT THE RABAT POWDER HOUSE]
[Illustration: ABUKTAYER]
Grewsome indeed our camping-ground, but good enough for Christian
dogs, the amiable Basha thinks, and the Christian dogs have ceased to
be fastidious. All that we ask is that the sleeping Moors, buried only
two feet underground, will manifest toward us the same aloofness as is
shown by their living co-religionists. But although our foreground is
not cheerful to contemplate, the views in two directions are superb.
Looking westward we see the snow-white city with its "saint-houses" and
minarets, and in the distance the square, commanding tower, high above
the winding river. The seaward vista is not less attractive. The wide
ocean stretches peacefully westward to the new world; at our feet the
warlike pomp of the old world is displayed in the six stately camps
of Bashas from the interior provinces. These Bashas have come to Rabat
to greet the Sultan who, with his mighty caravan, is expected within a
fortnight. Four thousand horsemen are assembled at Rabat to escort the
Imperial train from Rabat to Fez. Every evening, just before sunset,
fine old gentlemen in spotless robes of white toil up to our hill-top,
and, passing our camp without a side glance or a salutation, spread
small red rugs upon the tombs, seat themselves thereon, and watch the
slow sun sink into the progressive west. Then in the twilight they rise,
fold up their rugs, and with a measured tread return to the white city
whence they came. Seven times we saw the same old worthies come, watch,
and depart, but never was there a glance of recognition, never a sign
they are conscious of our presence amid the resting-places of their
dead. Therefore we were surprised, one evening, when three dignified
personages halted before our tents, spoke a few words to Haj, and then
sat down on tombstones and began a serenade with a violin, a tambourine,
and a peculiar form of Oriental guitar. A glance at their dress tells us
that these men are Jews; a word of explanation from Haj tells us that
they are sent to play for us by the local Consular-Agent of the United
States, a native Jew, upon whom we had called the day before.
[Illustration: THE BENI-HASAN TOWER—RABAT
Photograph by Cavilla]
[Illustration: THE CAMPS OF THE GOVERNOR]
Among the European residents of this remote port is an eccentric
Englishman from Gibraltar who has built for himself in Rabat the tallest
dwelling in Morocco, a house of four stories, its façade conspicuous
because of its unusual height and its coat of bright blue paint. On
several occasions the owner of this unique Moorish skyscraper entertained
us at dinner, and insisted that we should lodge under his aspiring
roof on stormy nights, when our camp was drenched with rain. In view of
this cordial treatment extended to entire strangers, we are surprised
to learn that our host is not on speaking terms with other members of
the foreign colony. That he lives practically alone, attended by an old
Spanish housekeeper. In every corner of the world the traveler is sure
to find the solitary Englishman dwelling in Anglo-Saxon seclusion and
independence amid strange peoples, sufficient unto himself, his house
his castle, his excuse for self-banishment the remark, "Oh, I rather
like the place, you know; good air, fine climate."
[Illustration: MINSTRELS OF ISRAEL]
Rabat is primarily a place of business; the markets and bazaars are
always thronged. Rug-making is the industry for which the port is
noted, and every day we see itinerant auctioneers, weighted down with
brilliant carpets trudging through the streets, calling the latest bid,
and offering the fabric for the examination of would-be purchasers.
Unfortunately, modern Rabat carpets, like Navajo blankets, have suffered
from the introduction of aniline dyes. The colors are crude, the designs
less artistic than in earlier times. The local industry, once carried
to perfection, is fast degenerating, and Rabat rugs are no longer things
of worth and beauty.
In all things the Moors have continually retrograded since the conquest
of Granada. From one of the foremost, they have become almost the last
of nations; their arts, their sciences, their industries forgotten,
nothing remains to them save their skill in horsemanship, their bravery
in battle, and their fixed belief in the predestination of all things,
good or evil.
[Illustration: THE TALLEST HOUSE IN MOROCCO]
A crazy saint replied when we reproached him for being drunk with rum,
"It is no sin. It is written." Those fatalistic words, "It is written—God
has willed it," have been the cause of Moorish retrogression. They have
robbed the people of ambition and energy; the Moor, in time of disaster,
shifts the responsibility upon Allah, and murmurs resignedly, "It is
written." This philosophy helps him to bear the ills of life, great
and small. For example, if a Moor chances to seat himself upon a tack,
he does not curse nor swear nor rail at fate, nor does he wince as he
withdraws the offending point. Far be it from him to protest. He simply
murmurs, "It is written," and carefully replaces the tack for some other
Moor to sit upon.
