Threatened attack by Zemmúr—Direction of march changed—Fight with
Zemmúr—Sport spoiled—Forest of Mamora—View of Rabât—Camp at
Sla—Sallee rovers—Ruins of Shella—Female saints—Tower of
Hassan—Auction of rugs.
_Camp Sla, opposite Rabât, 17th May 1880._
About two hours’ march from Sídi Adab there was suddenly great
excitement among our escort, who dashed off with cries of “Zíd,
Zíd!”[82] in the direction of a body of horsemen who had just come into
sight, while Kaïd Ali’s guards closed round the party. As the Beni
Hassan galloped across the plain, they insensibly separated into three
bodies—a few in advance, then the main body, followed by a small rear
guard. Before the two parties came into contact, the Zemmúr—for so they
proved to be—turned tail and disappeared into the Mamora forest, to
which we had now got near. A short way on we came upon a small body of
Beni Hassan cavalry, who said it would be impossible for us to proceed,
as the Zemmúr were in force ahead of us, and having heard of our
approach, intended to have a try at our baggage. The horrible vision of
Boomgheis and Norton, each with a Zemmúr at his throat, rose to view, so
I was glad when the order was given to send back a part of our escort to
save our followers—and portmanteaux—from the fate which awaited them. We
then struck off in the new direction, and got into camp at Kontra, after
a march of twenty-six miles, instead of about eighteen, as it ought to
have been. The rain had been falling nearly all day, and at luncheon it
blew such a hurricane that we had to hold on to the poles of the tent to
keep it from being blown down. During the latter part of the march we
rode through a plain covered with long rich grass, which they never cut
or make into hay, parallel to which, and three quarters of a mile off,
was the Mamora forest, along the edge of which we saw small bodies of
the Zemmúr occasionally peeping out to reconnoitre us. Kaïd Ali,
noticing two of the party riding too near the wood, at once sent off
some of his troopers to bring them in. He says the place is swarming
with these robbers, and it would take a whole regiment of cavalry to
conduct us through the way we wanted to go. At the same time, we are
told that if we had put ourselves under the protection of these
gentlemen, they would have seen us safely through this district. In that
case we might have been subject to an attack from our present
protectors, the Beni Hassan! These Zemmúr are a _brebber_, _i.e._
aboriginal tribe, inhabiting a vast tract of land south of the Beni
Hassan country. Most of it is covered by the forest of Mamora, into the
recesses of which they retreat when the Sultan sends a force against
them to levy tribute, which they never pay without some such gentle
pressure.
Outside the dúars were many fine cattle of a larger breed than I had yet
seen. The men who had charge of them were all mounted and armed, and the
beasts were driven inside the dúar at night. The camp at Kontra was
close to the Sebú, a small tributary of which we crossed at the end of
our day’s march by a stone bridge, with two large palm-trees near it. I
had a long talk with the Beni Hassan kaïd, who camped close to us. He
says his last fight with the Zemmúr was four days ago, when two of their
men were killed. He and his troop only came a short way with us next
day, a messenger having arrived in hot haste to tell him that his
village was being attacked, and that the cattle, about which I had
complimented him yesterday, had been carried off.
The tide comes up the Sebú as far as Kontra, where it is about a hundred
and fifty yards wide, justifying the praise of it by Pliny, who writes
of the “Subur amnis ... magnificus et navigabilis.” From thence it winds
north towards the outlet through which it flows into the sea at Mehdía.
We left it on our right hand, and presently came on a large body of
Udaiah, or regular cavalry, who are out in camp for the purpose of
punishing the Zemmúr, and whose commandant sent forty men as an
additional escort for the ladies, while we, with our guns and thirty men
of a neighbouring tribe who had joined us, went into the forest in
search of the Great Bustard. This bird is the _Otis tarda_, of which we
saw several between Fez and Mequinez, and it is still to be found in
many parts of South Europe, though the species is extinct in Great
Britain. The trees were chiefly cork, under which the long grass and
tall chamomile grow in great luxuriance. Our guides were queer-looking
fellows on small wiry horses, and all had guns; they had a remarkable
kind of coiffure, their heads being adorned with small red caps,
sticking out from which, on either side, were tufts or rather bushes of
black shaggy hair. Their chief was an intelligent fellow, on a
good-looking gray, which he told me had lately belonged to a Zemmúr. His
former owner, however, had wandered too far from the forest to
reconnoitre a village, and while being pursued by this chief and his
men, the gray put his foot in a rabbit-hole, and coming down, was
annexed by my friend. “And what did you do with the robber?” I asked.
