excitement to romance; and the occurrences that hurt his vanity are as plainly related as those that flattered it.

He embarked at Tariffa and landed at Tangier. On the transition he makes some curious reflections, considerably just, no doubt, but representing the matter rather in the extreme.

• The sensation which we experience on making this short passage for the first time, can be compared only to the effect of a dream Passing in so short an interval of time to a world entirely new, and which has not the smallest resemblance to that which we have quitted, we seem to have been actually transported into another planet.

In all countries of the world, the inhabitants of the neighbouring states are more or less united by mutual relation; they amalgamate in some degree together, and intermix so much in language, habits, and customs, that we pass from one to the other by gradations almost imperceptible. But this constant law of nature does not prevail between the inhabitants of the two shores of the Streights of Gibraltar; they, notwithstanding their vicinity, are as much strangers to each other as a Frenchman to a Chinese.

But

In the countries of the East, if we observe successively the inhabitants of Arabia, Syria, Turkey, Walachia, and Germany, a long series of transitions marks, in some manner, almost all the different degrees which separate the barbarian from the civilized man. here the observer, in the same morning, touches the two extremities of the chain of civilization, and within the petty space of twenty-two leagues and two-thirds (which is the shortest distance between the two coasts) he finds a difference of twenty centuries.'

The extremity of the chain of civilization'—that is to say, the finer end, in Spain! Could there be a stronger evidence of the consciousness of Spanish blood?

At Tangier he was readily and fully admitted as a true Mussulman, received all manner of flattering attentions, and was greatly amused in observing the manners of the people, who have just as many fanciful and superstitious ceremonies as their most excessive idleness will let them. He came upon them at the right time, as it happened to be the Mouloud, or festival of the nativity of the Prophet, during which the children of the faithful are initiated, with diverting antics, by the rite of circumcision. But a still more diverting exhibition was afforded by a court of justice. The venerable Kaïd held a much higher judicial rank than that enjoyed by the judges in a country like ours; his office was legislative as well as ministerial: in one breath he pronounced the law and the sentence; and he felt no embarrassment in the exercise of his solemn functions, from the circumstance of not being able to read. We must transcribe part of the account of so dignified a process.

The Kaïd lying on a carpet and some cushions, prepares to hear both parties, who are placed squatting down near the door of the hall; and the discussion begins. Sometimes the Kaïd and the parties

begin speaking, or rather bawling aloud, altogether for a quarter of an hour, and without any possibility of understanding each other, till the soldiers, who are always standing behind the parties, strike them violently with their fists to make them silent. The Kaïd then pronounces his judgment, and directly afterwards both the parties are turned out of doors by the soldiers with redoubled blows, and the sentence is executed without remission. It is a remarkable circumstance, that all who present themselves for judgment before the Kaid, are, after the decision, turned out in this manner by the soldiers, who continually cry out, "sirr, sirr," (run, run.)?

It is, at the same time, fair to remark, that this Kaïd, or governor of the place, is not the only constituted judicial authority; there is the Cadi, or civil judge, whose sessions are a trifle more decorous; still, however, the concerns of justice

are transacted nearly in the same manner; his decisions are taken from the Koran, and from tradition, so far as they are not in opposition to the pleasure of the Sovereign. After a case has been judged by the Kaid, or the Cadi, there is no appeal for the parties, but to the Sultan himself.'

Our author is minute on culinary matters, and the modes and ceremonies of repast; and alleges against these Moors, what we should not have expected, an excess of tea-drinking. At this time,' he says, more tea is drank in proportion at Morocco than even in England; and there is no Mussulman in any tolerable circumstances who has not at all hours of the day tea ready to offer to every one who may visit him. It is taken very strong, seldom with milk, and sugar is put into the teaSpot. The English provide them with both the sugar and tea, of which article great quantities are imported from Gibraltar. The dress, the domestic economy, the music, the bold and cruel horsemanship, the architecture, are all well described; as also the nuptial and funeral ceremonies. The mode of introducing the contracted pair to each other on the weddingday, might seem to have been contrived for the purpose of precluding, by its cast of farce and fun, any access of too pensive musings.'

The first time I saw this ceremony at Tangier, was about six in the morning. The young bride was carried on the shoulders of four men, in a kind of cylindrical basket, which was lined on its outside with fine linen, and covered over with a lid of a conical form, painted of various colours; like those which they put on their tables. The basket was so small, that I should have thought it impossible to have placed a woman in it; it looked altogether as if they were carrying a large dish of victuals to the bridegroom. When it arrived, he lifted up the lid, and then for the first time beheld his future wife.'

Music is of course indispensable; it is so indeed in almost all affairs of ceremony; and the Bey describes it as a frightful con

flict of sounds, the predominant one of which is a shrill cry of the women, which they are in the practice of uttering, both on occasions of ceremony, and whenever they would express respect or congratulation.

They utter these in honour of the king's presence; and when I became of some consideration among them, they conferred these compliments on me. As this exertion is considered as a talent, and is the result of art, they seize every opportunity of making it, and endeavour to excel each other in it, as well in the shrillness as in the length of the sound. Sometimes I heard them pass my house in groups, at one and two o'clock after midnight, shrieking out their horrible exclamations,'

The ignorance of the people, of whatever rank, is gross in the extreme; and so general that there is hardly an exception to be found, unless we are to consider as such a few cunning rogues, who carry on a most thriving trade of saintship at the expense of the barbarian community. One of these saints became quite social and frank with our pretended Moslem, and often repeated to him his favourite saying, that fools' are made for the amusement of men of ability;' and our zealot, (for Ali always affected to be most devoutly intent upon the duties of his religion,) instead of rebuking this scoundrel, seems to have fully shared in the glee with which, in confidential conversation, he laughed at the credulity of his dupes.