[Illustration: BUSINESS IN RABAT]
On the fifth morning of our sojourn in Rabat, we note a mighty stir in
all the military camps within and roundabout the city. Mysterious moving
statues appear upon the house-tops to watch the passing of armed men
through the streets. Troops of gorgeously arrayed horsemen gallop across
the town, filling the narrow lanes and covered bazaars with clatter and
confusion. We ask the cause of all this sudden animation. The answer is,
"The Prince arrives to-day. Our future Sultan, Abd-el-Aziz, is approaching
from the south to herald the advance of his imperial father, Mulai
El-Hasan III, who returns victorious from Tafilet and Tadla where he has
chastised the revolted tribes and 'eaten up' rebellious provinces." The
Sultan had written to the waiting Bashas in words like these: "To you do
I confide my best beloved son, my Mulai Abd-el-Aziz. Receive, protect,
and honor him as if he were myself and something more." That "something
more" bore a deep meaning, which was to be revealed within six days.
[Illustration: ITINERANT AUCTIONEERS]
[Illustration: RABAT RUGS]
[Illustration: "IT IS WRITTEN"]
Rabat turns itself wrong-side-out to welcome the young prince. The
Bashas and Kaids, who, with their retinues, have been awaiting Imperial
orders, now sally out from the south gates, followed by the entire
population in festival attire. We mount our horses, and with Haj and Kaid
Lharbi as escort join in this picturesque exodus. An hour later we find
ourselves in the midst of an armed multitude, massed on the hillsides
stretching southward from the city walls and overlooking the narrow
plain along the sea-shore, which is to be the avenue of approach for
the princely caravan. We are the only white men in that vast expectant
throng, the only "Christian dogs" who have ventured beyond the gates.
Haj wears an anxious look; he knows that we are acting rashly in thus
exposing ourselves unguarded to the whims of an army of fanatics. But
the spectacle is worth the risk. Four thousand cavaliers are assembled
along the crests of the hills or in the plain below, where battle seems
to rage, for thence rises the smoke of oft-repeated volleys and the roar
of musketry. Troop after troop is there performing the "powder play,"
Lab-el-Baroud, that very thrilling cavalry-manœuver peculiar to the
"rough riders" of the Arab race.
[Illustration: GATE OF SHELLA
Photograph by Cavilla]
[Illustration: MYSTERIOUS MOVING STATUES ON THE HOUSE-TOPS]
A dozen cavaliers advance in a broad platoon, first at canter, then
full gallop, then at a furious run, _ventre à terre_, the horses
at their highest speed, the men erect in the stirrups, spinning and
tossing their glittering flintlocks, until, at a word from the chief,
triggers are drawn, and the troop vanishes into a cloud of smoke. When
the smoke rolls away, there are the panting horses thrown back on their
haunches, motionless as statues; and then, before we can give vent to
our admiration, another troop comes thundering along, another volley
racks the ears and clouds the air, another tableau forms, and dissolves
in drifting smoke, until it seems as if all the hosts of the Prophet
were joining in a universal fantasia in honor of the young prince who
some day will be Commander of the Faithful, successor to the Shareefian
throne founded by the grandson of Mohammed.
[Illustration: ALL HORSEMEN SALLY SOUTHWARD]
[Illustration: A BASHA AND HIS TROOP AT REST]
[Illustration: POWDER PLAY—READY!]
[Illustration: THE START]
[Illustration: FIRE]
[Illustration: HALT!]
Then, when the troops are weary, two horsemen more energetic than the
rest dash furiously at one another, and without colliding they exchange
muskets; deftly, instantaneously, kiss each other on the cheek.
[Illustration: MULAI ABD-EL-AZIZ APPROACHING RABAT]
[Illustration: THE ENDLESS LINE OF HORSEMEN]
Meantime a slow, silent, interminable caravan has been creeping along
the shore. As far as the eye can reach in both directions, the shore
is dotted with tiny moving spots, some red, some white, some brown, as
if a tribe of giant ants were crawling northward toward Rabat. We see
mules and camels laden to death, urged on by cruel drivers; we see the
weary foot-soldiers dragging themselves along clad in a ragged suit of
red and blue; we see superb Moors in spotless white, dignitaries of the
imperial household, attended by mounted guards and running servants.
