There is certainly both art and mystery in doing nothing well which these men achieve in their peculiar lives; here they sit for years together, silently waiting, without a trace of boredom on their faces, and without exhibiting a gesture of impatience. They—the 'gentlemen' in the café on the right hand—have saved up money enough to keep life together, they have for ever renounced work, and can look on with complacency at their poorer brethren. They have their traditions, their faith, their romance of life, and the curious belief before alluded to, that if they fear God and Mahomet, and sit here long enough, they will one day be sent for to Spain, to repeople the houses where their fathers dwelt.
This corner is the one par excellence, where the Moors sit and wait. There is the 'wall of wailing' at Jerusalem; there is the 'street of waiting' in Algiers, where the Moors sit clothed in white, dreaming of heaven—with an aspect of more than content, in a state of dreamy delight achieved, apparently, more by habit of mind than any opiates—the realisation of 'Keyf'.
Not far from this street, but still in the Moorish quarter, we may witness a much more animated scene, and obtain in some respects a still better study of character and costume—at a clothes auction in the neighbourhood of the principal bazaar. If we go in the afternoon, we shall probably find a crowd collected in a courtyard, round a number of Jews who are selling clothes, silks, and stuffs, and so intent are they all on the business that is going forward, that we are able to take up a good position to watch the proceedings.
We arrived one day at this spot, just as a terrible scuffle or wrangle, was going forward, between ten or a dozen old men (surrounded by at least a hundred spectators) about the quality or ownership of some garment. The merits of the discussion were of little interest to us and were probably of little importance to anybody, but the result was in its way as interesting a spectacle as ever greeted the eye and ear, something that we could never have imagined, and certainly could never have seen, in any other land.
This old garment had magical powers, and was a treasure to us at least. It attracted the old and young, the wise and foolish, the excited combatant and the calm and dignified spectator; it collected them all in a large square courtyard with plain whitewashed walls and Moorish arcades. On one side a palm-tree drooped its gigantic leaves, and cast broad shadows on the ground, which in some places, was almost of the brightness of orange; on the other side, half in sunlight, half in shadow, a heavy awning was spread over a raised daïs or stage, and through its tatters and through the deep arcades, the sky appeared in patches of the deepest blue—blue of a depth and brilliancy that few painters have ever succeeded in depicting. It gave in a wider and truer sense, just that quality to our picture—if we may be excused a little technicality and a familiar illustration—that a broad red sash thrown across the bed of a sleeping child in Millais' picture in the Royal Academy Exhibition of 1867, gave to his composition, as many readers may remember.
But we cannot take our eyes from the principal group, or do much more than watch the crowd in its changing phases. To give any idea of the uproar, the 'row' we ought to call it, would be to weary the reader with a polyglot of words and sentences, some not too choice, and many too shrill and fiercely accentuated; but to picture the general aspect in a few words is worth a trial, although to do this we must join the throng and fight our way to the front.
Where have we seen the like? We have seen such upturned faces in pictures of the early days of the Reformation by Henry Leys; we have seen such passion in Shy lock, such despair in Lear ; such grave and imposing-looking men with 'reverend beards' in many pictures by the old masters; but seldom have we seen such concentration of emotion (if we may so express it), and unity of purpose, in one group.
Do our figure-painters want a subject, with variety of colour and character in one canvas? They need not go to the bazaars of Constantinople, or to the markets of the East. Let them follow us here crushing close to the platform, our faces nearly on a level with the boards. Look at the colours, at the folds of their cloaks, bournouses and yachmahs—purple, deep red, and spotless white, all crushed together—with their rich transparent shadows, as the sun streams across them, reflected on the walls. The heavy awning throws a curious glow over the figures, and sometimes almost conceals their features with a dazzle of reflected light. Look at the legs of these eager traders, as they struggle and fight and stand on tiptoe, to catch a glimpse of some new thing exposed for sale; look at them well—the lean, the shambling, the vigorous, the bare bronze (bronzed with sun and grime), the dark hose, the purple silk, and the white cotton, the latter the special affectation of the dandy Jew. What a medley, but what character here—the group from knee to ankle forms a picture alone.