Counterfeit saints these people can thus manufacture among themselves; for counterfeits of other things it seems they are beholden to more skilful nations. Bad money is very common in their circulation, and the result of all the Bey's inquiries about it was, that it is supposed to be coined in England.' It does not therefore contribute to aggravate that rancour against the Jews, which, by our Author's account, inflicts on them systematically so many grievances in Morocco. He recounts the humiliations and iniquities they are doomed to suffer; and these are just as many as all the possible ways in which their interests and feelings can be placed in any sort of competition with those of their tyrants; and their tyrants are just as many as there are Mahomedans around them; for the very children of the Mahomedans will insult and strike a Jew, whatever 'be his age and infirmities, without his being allowed to complain, or to defend himself.' The only alleviation of the oppression they suffer, is derived from their corruption: the young Jewesses have much more agreeable countenances than the Moorish women; and some slight mitigation of tyranny is the consequence, to the sect, of the tyrants often liking to have Jewish mistresses.

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The sort of lordly style so judiciously assumed by this representative of the Abbassides, and the power of science or di

vination which he evinced in calculating an eclipse, soon secured him great respect, consequence, and notoriety in the country; so that he was quite a fit person to be introduced to Muley Soliman, Emperor of Morocco, who at that time made a visit to Tangier. He took mightily with his Majesty and other branches of the imperial family, who insisted on the honour of his company at the seats of empire, Fez and Morocco. He set off therefore for Fez, by way of Mequinez; constantly making, as indeed throughout all his peregrinations, such observations on matters connected with science, as travelling inconveniences allowed; and as he durst do, for fear of the observations of which he was liable to become himself the subject; for he found it uniformly a characteristic of his brethren of the Islam church, that a mixture of contempt and suspicion is excited in them by any appearance of the minute, inquisitive, and earnest observation which distinguishes a philosopher: so that he was obliged to keep himself under much management and restriction in collecting flowers or mineral specimens, and in his celestial observations. He must have been very adroit to make the number of observations, in different apartments, which he has put on record.

A minute description, with every appearance of accuracy, is given of the appearance, condition, and principal structures, of Fez, where he resided nearly four months, in high favour and intimacy with whatever was the most powerful, or opulent, or illuminated, or saintly, in the city. Every thing belonging to architecture is wretched, whether in houses, palaces, or mosques. The streets are narrow, dark, and unpaved, with mud in rainy weather to the depth of the knee. The houses are high and projecting in front; the two sides of the street, therefore, approach very near each other at the exterior galleries of the upper stories. This construction, and the badness of the walls, which, he says, ' are almost all fissured and bulging,' have made it necessary to prop them by walls across at certain distances. 'These walls have arched passages, which are shut at night; and the city becomes then divided into several quarters, and all 'communication between any one part of the town and the rest, ' is effectually precluded.' Most of the fronts to the street are without windows, and the few that are seen are placed very high,' are not larger than a common sheet of paper, and are generally either shut or covered with blinds, from jealousy.' The residences of persons of rank are generally disposed in the form of a court-yard, with long colonnades and galleries. There is a universal meanness of workmanship, and a prevailing appearance of decay and ruin. And no wonder at this latter circumstance, if the information given to Ali was correct, that the 100,000 souls it is now computed to contain, are but half the

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number it contained before the last visit of the plague, of which event he does not mention the date.

It is said that Fez contains more than two hundred mosques. Our Mahomedan had every possible advantage for inspecting every thing about such a wretched load upon the earth. Each of them has its court-yard surrounded by arcades. The handsomest is one dedicated to the Sultan Muley Edris, the founder of Fez. Its chief use is that of being a sacred asylum for criminals; the greatest criminal is there in safety, and no one would dare to arrest him.' The largest of them contains, in one of its minarets, some mouldering and defaced relics of a pair of globes, and a quantity of books. It has another very remarkable singularity,

A covered place for women who may choose to participate in the public prayers: this is a circumstance unique, and peculiar to this building; for, as the Prophet has not assigned any place for women in his paradise, the Mahomedans give them no place in the mosques, and have exempted them from the obligation of attending the public prayers.'

There are large and well supplied markets for provisions, and the shew of shops is prodigious. Baths are numerous; in the one resorted to by our adventurer, he found pails full of hot water carefully placed in corners. I asked them the reason of

this. "Do not touch them, Sir," answered all the people belonging to the bath, "do not touch them!" "Why not?" "These pails are for the people below." "Who are they?" "The demons who come here to bathe themselves at night." On this topic they told me many ridiculous stories.' He says they actually believe that the storks which frequent the town during part of the year, are meu from some distant islands,' who have taken the shape of birds, and after a time return to their own country, where they resume the human forin.

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It is not, however, that the city has not schools, an academy,' and a good complement of doctors, denominated Fakihs. With these sages the Bey held divers learned and philosophical disputations. He reports that he confounded them; and more, that he almost made some of them suspect the barbarism of their lore, and their mode of reasoning. They could not, however, be made to comprehend the difference between astronomy and astrology, though he avers that he posed them from the Koran with respect to the merits of the latter.

The technicalities of the academic course are not unworthy of the dignity of its subjects.

Imagine a man sitting down on the ground with his legs crossed, uttering frightful cries, or singing in a tone of lamentation. He is surrounded by fifteen or twenty youths, who sit in a circle with their