“Oh, he was hurt a good deal, and we killed him, as we always do with
the Zemmúr,” was the reply.
[Illustration: TOWER OF HASSAN NEAR RABAT.]
The pursuit of bustard proved a failure. Our plan had been to go ahead
some way, and dismounting from our horses, wait for the birds to be
driven to us by the horsemen in line. This their chief would not hear
of, saying that not only should we run great risk for ourselves and
horses, but that his men being scattered would fall an easy prey to the
robbers, who he knew for certain were moving parallel to us in great
numbers through the wood. Seeing they were determined, and would not
even spread out to drive the wood, we gave it up as a bad job,—the more
courageous of the party, when well out of the forest, being as
disappointed at not having a brush with the enemy as with the failure of
the bustard-shooting. We got on the track again near the sea, and about
eight miles from Rabât, the view of which, as we rode along the top of
the cliffs, was very fine. Its white walls and minarets, bright and
shining with the rain that glistened on them, had quite a dazzling
appearance in the light of the sun, which now began to show itself. The
effect of this also was heightened by the contrast with the dark and
stormy Atlantic, whose waves rolled in with a loud booming sound against
the iron-bound coast beneath us; while on our left, and looking, from
its enormous size, close to us, rose the gigantic Tower of Hassan, like
a huge sentinel guarding the eastern approaches to the city. Half a mile
from the town we were overtaken by a tremendous blast of wind and rain,
from which we took shelter under an arch of the old Roman aqueduct,
which as late as 1790 supplied the town of Sla with excellent water.[83]
The river Búraghrag, on the bank of which we are encamped, divides Rabât
from Sla. It flows through a large expanse of sand before emptying
itself into the sea, and on this plain our tents are pitched—a rather
insecure holding-ground for tent-pegs during the fierce squalls which
sweep across it.
Some of us took a walk through Sla before dinner. There is nothing very
remarkable about the place, except the intense dislike of the
inhabitants to Christians, which is the more to be wondered at,
considering that across the river, in Rabât, this unfortunate class has
long been tolerated. Possibly the feeling is inherited from their
ancestors, the far-famed Sallee Rovers, who, up to the middle of last
century, used to commit much havoc among the English mercantile marine,
robbing and destroying the ships, and sending the unfortunate crews as
slaves into the interior. It was not until quite the beginning of this
century that any effectual measures were taken to disperse this nest of
pirates, though as far back as 1648 the place was stormed and destroyed
by the combined forces of the Sultan Mulai Zidan and Charles I. of
England,—the latter monarch receiving the following year, in a present
from the Sultan, a number of Barbary horses and three hundred Christian
slaves!
Sla (Sallee) seems more given up to shoemaking now-a-days than piracy,
whole streets being occupied with nothing but slipper shops. The Melha,
which we also visited, was full of excited Jews all in gala attire for
their Feast of Pentecost, and many in an advanced stage of intoxication,
in which we were pained to see one or two true believers joining.
In Pliny’s time, 23 A.D., “Sala” was the southernmost Roman settlement
in Marocco. He calls the river “Sala” also, and Polybius, two hundred
years before him, mentions it as “Salat,” in which spelling he is borne
out by inscriptions on coins found here. Pliny, in writing of the town,
says it was “solitudinibus vicinum”—a description which still applies,
but the elephants which he mentions as infesting the neighbourhood are a
thing of the past. The savage tribe of the Autololes, however, who in
those primitive days held in terror the whole neighbourhood of Sala,
have their representatives now in the Zemmúr, who are proved to be their
direct descendants. The few foreign consuls who live in Rabât came over
to pay their respects to His Excellency, and Mr. Frost, the English
representative, to whom we are indebted for much attention and civility,
dined with us in camp. We have now reached the farthest point of our
pilgrimage, and to-morrow our horses’ heads will be turned northwards
for the homeward march,—rather to the regret, I think, of most of the
party.
