The pillars of Hercules

The civil government of Rabat is vested in the Caïd, whose functions I have already described. The financial officers are the Emirs of the custom-house, the chief of whom is called the Administrador, and which, from that title, seems to have supplanted the original municipal Government; the Mehatzib, an officer appointed to fix the price of provisions, and to stamp goods publicly sold; and the Nadir, or administrator of the Sultan’s property, which consists in the houses and gardens he comes into possession of on the demise of his debtors, by which means he has extinguished in part, and is in process of extinguishing, the ancient rights and privileges of the town. There is no confiscation in Rabat for any crime; but by the custom-house system he is becoming the proprietor of all the property. The Nadir has from these funds to pay the poor Talebs, or learned men, which absorbs a great portion of the profits. There is a Beit ul Mal, or public treasury. The judicial power belongs of right to the Caïd, or to him who is next in dignity to the Caïd. The office is well known in Turkey, but here he belongs to no independent body, and exercises but slender influence: it has not, however, been always so. Mr. Addison, a chaplain of Charles II., and some time at Tangier during the English occupation, thus speaks of what he calls “The Moors’ Church Government.”

“They have in every cavila (or county) an Alcalib or high-priest, in whose nomination the secular power doth not at all interpose, for he is chosen out of and by the Alfaques, and invested with power to depose or otherwise chastise the offending clergy. Immediately upon this arch-priest’s election, he is possessed of the Giamma Gheber, or Great Church, wherein upon every Friday he expounds some text of the Alchoran, unto which exercise he always goes accompanied with the chief personages of the neighbourhood. This eminent churchman is seldom seen in public but at this exercise. For, to make himself the more reverenced, he affects retirement,[229] spending his hours in the study of the Alchoran, and in resolving such cases as the laity present him, who esteem his resolutions as infallible; and this, with a careful inspection into the deportment of the inferior clergy, doth constitute the office and government of the Alcalib. As for his revenues, they are suitable to his condition; and as to his life, it is austere and reserved, he affecting a peculiar gravity in all his carriage. Every Alcalib has his distinct diocese, out of which he has no power, so that the Alcalib of Beni Aros hath nothing to do in Minkél, for every one is absolute in his own cavila.”

Mr. Addison gives the following interesting details respecting their judicial proceedings:—

“Here’s no intriguing the plea with resolutions, cases, precedents, reports, moth-eaten statutes, &c.; but everything is determined according to the fresh circumstances of the fact, and the proof of which is alleged. The testimony of two men, if they are of known sobriety, is sufficient to make good the allegation, but there must be twelve to ratify it, if their conversation be suspected.

“In taking the testimony of a Moor upon oath, the servant of the Alcaldee carries the deponent to the Giamma or Mosch, where, in the presence of the Alcaldee, he swears by that holy place that he will declare all that he knows concerning the matter to which he is to give evidence; but oaths are never administered to any in another man’s case but such as are suspected persons, and they are usually numbered among the rogues and faithless, who have no credit without them. Besides, it is never permitted for a man to swear in his own case but for want of witnesses, or when the accusation is of that nature that the impeached cannot otherwise receive purgation: as for the Christian and Jew, they are suffered to give testimony according to the rites and customs of their own religions, but the Moors are not forward to put them upon this trial, as doubting that fear of punishment should tempt them to perjury; and those who are thereunto accessory (according to the Moresco principle), are involved in the guilt.

“In pleas of debt it is required that the reality of the debt be first manifest, which being done before the Alcaldee, he signifies it to the Almocadem of the cavila where the debtor lives, who, upon his signification, commands a present payment to be made; but if the debtor refuse, or be unable, to give the creditor satisfaction, the Almocadem remits him to the alhabs or prison, which is always near the Almocadem’s house, where he stays till bailed thence by sufficient sureties, or personally pays the debt.”

The following on the same subject is from the ponderous records of the Franciscan Friars:—

“It is customary for all the chief priests and doctors of law to assemble with the other great people of the town, and for the Mufti or Cadi to read aloud to the Emperor a short recapitulation of some of the laws of the Koran, which direct that he shall preserve the empire, administer speedy justice, protect the innocent, destroy the wicked; and so far from countenancing and keeping near his sacred person any adulterer, that he shall punish adultery, prevent the exportation of corn and provisions to the prejudice of the people, tax provisions according to their plenty or scarcity, and forbid usury to be exercised towards the poor, which is an abomination before God. He is told that if he breaks these articles, he shall be punished as he ought to punish others.”

These extracts will show that Morocco is not now without some rule for the present, and some respectable vestiges of the past. There are other functionaries of the city, whose origin ascends to an earlier period than the Mussulman times. They are public notaries, called Edules; no doubt the Roman edile. Before them sales are effected, and deeds executed.

