The lawless bands spat
at me, and every European passing by them, screaming with threatening
gestures, "God curse you! Infidels." These semi-savages, called out for
the defence of the Empire, were merely armed with a bad gun or
matchlock; some had only knives and clubs. Such levies are certainly
more fit to pillage the Emperor's coast-towns than to defend his
territory against the foreign enemy.
These poor tribes bring their own provisions, a little barley meal, and
olive or argan-oil, or liquid butter; on this being exhausted, they
could stay no longer, for Government supplies them with nothing but bad
matchlocks.
They were loud in their complaint on not receiving any nations, and
threatened to join the French Nazarenes when they arrived. His
Excellency the Governor was very anxious to get rid of them, which was
not at all surprising. So avaricious is the Emperor, that when he can,
he makes the rich Moors supply arms for their poorer brethren, instead
of furnishing them from government depots. And this he insists upon as a
point of religion. The Governor called upon rich Moors to supply the
poor with arms.
A friend of mine who understands Shelouh as well as Arabic, overheard a
characteristic quarrel between a Shedma man and a Hhaha man. The Shedma
people, or inhabitants of the plains, mostly speak Arabic, those of the
mountains, Shelouh, which difference of language embitters their
quarrels, and alienates them from one another.
Shedma man. - "Dog! you have put your hands of the devil into my bag of
barley."
Hhaha man. - "Dog and Jew, you lie!"
Shedma man. - "Jew and Frenchman! there's some one now in your wife's
tent."
Hhaha man. - "Religion of the Frenchman! your mother has been
dishonoured a thousand times."
The maternal honour is the dearest of things amongst these
semi-barbarians. At the mention of this libel on his mother, the Shedma
fellow rushed at the Hhaha man, seizing him by the throat, and
unsheathed a dirk to plunge into his bowels. The scuffle fortunately
excited the instant attention of a group of Arabs close by, who,
securing both, carried them before the Shiekh; who, without hearing the
subject of the quarrel, bastinadoed them both with his own hand. But he
was the Hhaha Sheikh, and the Shedma Sheikh complained to the Governor
of his man having been bastinadoed by the other Sheikh. The Governor
dismissed them, each threatening the other with due vengeance.
It is time to give some account of Mogador. We sometimes spell the name
with an e, Mogadore, the inhabitants call their town _Shweerah_. Square,
[30] in allusion to its beauty, for it is the only town constructed
altogether on geometrical principles throughout Morocco.