[Illustration: A FRAGMENT OF THE LIVING WALL OF MEN AND HORSES]
[Illustration: AS IN THE DAYS OF THE CRUSADES]
[Illustration: UNIQUE PORTRAIT OF MULAI ABD-EL-AZIZ, EMPEROR OF
MOROCCO]
Suddenly Haj exclaims, "There is the prince!" He points to a white-robed
boy, superbly mounted, with an attendant walking at each stirrup. Behind
him comes a litter borne by two mules in which young Abd-el-Aziz may
repose when weary of the saddle. Then follows a broad platoon of the
Imperial Guards, fierce negro cavaliers, the Bokharis, in whom alone,
of all the army, the Sultan places perfect trust. Slowly the prince's
train nears the waiting multitude. The four thousand horsemen on the
hill-tops form in one grand line, and, as the future ruler of Morocco
comes in view, that mighty rank of flesh and blood descends majestically
to the plain like a foamy wave receding from a beach. No illustration
can suggest the majesty of that spectacle. The endless line of white, so
faint and dim, which undulates along the hillsides, is in reality the
Moorish army drawn up in one unbroken rank, a living wall along which
the son of Mulai El-Hasan is to pass, receiving homage from the troop
of every Kaid and Basha. As far as we can see, the line, though curved
and bent by the inequalities of the ground, is perfect, unbroken, the
white, flowing garments of the horsemen looking like a mere thread lying
along the slope and stretching away over the summit of a distant hill
even to the city gates. As soon as the prince's train has passed us,
we dash across its wake and ride along behind that wall of horsemen,
peering through it at Abd-el-Aziz as he halts before each governor to
receive the homage of the tribes. My one thought is to make a photograph
of the prince during one of his brief pauses. Three times do I just
miss my opportunity. But at last, riding on in advance, I take position
directly behind two horsemen who appear like men of prominence, and there
await the passing of the imperial youth. As Abd-el-Aziz approaches, I
am trembling with excitement and anxiety; if I succeed, I shall have
accomplished what never before has been done; if I am detected in the
act of copying the features of the sacred youth, the consequences may
be serious—men have been killed for lesser sacrilege. The prince draws
nearer; to my joy he halts directly before the men who shield me from
his look. Just as he draws rein, the horses prance apart and leave an
opening in the line. Through this gap the Prince looks wonderingly at
me as I make a profound salute, and at the same time level my camera,
and with a trembling finger press the button. The click of the shutter
sends a cold chill through me. I raise my hat and bow a second time.
Abd-el-Aziz looks squarely at me, his face impassive and expressionless.
He slightly inclines his head. Meantime the horsemen, with heads bent
low, utter in unison, with religious intonation, the words, "God bless
the days of our lord!" "God send our lord victorious!"
[Illustration: THE BASHA WITH HIS BANNERS AND BRIGADE]
[Illustration: THE SPECTACLE IS NOT FOR UNBELIEVERS]
[Illustration: AWAITING THE IMPERIAL ENTRY]
[Illustration: THE EMPEROR ENTERS RABAT]
These words should be spoken only to the Sultan; but has not Mulai
El-Hasan commanded the Faithful to receive his son, as if he were "myself
and something more"?
The Prince is in appearance older than his age, being in his fifteenth
year. In his mien there is a dignity beyond his years. He looks the
Sultan, and I recall the words of Haj: "He may succeed his father before
many months are past, for rumor has it that El-Hasan III is hastening back
to Fez to die." Strange indeed that this thought should have come to me
just then, for at the very moment that my eyes met those of Abd-el-Aziz,
he was already Sultan—he was the Great Commander of the Faithful. The
boy himself did not then know it; the army and the people were still
ignorant of the event; but that very morning the old Emperor, Mulai
El-Hasan III, had "received the visit of death," and had closed his long
career of military journeyings. We therefore looked upon the face of
one who almost within the hour had been called to rule the destinies of
dark Moghreb, to sit on the Shareefian throne, to become the feared and
hated ruler of a semi-barbarous land, to bear the Imperial burden of a
direct descendant of Mohammed.
[Illustration: A WOULD-BE CUSTOMER OF "WINCHESTER BROS."]
