TANGIER
To see Morocco from another side--for we had looked upon the country so
far only from behind French guns--we started up the coast on a little
‘Scorpion’ steamer, billed to stop at Rabat. But this unfriendly city
is not to be approached every day in the year, even by so small a
craft as ours, with its captain from Gibraltar knowing all the Moorish
ports. A heavy sea, threatening to roll on against the shores for many
days, decided the skipper to postpone his stop and to push on north to
Tangier; and we, though sleeping on the open deck, agreed to the change
of destination, for we had seen all too little of ‘the Eye of Morocco.’
Tangier is a city outside, so to speak, of this mediæval country. It
seems like a show place left for the tourist, always persistent though
satisfied with a glimpse. Men from within the country come out to this
fair to trade, and others, while following still their ancient dress
and customs, are content to reside here; yet it is no longer, they will
tell you, truly Morocco. There is no _mella_ where the Jews must keep
themselves; Spaniards and outcasts from other Mediterranean countries
have come to stay here permanently and may quarter where they please,
and there is a great hotel by the water, with little houses in front
where Christians, men and women, go to take off their strange headgear
and some of their clothes, then to rush into the waves. Truly Tangier
is defiled. Franciscan monks clang noisy bells, drowning the voice of
the _muezzin_ on the Grand Mosque; the hated telegraph runs into the
city from under the sea; an infidel--a Frenchman, of them all--sits
the day long in the custom-house and takes one-half the money; and
no true Moslem may say anything to all of this.
[Illustration: ON THE CITADEL. TANGIER.]
Still there are compensations. The Christian may build big ships and
guns that shoot straighter than do Moslem guns, but he is not so wise.
He works all day like an animal, and when he gets much money he comes
to Tangier with it, and true believers, who live in cool gardens and
smoke _hasheesh_, make him pay five times for everything he buys. He is
mad, the Nazarene.
Seated at a modern French or Spanish table at a café on the Soko
Chico, the Christian is beset by youthful bootblacks and donkey
drivers; and older Moors in better dress come up to tell in whispers
of the charms of a Moorish dance--‘genuine Moroccan, a Moorish lady,
a beautiful Moorish lady’--that can be seen at a quiet place for ten
pesetas Spanish. One of them, confident of catching us, presents a
testimonial; and with difficulty we reserve our smile at its contents:
‘Mohammed Ben Tarah, worthy descendant of the Prophet, is a first-class
guide to shops which pay him a commission on what you buy. He will
take you also to see a Moorish dance, thoroughly indecent, well
imitated, for all I know, by a fat Jewish woman. He has an exaggerated
idea of his superficial knowledge of the English language, and as a
prevaricator of the truth he worthily upholds the reputation of his
race.’ (Signed.)
The Soko Chico of Tangier, though an unwholesome place, is thoroughly
interesting. About the width of the Strand and half the length of
Downing Street--that is, in American, half a block long-it is large
enough, as spaces go in Morocco, to be called a market and to be used
as such. From early morn until midnight the ‘Little Sok’ is crowded
with petty merchants, whose stock of edibles, brought on platters or
in little handcarts, could be bought for a Spanish dollar. Mightily
they shout their wares, five hundred ‘hawkers’ in a space of half as
many feet. The noise is terrific. The cry of horsemen for passage, the
brawl of endless arguments, the clatter of small coins in the hands
of money-changers, and the strains of the band at the ‘Grand Café,’
struggling to make audible selections from an opera; all these together
create an infernal din. The Soko Chico, where the post-offices of the
Powers alternate with European cafés, is, of all Morocco, the place
where East and West come into closest touch. The Arab woman, veiled,
sits cross-legged in the centre of the road, selling to Moslems bread
of semolina, and the foreign consul, seated at a café table, sips his
glass of absinthe. Occasionally a horseman with long, bushed hair,
goes by towards the _kasbah_, followed a moment later by the English
colonel, who lives on the _Marshan_ and wears a helmet. A score of
tourists gather at the café tables in the afternoon, and as many
couriers, with brown, knotty, big-veined legs, always bare, squat
against the walls of the various foreign post-offices, resting till the
last moment before beginning their long, perilous, all-night runs. Jews
who dress in gaberdines listen to Jews in European clothes, telling
them about America.