The view from our camp, across the Búraghrag, of the town of Rabât is
exceedingly picturesque, and a good photograph of it was obtained. The
town stands high on a red sandstone cliff, against the ruddy sides of
which the white houses form a striking contrast. The ancient
fortifications on the extreme west of the rock are built of this
sandstone, and mingle their warm colouring with the luxurious
vegetation, by which in parts they are almost concealed. This fortress,
and indeed most of the town, was built by Yakúb el Mansor (the
Victorious), the reputed founder, too, of Alcazar, in the twelfth
century. A part of it was rebuilt and made into batteries by a renegade
Englishman in 1772. These seem still in pretty good repair, as also are
some immensely strong bomb-proof magazines close by, but the guns in the
batteries are not fit for much.
The rain began falling in torrents as usual about twelve yesterday, from
which hour till 2 P.M. we occupied ourselves pleasantly in rowing up the
river, in an open boat half full of water, to opposite the ruins of
Shella, an ancient and very sacred town, in which are curiously combined
the traces of Roman and old Moorish occupation. Until lately, all access
to this spot for Jews or Christians has been forbidden, so very little
is known about the ruins; and from the extensive repairs effected by El
Mansor about the year 1190, it is sometimes difficult for an unskilled
eye to distinguish between the different styles. The traces of Roman
work which were most apparent was a row of vaulted arches, about four
yards across their opening, but which were more than one-half filled in
by stones and débris, and a narrow stone aqueduct, which still conveys
the waters of a spring through the ruins. The arches do not appear in
the photograph, but are just beyond and below the square tower on the
right hand, while the watercourse was farther away still to the
south-east.
[Illustration: RUINS OF SHELLA.]
From remains which have been found at Rabât, including the head of an
ancient statue, life-size, which was discovered a few years ago in the
foundations of the French Consul’s house, it is evident that Shella
increased gradually towards Rabât, and that these two towns are the
“exact equivalent of the Sala Colonia of the Itinerary.”[84] There are
some very perfect Arabic inscriptions on tombstones in the ruined
mosque, one of which is descriptive of the piety and virtues of a lady
saint; the date of this is 750 of the Hegira (about A.D. 1370), and it
tells us how the deceased lady “died in the night of Saturday the 4th of
the month Rajab, and was buried after the prayer of Friday beside the
tomb of our lord, El Mansor. May God perpetuate her magnificent works
and brilliant actions,” &c. &c. I am quite of opinion that “de mortuis
nil nisi bonum” should be said, but some of the anecdotes relating to
Latter-Day Saints of the feminine gender in Marocco would hardly tally
with the virtues inscribed on the Shella tombstone. About half-way
between Shella and Rabât stands the tower of Hassan, and adjacent to it
a ruined mosque. These also were built in the twelfth century in El
Mansor’s reign. We landed on our way up the river to look at them, and
admired the enormous proportions of the minaret, which is square, of the
same thickness all the way up, and said to be 180 feet in height. The
same architect built the tower of El Kutubia in Marocco, and the Giralda
in Seville, which latter is ascended by the same means as the one here,
viz. an inclined plane.
The tower of Hassan has lasted well, and shows the superiority of the
Moorish workmen in former days, but about two-thirds up it bears signs
of having been struck by lightning. The mosque close by must have been a
building of great extent, its roof having been supported—so Jackson
(1809) and others tell us—by 360 columns of marble. Many of these are to
be seen lying about the place, partly buried in the ground, and none
apparently in their original positions. From Shella we walked back to
Rabât, being anxious to buy some of the famous rugs made there, and
arrived in time for the afternoon sale from four to six, which takes
place whenever they have any for disposal. The sellers run up and down
the streets, with the rug on their arm, shouting the price, and noting
the offers of intending purchasers as they pass. We stood in the hall of
the Vice-Consul’s house, which is at the end of a passage connecting it
with the street, and every now and then a carpet-seller would rush down
the lane and into the hall, shout out to what figure the price had
risen, then taking our bid, would run out again to the street, being
followed in quick succession by one or two more. Whether or not they may
have received some imaginary offers in the street to raise the price
before returning, I cannot say; but we had no reason to complain of what
we paid for the few very pretty rugs we purchased. We leave here
to-morrow, the 18th, for Mehdía, our two days’ halt having been
acceptable alike to man and beast.