MARSA.
Angelo's Horsemanship.--The Bey's Palace at Marsa.--The Arabs and
their Love of Tobacco.--The Friendly Moor at Camatte.
On the first of April I rode to Marsa, a little town on the seashore.
Angelo's horse seemed rather fresh, and my servant was evidently no
Centaur. He came up to me in an olive wood, where I made a halt for
about five minutes. He was holding on hard by the mane, his trousers
were up to his knees, and his face was horribly pale. On my asking him
why he loitered behind so, he owned, with a dismal sigh, that he was
half afraid of the horse. "Afraid of the horse, sir!" was poor
Angelo's lament: "Very wicked horse, sir--fell from a horse, sir--at
Scutari, sir--broke three ribs, sir--and in hospital five weeks,
sir!"
I told him to be of good cheer, for the horse would soon be quiet
after a good gallop; and, tying the horses to some olive trees, I bade
Angelo wait for me by the side of a little hillock in the plain, where
I could readily find him on my return, and went away into the forest
with my gun. The ground was covered with long, thick, pointed grass,
very wet with the dew. I saw some quails, and shot a few; then
returned to where Angelo was waiting, and galloped on to Marsa. At
this place, the Bey, and the principal inhabitants of Tunis, have
summer residences, to which they resort for the sake of sea-bathing.
On the way, I encountered a number of Arabs, mounted on mules. The
foremost shouted out to me in Arabic, as I passed, asking me to stop
and give him some tobacco. I understood the word "tobacco," which
seems to have nearly the same sound in all languages, and knowing this
request to be often a "dodge" on the part of the Arabs, who want an
opportunity to rob, if not to murder, the traveller, I pointed to
Angelo, who was following, about fifty paces behind me, with my gun,
and shouted out that _he_ would find tobacco for them. They evidently
understood my meaning; for they all set up a loud laugh, and my friend
the tobacconist--or rather the tobacco-less--looked exceedingly
"sold."
I found Marsa very prettily situated, opposite to the bay of Tunis,
near the ruins of old Carthage. The Bey's palace is a handsome
building. The English and French consulates are also well built. I
proceeded to a small Italian _locanda_, to get breakfast; but the old
lady, who seemed the presiding genius of the place, obstinately
refused to let us have anything. "_Io han niente_," was her
unanswerable argument. But I rather ostentatiously pulled out my
watch, whose golden blink somewhat softened the old lady's mood, and
caused her to remember that she might have certain eggs, and some
bread, and salad, though a moment before she had been protesting that
she had not even such a thing as bread in the house. Her son, a
handsome young Italian, returned at this juncture, and we soon had an
excellent _dejeuner_ of sausages, salad, spinach, omelette, and
cheese, with very good wine and coffee. I went down to the seaside and
bathed, first burying my watch and purse in the sand; for the Arabs
have a weakness for occasionally coming down under such circumstances,
and stealing one's clothes.
Past a ruined temple, down an avenue into Camatte, where I got an Arab
to show me the way to a house formerly occupied by an Englishman.
Here, for a wonder, I met a Moor, who spoke very good French, and was
very civil. He asked me how I liked Africa, and laughed cordially at
my open avowal, that it was "_un peu bizarre_." After gathering a few
delicious oranges for me in the garden, he took me into the interior
of the house. I found it a most charming residence, with a deliciously
cool marble reservoir in the centre, full of gold and silver fish.
I rode back by the margin of the lake, but saw only small game till I
got to a large olive forest, where a jackal made his appearance. I
gave chase, and, after a rattling gallop, lodged him among some cactus
bushes, where I could get near enough to shoot him; and so back to
Tunis.