But there is another Sok, the Outer Sok, beyond the walls, where the
camels and the story-tellers come, and this is no hybrid place, but
‘real Morocco,’ and as fine a Sok as any town but Fez or Marakesh can
show. Here, across a great open space that rises gradually from the
outer walls, are stretched rows upon rows of ragged tents as high as
one’s shoulder, and before them sit their keepers: Arab barbers ready
to shave a head from ear to ear or leave a tuft of hair; unveiled
Berber women, generally tattooed, selling grapes and prickly pears,
or as they call them, Christian figs; Soudanese, sometimes freemen,
trading or holding ponies for hire; women from the Soudan, generally
pock-marked and mostly slaves, squatting among their masters’
vegetables; Riff men who have come perhaps from forty miles away to
sell a load of charcoal worth two francs; pretty little half-veiled
girls, with one earring, selling bread broken into half and quarter
loaves; soldiers feeling the weight of each small piece and asking
for half a dozen seeds of pomegranate as an extra inducement to buy;
minstrels and snake-charmers and bards; water-carriers tinkling
bells; blind beggars with their doleful chants--‘Allah, Allah-la’;
camel-drivers; saints. At dark the big Sok goes to bed with the camels
and the donkeys and the sheep; man and beast bed down together; and it
is an eerie place to pick one’s way through when the night is dark.
From choice we lived, when in Tangier, across the big Sok, at the Hôtel
Cavilla, and sometimes of an evening, after dinner, would descend the
slope, passing through the gates, down the narrow, cobbled streets, to
the Soko Chico, with its flaring cafés, to sit perhaps and watch a
Moorish kaid pit his skill at chess against a German champion. It was
the business of Kaid Driss, commander of artillery, to be in readiness
at this central square to go to any gate which Raisuli or another
hostile leader might suddenly attack; and so this splendid Moor, a
well-liked gentleman, spent the weary hours until midnight at this, the
Moors’ favourite game. Around the corners, under dank arches, slept his
troops, covered even to their noses, their guns, too, underneath their
white jelebas. Except the Kaid himself there seemed to be no other
Moorish soldier stirring after nine, or at the latest, ten o’clock, and
if we should delay our stay within the walls beyond this hour, nothing
but a Spanish or other coin more valuable than a Moorish piece would
quiet the complaining brave who pulled himself together to unbar the
gates for us to pass.
It is not only, however, when the sun is down that the Moor sleeps; he
sleeps by day, as he tells you his religion teaches, and rolled in
woollen cloth lies anywhere that slumber overtakes him, in the sands
upon the beach, on the roadway under gates--what difference does it
make, the earth is sweet and a hard bed is best! Why work like the
Christian to spend like a fool?
One day I saw a fisherman without a turban, sitting on a rock, beside
him a sleeping bundle of homespun _haik_. They were a pretty pair, and
with my kodak I proceeded out to where they were, going cautiously,
intending to get a picture, from behind, of the shaved head and its
single trailing scalp-lock. But the fisherman discovered me and
hurriedly lifted the hood of his jeleba, muttering something. The sound
waked the sleeping bundle, which moved itself a moment, then poked
out a likewise shaven head and a youthful face thinly covered with
sprouting beard. ‘You English man?’ said the head.
‘No, ’Merican,’ I replied.
‘Dat’s better; more richer. Open you mouth and show dis chap you got
gold teeth.’
I did as he bade and disappointed him.
‘Me woman,’ he continued.
‘A bearded woman,’ I suggested; at which he laughed and explained
(still lying on his back) that he had been to Earl’s Court once, in a
show, that he had had no beard then, being but sixteen, and because he
wore what seemed to Londoners to be a feminine attire they all thought
he was a woman.
The Arab quarter of Tangier is entirely Moorish. The _kasbah_ or
citadel, high above the water of the Straits, has its own walls, as is
customary, and within these, though the architecture may not be so fine
as that at Fez, there is yet no Christian and no Christian way; it is
thoroughly Moorish. The tourist may enter without a guide and poke his
way through the heavy arches and the stair-like streets. He may go into
the square where the Basha governing the district, like the Sultan at
the capital, receives delegations and hears the messages of tribesmen
in trouble; but the infidel, even though he be a foreign minister, may
not enter mosque or fort or arsenal, or any other place except the
residence of the kaid who is in command.