[Illustration: THE SULTAN'S BARGE AND THE ENTIRE MOORISH NAVY OF TO-DAY]
[Illustration: THE EMPEROR RETURNING FROM SALLI]
So absorbed are we in studying the face and manner of Abd-el-Aziz, that
we forget our whereabouts, forget the thousands of horsemen who are
chanting their welcome to the son of their Emperor. But when, a moment
later, the Prince rides on, we are suddenly aroused to a sense of our
perilous situation. The troops which formed the left wing of the host,
and have already rendered their salute, have now broken rank and come
dashing northward behind the line of cavaliers, that they may fall in
at the upper end of the line and be at hand to take part in the final
powder play as the Prince enters the city gate. A Basha, followed by
his banner-bearers, advances toward us, his brigade forming a phalanx
so broad that we cannot hope to avoid its onrush. To the right escape
is barred by the long file of white-robed riders; to the left we dare
not ride, for another troop is there racing past at full gallop. We are
hemmed in. There is nothing for it but to join in the tumultuous rush
of the wave of horses and men which is thundering toward us. We urge
our horses to their utmost speed, and a moment later we find ourselves
engaged in a race for safety, a roaring torrent of Moorish warriors
surging roundabout us. Should our horses stumble, we are lost. No power
on earth can stem that furious tide. Our only salvation is coolly to
guide our running steeds, avoiding obstacles and collisions; but how
easily an angered Moor, indignant at our having looked squarely into the
sacred countenance of his prince, could ride us down, and attribute the
accident to our rash attempt to emulate the rough-riders of the Moroccan
plains!
[Illustration: A PRINCELY RETINUE ON THE BEACH]
[Illustration: SHIP AHOY! BREAKING CAMP]
Thus we are swept onward as by the surge of a white-crested wave, until
the torrent breaks against the grim old walls of Rabat, and the flood
of horsemen recoils, divides, and spreads itself on either side of the
trail leading to a massive mediæval gate.
The scene recalls the days of the Crusades. An armed host are at the gate
of a walled city, fantastic banners wave, the clash and roar of battle
and the tramp of many hoofs is heard, and then a mighty shout rings from
six thousand throats as the gate swings open to admit an Emperor's son.
The spectacle is not for unbelievers, but we have cautiously drawn near
enough to witness the triumphal entry and to hear the shrill salutations
of the thousand closely veiled Moorish women who are massed on either
side of the imposing portal.
[Illustration: REGRETS!]
Then follows a mad rush cityward of soldiers and civilians. The tortuous
passages of the old gates are choked for hours with swirling currents
of humanity. By the time we have reached our camp by a circuitous route,
Abd-el-Aziz is safely housed in the Imperial Palace of Rabat. The dying
wish of Mulai El-Hasan has been accomplished, his favorite son, and
appointed successor, has reached in safety a fortified city, and has been
joined by a large and loyal force under the command of trusted chiefs.
This has been done before the elder son, or the ambitious uncle, has
had time to learn of Mulai El-Hasan's death, and to raise the standard
of revolt. Seldom it is that a Sultan mounts peacefully to his throne.
There are always many claimants, each supported by a faction; and had
Hasan's death been known in Fez while Abd-el-Aziz was on the road, he
never would have had a chance at the succession despite the expression
of his father's will.
On the day of his proclamation the young Sultan makes a triumphal
progress through the streets. He rides a superb horse, with rich green
trappings. His form is hid in folds of white. On either side walks the
Mul-es-Shuash, a trusted retainer charged with the task of waving a cloth
to flick imaginary flies from the Imperial Master. The Sultan lacks,
however, the most important insignia of Moorish Majesty, the scarlet
umbrella, which is now being carried across the southern plains in the
funeral cortege of his father. Companies of red-clothed infantry guard
the prince; he is followed by a hundred dignified Moors magnificently
mounted. His passing is greeted with enthusiastic shouts from the men
in the streets, and shrill piercing cries, of "You, you, you!" from
hundreds of veiled women on the house-tops.
We follow the procession to the beach, and watch the Emperor embark on
the Imperial barge, which will bear him to Salli to pray in one of the
historic mosques. A short distance up the river the entire Moorish Navy
lies at anchor—a solitary little steam-yacht, dressed with many flags, but
too poor even to fire a salute. An hour later his Majesty returns and,
joined by the princely retinue in waiting on the Rabat side, re-enters
the city to confer with the viziers of his late father and make plans
for a triumphal progress inland to Fez, his capital.
[Illustration: THE FINAL "PACK-UP"]
With intense interest we have followed these events; we are conspicuously
unwelcome to the Moors, being forced into prominence in our efforts
to attain effective points of view for making photographic records of
these historic incidents. We wonder why we are not molested—why we are
able to escape the stonings to which many a rash Christian onlooker
has been subjected. Haj, the invaluable, makes clear the reason of our
immunity. Knowing that our actions would make us objects of hostility,
the ingenious Haj spent several days, before the arrival of the Prince,
in visiting the numerous military camps and spreading among the Bashas,
Kaids, and Sheiks, certain reports concerning us and the object of our
presence, that would insure our safety and give us a high place in the
estimation of every warlike Moor.