And thus they crowd together for half-an-hour, whilst all ordinary business seems suspended. Nothing could be done with such a clatter, not to mention the heat. Oh, how the Arab gutturals, the impossible consonants (quite impossible to unpractised European lips) were interjected and hurled, so to speak, to and fro! How much was said to no purpose, how incoherent it all seemed, and how we wished for a few vowels to cool the air!
In half-an-hour a calm has set in and the steady business of the day is allowed to go forward; we may now smoke our pipes in peace, and from a quiet corner watch the proceedings almost unobserved, asking ourselves a question or two suggested by the foregoing scene. Is expression really worth anything? Is the exhibition of passion much more than acting? Shall grey beards and flowing robes carry dignity with them any more, if a haggle about old clothes can produce it in five minutes?
And so we sit and watch for hours, wondering at the apparently endless variety of the patterns, and colours of the fabrics exposed for sale; and perhaps we doze, perhaps we dream. Is it the effect of the hachshish? Is it the strong coffee? Are we, indeed, dreaming, or is the auction a sham? Surely that pretty bright handkerchief—now held up and eagerly scanned by bleared old eyes—now rumpled and drawn sharply between haggard fingers—is an old friend, and has no business in a sale like this? Let us rub our eyes and try and remember where we have seen it o before. Yes—there is no mistaking the pattern, we have seen it in Spain. It was bound turbanwise round the head of a woman who performed in the bull ring at Seville, on the occasion of a particularly high and rollicking festival of the 'Catholic Church;' it was handed out of a diligence window one dark night on the Sierra Morena, when a mule had broken its leg, and the only method of getting it along was to tie the injured limb to the girth, and let the animal hop on three legs for the rest of the way. It found its way into the Tyrol, worn as a sash; it was in the market-place at Bastia in Corsica, in the hands of a maiden selling fruit; it flaunted at Marseilles, drying in the wind on a ship's spar; and the last time we saw it (if our memory serves us well) it was carefully taken from a drawer in a little shop, 'Au Dey d'Alger' in the Rue de Rivoli in Paris, and offered to us, by that greatest of all humbugs, Mustapha, as the latest Algerian thing in neckties, which he asked fifteen francs for, and would gladly part with for two.
It was a pattern we knew by heart, that we meet with in all parts of the world, thanks to the universality of Manchester cottons. But the pattern was simple and good, nothing but an arrangement of red and black stripes on a maize ground, and therein lay its success. It had its origin in the first principles of decoration, it transgressed no law or canon of taste, it was easily and cheaply made (as all the best patterns are), and so it travelled round the world, and the imitation work came to be sold in, perhaps, the very bazaar whence the pattern first came, and its originators squabbled over the possession of it, as of something unique.
But we can hardly regret the repetition of these Moorish patterns, for they are useful in such a variety of ways. Wind one of the handkerchiefs in and out amongst dark tresses, and see what richness it gives; make a turban of it for a negress's head; tie it nattily under the chin of a little Parisienne and, hey presto! she is pretty; make a sash of it, or throw it loosely on the ground, and the effect is graceful and charming to the eye. In some Japanese and Chinese silks we may meet with more brilliant achievements in positive colours; but the Moors seem to excel all other nations in taste, and in their skilful juxta-position of tints. We have seen a Moorish designer hard at work, with a box of butterflies' wings for his school of design, and we might, perhaps, take the hint at home.
But we must leave the Moors and their beautiful fabrics for a while, and glance at the Arab quarter of the town. We shall see the Arabs bye and bye in the plains and in their tents, in their traditionary aspect; but here we come in contact with a somewhat renegade and disreputable race, who hang, as it were, on the outskirts of civilization. Many of them have come from the neighbouring villages and from their camps across the plains of the Sahel; and have set up a market of their own, where they are in full activity, trading with each other and with the Frank. * Here they may be seen by hundreds—some buying and selling, some fighting and not unfrequently, cursing one another heartily; others ranged close together in rows upon the ground, like so many white loaves ready for baking. Calm they are, and almost dignified in appearance, when sitting smoking in conclave; but only give them something to quarrel about, touch them up ever so little on their irritable side, and they will beat Geneva washerwomen for clatter.
