Regarding His Co-Religionists In England, Ben Observed With
Bitterness, "The Jews There Are No Good; They Are Very Blackguards." He
Was Disappointed At Their Want Of Liberality, As Well As Their Want Of
Sympathy For Morocco Jews.
Ben thought he knew everything, and the ways
of this wicked world, but this visit to England convinced him he must
begin the world over again.
Our cicerone is very shrewd; withal is
blessed with a good share of common sense; is by no means bigoted
against Mahometans or Christians, and is one of the more respectable of
the Barbary Jews. His information on Morocco, is, however, so mixed up
with the marvellous, that only a person well acquainted with North
Africa can distinguish the probable from the improbable, or separate the
wheat from the chaff. Ben has a large family, like most of the Maroquine
Jews; but the great attraction of his family is a most beautiful
daughter, with a complexion of jasmine, and locks of the raven; a
perfect Rachel in loveliness, proving fully the assertion of Ali Bey,
and all other travellers in Morocco, that the fairest women in this
country are the Jewesses. Ben is the type of many a Barbary Jew, who, to
considerable intelligence, and a few grains of what may be called fair
English honesty, unites the ordinarily deteriorated character of men,
and especially Jews, bora and brought up under oppressive governments.
Ben would sell you to the Emperor for a moderate price; and so would the
Jewish consular agents of Morocco. A traveller in this country must,
therefore, never trust a Maroquine Jew in a matter of vital importance.
Mr. Drummond Hay, our Consul at Tangier, advised me to return to
Gibraltar, and to go by sea to Mogador, and thence to Morocco, where the
Emperor was then residing. Adopting his advice, I left the same evening
for Gibraltar. I took my passage in a very fine cutter, which had
formerly been a yacht, and had since been engaged as a smuggler of
Spanish goods. I confess, I was not sorry to hear that the Spanish
custom-house was often duped. The cutter had been purchased for the
Gibraltar secret service.
The Anti-Slavery Society had placed at my disposal a few yards of green
cloth, for a present to the minister of the Emperor. At the custom-house
of Havre-de-Grace, I paid a heavy duty on it. But, when I got to Irun,
on the Spanish frontier, (having determined to come through Spain in
order to see the country), the custom-house officers demanded a duty
nearly double the cost of the cloth in London, so that there was no
alternative but to leave it in their possession. The only satisfaction,
or revenge which I had, was that of calling them _ladrones_ in the
presence of a mob of people, who, to do justice to the Spanish populace,
all took my part.
When I complained of this conduct at Madrid, my friends laughed at my
simplicity, and told me I was "green" in Spanish; and in travelling
through "the land of chivalry," and of "ingeniosos hildagos," ought, on
the contrary, to thank God that I had arrived safe at Madrid with a
dollar in my pocket; whilst they kindly hinted, if I should really get
through the province of Andalusia safe to Cadiz, without being stripped
of everything, I must record it in my journal as a miracle of good luck.
This was, however, exaggeration.
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