The present practice I shall give as I have been able to collect it. The initiatory steps are by documents drawn up by Edules—these have the conjoint characters of petition, affidavit, and verdict (in the old sense). The Plaintiff’s case is stated—he signs it. His witnesses then sign, if they agree with his statement of facts, or state in what they differ. Then follow signatures as vouching for the Plaintiff or Defendant, as the case may be, the witnesses, or the other signees. This act is then verified by the Edules, as to the genuineness of the signatures. Furnished with this document, the petitioner proceeds to the judge, the governor, or the Sultan. He is met by a counter document. The Judge, after perusing these, proceeds to try the case by oral testimony, and without intervention of legal practitioners. The document is called El Bra, which is very near, Brief.[230] This is evidently the origin of the Spanish mode of procedure by Escribanos. Among the Spaniards the oral proceedings are suppressed, and those which are the preliminary steps only in the Moorish courts, constitute the whole proceeding. The Edules have become agents to the parties, as well as public notaries; so that the case of each party is placed in the hands of the agents of the other. Thus, notwithstanding excellent laws, the Spanish Courts have been converted into labyrinths of intrigue. The Moorish system, which exhibits the origin of the Spanish aberrations, still retains the celerity of oral proceedings, with the advantage of record, and combines the responsibility of a Judge with the uses of a Jury. In fact, it differs little from the ancient institution of the Jury in Britain, which gave their verdict on the common repute of the parties, and not on the facts of the case; though it does not leave to them the faculty either of condemnation or expurgation. I look, of course, to the system, as what it would be if duly executed; and it was, no doubt, the foundation of that prompt justice which characterised the Mussulman government in Spain, and made Algiers a model for quick, gratuitous, and impartial adjudication, until its capture by the French.

When any one is assaulted or insulted in the streets, or in any way injured in public, and he appeals to the Caïd: his appeal is rejected unless he brings as witnesses those who were present; but he has the power of compelling their presence—he has but to cry out, “I seek justice,” and every one within hearing must quit whatever occupation they are engaged in, and secure the offender. If they refuse or neglect, they become immediately principals, and the injured person has his remedy against each and all.

It is to this rule—an extended “view of frank pledge,”[231]—that the tranquillity and security of the towns amongst so turbulent a population is to be attributed; and whatever partiality there may be in governors, there is no apprehension of false testimony among the people.

The office of king, in Morocco, is specially that of Grand Justiciary. The king himself is the fountain of justice. There is the utmost freedom of appeal to him from or against the Caïd;—he will stop in the streets, and administer summary justice while sitting on horseback; and when any supplicant appears at his gate, however humble, of whatever race or faith, and pronounces the words, “The God of Justice,” he is admitted to his presence; the order is given for the council to be filled; the secretaries appear in their places, and the petitioner states his or her case, and justice is immediately done. While he has been here, two hours have been daily consecrated to this duty; and this I imagine to be the secret of those constant peregrinations of the Emperor of Morocco, and their extraordinary effect in quelling insurrections and quieting the country; whilst, by the heavy exactions with which they are accompanied, they might appear calculated to produce the very contrary effect. A “progress of the king,” is the constant specific in Morocco for disturbance—there is always disturbance where he has not for a long time appeared; and he always manages to subdue it.

The designation of the court of Morocco is El Haznee, or the treasury. The title of the Minister of Finance in Spain to day is Haciendu. Haznee is treasury or possessions—the two terms are synonymous, and one is derived from the other: the one briefly explains in Morocco the purposes of government, and in Spain its necessities. Our word magazine comes from Mal Haznee, or treasury of wealth. How surprised the legitimate owners of the terms would be, if they knew the contents of the periodicals to which we apply it.

It is impossible to conclude this subject of government without mention of the saints. What constitutes a saint no one can tell: they are of both sexes and all ages, of every class and rank, from the madman to the philosopher, from the fanatic to the infidel, and from the mischievous and wicked to the humane and benevolent. I met a man with wool on his head, and a long stave in his hand, chanting forth a ditty at the top of his strained voice. This was a saint, and the soldiers made me move aside, for fear he should make a rush at me. They took the man for a madman; he was none. There was some time ago at Tangier, a female saint, who went about entirely naked: every morning she took from the market-people wood, and laying it in a circle made a fire and seated herself in the middle. There are respectable families where saintship is hereditary: these bury the saints when they die, in their own houses. In these saints are to be found traces at once of the asceticism of early Christianity, which had its birth in Africa, and of those practices which, in the still earlier times of Polytheism, rendered Africa a scandal and wonder to the rest of the world.[232]

Since the introduction of Islamism, the superstitions of a country, in early times the most fertile in monsters and chimeras, have been associated with that faith, and have produced that strange veneration of dead saints and sanctification of living fools, which is without parallel elsewhere; and weaving themselves into the religious forms of a people whose civil government is derived from its sacred writings, the distinction between the doctrines of the one, and revolutions of the other is effaced, and thus do we find the names of dynasties derived from the denomination of sects.

All the great dynasties, save one, have begun with saints or preachers. Fez and Morocco were built by followers of teachers who settled around their cells to listen to their words, and share in the repose that resulted, if not from the justice they administered, at least from the respect which they inspired. They died, as they had lived, teachers and preachers. On the son of the one—on the posthumous child of the other—the surviving gratitude of the people bestowed the title and authority of prince. The title of the present emperor is merely the designation of an officer of the law. That character alone should give to a man control over the multitude and authority over the monarch—make his house a sanctuary for the malefactor, and himself a guarantee of safety to a caravan, is a wonderful thing. Their religious establishment has served to repair wrongs and to avert calamities, and even at the present moment it mitigates rudeness and restrains power.