Take them individually, these trading men, who have had years of intercourse with their French conquerors, and they disappoint us altogether. They are no longer true followers of the Prophet, although they are a great obstruction to traffic, by spreading carpets on the ground in the middle of the road, and prostrating themselves towards Mahomet and the sun. Trade—paltry, mean, and cowardly as it so often makes men—has done the Arab irreparable harm: it has taught him to believe in counterfeits and little swindles as a legitimate mode of life, to pass bad money, and to cringe to a conqueror because he could make money thereby. He could not do these things in the old days, with his face to the sun.
The Arab is generally pictured to us in his tent or with his tribe, calm, dignified and brave, and perhaps we may meet with him thus on the other side of the Sahel, but here in Algiers he is a metamorphosed creature. The camels that crouch upon the ground, and scream and bite at passers-by, are more dignified and consistent in their ill-tempered generation than these 'Sons of the Prophet,' these 'Lights of Truth.'
And they have actually caught European tricks. What shall we say when two Arabs meet in the street, and after a few words interchanged, pass away from each other with a quickened, jaunty step, like two city men, who have 'lost time,' and must make it up by a spurt! Shall we respect our noble Arab any more when we see him walking abroad with a stereotyped, plausible smile upon his face, and every action indicating an eye to the main chance? *
A step lower, of which there are too many examples in the crowd, and there is a sadder metamorphose yet—the patriarch turned scamp—one who has left his family and his tribe to seek his fortune. Look at him, with his ragged bournous, his dirt and his cringing ways, and contrast his life now, with what he has voluntarily abandoned. Oh! how civilization has lowered him in his own eyes, how his courage has turned to bravado, and his tact to cunning; how even natural affection has languished, and family ties are but threads of the lightest tissue. He has failed in his endeavour to trade, he has disobeyed the Koran, and is an outcast and unclean—one of the waifs and strays of cities!
As we wend our way homeward (as John Bunyan says), 'thinking of these things,' we see two tall white figures go down to the water side, like the monks in Millais' picture of 'A Dream of the Past.' They stand on the bank in the evening light, their reflections repeated in the water. It is the hour of prayer; what are they doing? They are fishing with a modern rod and line, and their little floats are painted with the tricolour!
T would be passing over the most-enjoyable part of our life abroad, if we omitted all mention of those delightful days, spent on the hill-sides of Mustapha, on the heights of the Bouzareah, and indeed everywhere in the neighbourhood of Algiers, sketching in winter time in the open air.
Odours of orange-groves, the aromatic scent of cedars, the sweet breath of wild flowers, roses, honeysuckles and violets, should pervade this page; something should be done, which no words can accomplish, to give the true impression of the scene, to picture the luxuriant wild growth of the surrounding vegetation (radiant in a sunshine which to a northerner is unknown), and to realise in any method of description, the sense of calm enjoyment of living this pure life in a climate neither too hot nor too cold, neither too enervating nor too exciting; of watching the serene days decline into sunsets that light up the Kabyle Hills with crests of gold, and end in sudden twilights that spread a weird unearthly light across the silver sea. *
We take our knapsacks and walk off merrily enough on the bright. December mornings, often before the morning gun has fired or the city is fully awake. If we go out at the eastern gate and keep along near the sea shore in the direction of the Maison Carrée (a French fort, now used as a prison), we obtain fine views of the bay, and of the town of Algiers itself, with its mole and harbour stretching out far into the sea.
There is plenty to interest us here, if it is only in sketching the wild palmettos, or in watching the half-wild Arabs who camp in the neighbourhood, and build mud huts which they affect to call cafés, and where we can, if we please, obtain rest and shelter from the midday sun, and a considerable amount of 'stuffiness,' for one sou. But there is no need to trouble them, as there are plenty of shady valleys and cactus-hedges to keep off the sun's rays; the only disturbers of our peace are the dogs who guard the Arab encampments, and have to be diligently kept off with stones.