[Illustration: THE CARAVAN ARRIVES AT SUNSET]
[Illustration: INTERESTED]
The Moors admire above all things a good gun. To them the repeating
Winchester is the noblest work of man. The tribesman armed with one of
those coveted American weapons is worth a dozen enemies armed with the
native flintlock. Therefore did Haj conceive a fabrication that worthily
crowned the forty days of persistent perjury to which we owed so many
splendid opportunities. Discreetly, confidentially, he informed the men
of every tribe that we, his Christian masters, were no less personages
than the "Winchester Brothers," makers of the famous rifles, proprietors
of the vast factories in America. We are come, he added, to perfect plans
for arming the tribes faithful to the Emperor, that they may quickly
exterminate the rebellious Beni-Zimour and the other unsubdued clans
which defy the Imperial power. And the chieftains said to Haj, "As God
is great, we shall protect your noble masters! They may move as freely
as they wish amidst our troops, who will treat them with due respect."
During our last days in Rabat, obsequious warriors came to our camp
bringing broken Winchesters, begging us to repair them. One morning a
handsomely-mounted boy, the son of a powerful Kaid, rode up attended
by a small escort. He asked for Mr. Winchester. My friend bowed low and
blushed. The little fellow kissed his own hand, my friend did likewise.
Then, through our interpreter, the boy placed an order for a boy's-size
Winchester, instructing us to make the best rifle that money could buy,
very light and small, but large enough to kill sixteen rebels without
reloading. We entered the order on the seared and yellow pages of our
Christian consciences. Our fame as fabricants of arms threatened to get
us into trouble; inquiries and demands for repairs increased each day. We
were not sorry when, a few days later, our summons to depart was given
by the whistle of a coasting merchant-ship which loomed up off the bar,
as the fog lifted shortly after sunrise.
The order to break camp is given; our men work with a will, for should
we fail to reach the ship in time, it will mean a delay of at least two
weeks or a long land-journey with the animals, along the sandy coast
road to Tangier. We bid farewell to Achmedo, Kaid Lharbi, Abuktayer, and
Bokhurmur, to the horses, mules, and burros, which are to find their
way slowly back to Tangier by land, while we, with Haj and remaining
provisions, go cruising up the coast in comfort on an English ship.
[Illustration: READY FOR THE BATTLE WITH THE BREAKERS]
Embarkation at Rabat is easier to plan than to accomplish. No ship can
cross the bar; if the wind blows from the west, the huge native lighters
cannot climb over the inrolling breakers, and the ship, after a courteous
delay, steams off, leaving the drenched, discomfited passengers to
return shoreward and possess their souls in patience until there comes
the happy conjunction of a passing steamer and a calmer day.
[Illustration: FAREWELL!]
Fortune, however, favored us in this as it did in all other things during
our wanderings in Morocco. True, the breakers are rolling mountain-high
across the bar, the forty-foot lighter is tossed like an egg-shell
on their crests, or dropped with awful suddenness into abysses formed
between cliffs of green transparent water. But our sturdy crew of twenty
Salli men, descendants of the famous Rovers, attack the billows with
that dogged perseverance that made their fathers the masters of the sea
and all that sailed upon it. Wave after wave sweeps past—green-robed,
with draperies foaming white, as if the cohorts of the sea were striving
to surpass the Moorish squadrons in a glorious lab-el-baroud—a powder
play where foam and spray and the roar of waters supplant the flowing
burnooses, rolling smoke, and din of volley firing.
This is our last impression of Morocco, this overwhelming "fantasia"
of the billows. And as we look back through clouds of flying spray at
the grim Kasbah of Rabat, at the white city, and the smiling hillsides
roundabout, we say with Pierre Loti, "Farewell, dark Moghreb, Empire of
the Moors, mayst thou remain, many years yet, immured, impenetrable to
the things that are new! Turn thy back upon Europe! Let thy sleep be the
sleep of centuries, and so continue thine ancient dream. And may Allah
preserve to the Sultan his unsubdued territories and his waste places
carpeted with flowers, there to do battle as in old times the Paladins,
and gather in his harvest of rebel heads! May Allah preserve to the
Arab race its mystic dreams, its immutability scornful of all things,
and its gray rags; may he preserve to the Moorish ruins their shrouds
of whitewash, and to the mosques their inviolable mystery!"
[Illustration]