He may look in, however, at the door of the prison and even talk to
victims crowded within, but there is much grumbling and no doubt some
cursing if he goes away forgetting to distribute francs among the dozen
jailers whose ‘graft’--to use an expressive American term--is to make a
living in this way from Europeans. There is one man in prison here who
speaks a little English and tells you that he has been in jail for more
than ten long years and will be there for ever, for he has no money and
his friends are far up country. He was imprisoned, so he says, because
a rival told the Basha that he had smuggled arms from Spain. Now
smuggling arms is a trade that meets, in ports where consuls do not
interfere, with speedy execution. Not many years ago this punishment
was meted out to some offenders even in Tangier. There is a graphic
story of one such killing told in a book by an Italian, De Amicis,
published many years ago:
‘An Englishman, Mr. Drummond Hay, coming out one morning at one of
the gates of Tangier, saw a company of soldiers dragging along two
prisoners with their arms bound to their sides. One was a mountain man
from the Riff, formerly a gardener to a European resident at Tangier;
the other, a young fellow, tall, and with an open and attractive
countenance. The Englishman asked the officer in command what crime
these two unfortunate men had committed.
‘“The Sultan,” was the answer--“may God prolong his life!--has ordered
their heads to be cut off, because they have been engaged in contraband
trade on the coast of the Riff with infidel Spaniards.”
‘“It is very severe punishment for such a fault,” observed the
Englishman; “and if it is to serve as a warning and example to the
inhabitants of Tangier, why are they not allowed to witness the
execution?” (The gates of the city had been closed, and Mr. Drummond
Hay had caused one to be opened for him by giving money to the guard.)
‘“Do not argue with me, Nazarene,” responded the officer; “I have
received an order and must obey.”
‘The decapitation was to take place in the Hebrew slaughterhouse. A
Moor of vulgar and hideous aspect was there awaiting the condemned. He
had in his hand a small knife about six inches long. He was a stranger
in the city, and had offered himself as executioner because the
Mohammedan butchers of Tangier, who usually fill that office, had all
taken refuge in a mosque.
‘An altercation now broke out between the soldiers and the executioner
about the reward promised for the decapitation of the two poor
creatures, who stood by and listened to the dispute over the
blood-money. The executioner insisted, declaring that he had been
promised twenty francs a head, and must have forty for the two. The
officer at last agreed, but with a very ill grace. Then the butcher
seized one of the condemned men, already half dead with terror, threw
him on the ground, kneeled on his chest, and put the knife into his
throat. The Englishman turned away his face. He heard the sounds of the
violent struggle. The executioner cried out: “Give me another knife;
mine does not cut!” Another knife was brought, and the head separated
from the body. The soldiers cried in a faint voice: “God prolong the
life of our lord and master!” but many of them were stupefied.
‘Then came the other victim, the handsome and amiable-looking young
man. Again they wrangled over his blood. The officer, denying his
promise, declared that he would give but twenty francs for both heads.
The butcher was forced to yield. The condemned man asked that his hands
might be unbound. Being loosed, he took his cloak and gave it to the
soldier who had unbound him, saying: “Accept this; we shall meet in a
better world.” He threw his turban to another, who had been looking at
him with compassion; and stepping to the place where lay the bloody
corpse of his companion, he said in a clear, firm voice: “There is no
God but God, and Mohammed is His prophet!” Then, taking off his belt,
he gave it to the executioner, saying: “Take it; but for the love
of God cut my head off more quickly than you did my brother’s.” He
stretched himself upon the earth, in the blood, and the executioner
kneeled upon his chest....
‘A few minutes after, two bleeding heads were held up by the soldiers.
Then the gates of the city were opened and there came forth a crowd of
boys who pursued the executioner with stones for three miles, when he
fell fainting to the ground covered with wounds. The next day it was
known that he had been shot by a relation of one of the victims....
The authorities of Tangier apparently did not trouble themselves about
the matter, since the assassin came back into the city and remained
unmolested. After having been exposed three days the heads were sent
to the Sultan, in order that his Imperial Majesty might recognise the
promptitude with which his orders had been fulfilled.’
Since this incident of thirty years ago Tangier has changed. No longer
may a man be flogged in public in the Sok; no longer may the slave be
sold at auction; no longer may the heads of the Sultan’s enemies hang
upon the gates; for the place is dominated now by foreign ministers.
Though still in name within the empire of the Sultan, it is defiled for
ever, gone over to the Christian.