One of the tribes of necromancers seems to possess some secret which protects them against the bite of the most venomous serpent.[233] An exhibition of this kind I have failed to see, this not being the season of the year. They attribute diseases to the presence of evil spirits—they fear the evil eye, and against these the remedy is writing on pieces of paper and amulets, a practice derived from or connected with the writing by the Jews of portions of Scripture on paper, binding it on the foreheads and arms, and inserting them in holes in the door-posts. Anybody performs this service of writing on pieces of paper, and in the Dunus when I have refused to prescribe, or had nothing to give, the patient has been taken to the Scheik, who immediately furnished at once a prescription and dose with his reed. The learned in the art are from Suz—they are called Tolmas, and walk in secret, making an equal mystery of themselves and their necromancies; poor and wandering, and refusing remuneration. They generally exact a promise of secrecy before they exert their art.

By the account which I have heard, it is with them also the pen and scraps of paper, but their mode of using them is different. As they write they throw their prescriptions into a brazier, and go on thus increasing the power of the incantation—but into the brazier is first thrown incense. In the shops, incense, or plants, or leaves producing sweet odours, occupy a considerable amount of space. The Pharmacopolists exceed all conceivable proportion. The operation of their drugs upon the human body appears chiefly to be through the nose, and by means of the chafing-dish. The plants and gums are supposed to possess distinct qualities and virtues. Thus, in ancient Polytheism, different incense was offered to different divinities. Vervain had magical power for Greeks, Romans, and Druids; it has so still for cats. A plant is particularly mentioned—Cynospastes,[234]—by the smoke of which epilepsy was cured, and demons were expelled. The plant Barras, was similarly used by the Hebrews.[235] It is supposed, to be one of the Algæ, which contains prussic acid. Amongst the Jews, death was the penalty for compounding the incense that was used in the Temple. In the story of Balaam, we find incantations mixed with the worship of Jehovah.

The Tolmas are applied to in cases of disease; for the recovery of stolen goods; that they “may not be seen when burying their money; for gaining the affection of individuals, but chiefly for casting out devils.” The consulting party states his case; the Tolman writes, and throws the paper in the fire, and after a time tells him that the disorder will or will not be cured, and in what time and manner, or what he is to do—that the stolen property has been taken by a certain individual, or by a man of such a form and appearance—that at a certain time he will be moved by remorse to restore it—that in such a day or place he will be found selling it, &c. Stories of the casting out of devils take the place of our ghost stories;—I will give one as a specimen.

A party of Jews were amusing themselves in a garden near Tangier; one of them, a butcher, fell into a pond. When he was drawn out, he was in violent contortions—he had been seized by a spirit. A Tolma was sent for. Having cut a reed of the length a man could hold between the palms of his hands with his arms stretched out, he made it to be so held by one of the party; then addressing the devil, asked who he was. The devil, speaking by the mouth of the man in convulsions, answered, that he would tell him neither his name, nor that of his tribe, nor that of his father, nor that of his mother, but only that he was a Jew. The Tolma asked, why he had entered into this man? The devil answered, that he was at the bottom of the lake with his wife and children, and that the butcher had fallen in and killed one of his sons; and that now he would not leave him until he had taken his life. While this conversation was going on, the reed was shortened in the hands of the man who held it, and the Tolma declared that power was given to the spirit over the man. Incantations were vain, but he continued to write on paper, and to throw the scraps into the brazier; and as he did so, the reed shortened and shortened, and the man’s frenzy became wilder, and then his strength decayed, and suddenly the hands of the man who held the reed closed together, and, at the same moment, the possessed expired.

When the incantation is powerful enough to subdue the spirit, he implores liberty to be released, and to go into some other body, and then the enchanter will not suffer him until he has bound himself by an oath never to enter the same man again, nor to come near a certain place, and then asks him whether he chooses to go out by fire or water. A basin of the one and the other is accordingly brought, into one of which the spirit is supposed to plunge, and then the patient speaks in his own voice, and recovers as if from a trance.

The chaplain of Tangier, while it was held by the English, gives us the following narrative:—

“One of my soldiers, an Issówi, was seized with the devil: it took four men to hold him down, and prevent him jumping over the battlements. He then broke away from us, and throwing himself on the ground began tearing himself: I never saw anything so explanatory of the account in Scripture. The cure is as curious as the disease. They burn some benzoin under the nose of the patient, which quiets him for a time; but as soon as the fumes cease, he breaks out again, and lays hold of everything within his reach: in some cases he has been known to destroy children. This poor creature ate several pieces of paper, and bits of lime and dirt; but when the words ‘Sídí Benel Abbás, Sídí Abd-el-Kádir,’ &c., were pronounced, his hands, which had been firmly closed, were opened: his companions then called upon Abú to say the Fátihah, in which all joined, when he came to himself, although he appeared, and talked, like a child for some minutes; after which he quite recovered.”