Perhaps the best spots for quiet work are the precincts of the Marabouts' tombs, where we can take refuge unobserved, behind some old wall and return quietly to the same spot, day after day. And here, as one experience of sketching from Nature, let us allude to the theory (laid down pretty confidently by those who have never reduced it to practice), that one great advantage of this climate is, that you may work at the same sketch from day to day, and continue it where you left off! You can do nothing of the kind. * If your drawing is worth anything, it will at least have recorded something of the varying phases of light and shade, that really alter every hour.
Let us take an example. About six feet from us, at eight o'clock in the morning, the sheer white wall of a Moslem tomb is glowing with a white heat, and across it are cast the shadows of three palm-leaves, which at a little distance, have the contrasted effect of the blackness of night. ** Approach a little nearer and examine the real colour of these photographic leaf-lines, shade off (with the hand) as much as possible of the wall, the sky, and the reflected light from surrounding leaves, and these dark shadows become a delicate pearl grey, deepening into mauve, or partaking sometimes of the tints of the rich earth below them. They will be deeper yet before noon, and pale again, and uncertain and fantastic in shape, before sundown. If we sketch these shadows only each hour, as they pass from left to right upon the wall (laying down a different wash for the ground each time) and place them side by side in our note-book, we shall have made some discoveries in light and transparent shadow tone, which will be very valuable in after time. No two days or two hours, are under precisely the same atmospheric conditions; the gradations and changes are extraordinary, and would scarcely be believed in by anyone who had not watched them.
Thus, although we cannot continue a sketch once left off, to any purpose, we may obtain an infinite and overwhelming variety of work in one day, in the space of a few yards by the side of some old well or Marabout's tomb.
We seldom returned from a day in the country, without putting up for an hour or two at one of the numerous cafés, or caravanserai, built near some celebrated spring, with seats, placed invitingly by the roadside, under the shade of trees. There were generally a number of Arabs and French soldiers collected in the middle of the day, drinking coffee, playing at dominoes, or taking a siesta on the mats under the cool arcades, and often some Arab musicians, who hummed and droned monotonous airs; there were always plenty of beggars to improve the occasion, and perhaps, a group of half-naked boys, who would get up an imitation of the 'Beni Zouzoug Arabs,' and go through hideous contortions, inflicting all kinds of torments on each other for a few sous.
It is pleasant to put up at one of these cafés during the heat of the day, and to be able to walk in and take our places quietly amongst the Arabs and Moors, without any particular notice or remark; and delightful (oh! how delightful) to yield to the combined influences of the coffee, the hachshish, the tomtom and the heat, and fall asleep and dream—dream that the world is standing still, that politics and Fenianism are things of the past, and that all the people in a hurry are dead. Pleasant, and not a little perplexing too, when waking, for the eye to rest on the delicate outline of a little window in the wall above, which, with its spiral columns and graceful proportions, seems the very counterpart in miniature of some Gothic cathedral screen.
If we examine it, it is old and Moorish (these buildings date back several hundred years), and yet so perfect is its similarity to later work, that our ideas on orders of architecture become confused and vague. We may not attempt to discover the cause of the similarity, or indeed to go deeply into questions of 'style,' but we may be tempted to explore further, and if we examine such cafés (as, for instance, those at El Biar, or Birkadem), we shall find the walls ornamented with Arabesques, sometimes half-concealed under whitewash, and the arcades and conical-domed roofs and doorways covered with curious patterns.
In this way we pass the day, often lingering about one spot in most vagrant fashion, till nightfall, when the last diligence comes crashing in, and stops to change its wretched horses. We take our places quickly in the intérieur, and are wedged in between little soft white figures with black eyes and stained finger-nails, who stare at us with a fixed and stony stare, all the way back to Algiers. Another day we spend in the Jardin d'Essai, (the garden of acclimatisation), where we may wander in December, amidst groves of summer flowers, and where every variety of tree and shrub is brought together for study and comparison. Through the kindness of the director we are enabled to make studies of some rare and curious tropical plants; but there is a little too much formality and an artificial atmosphere about the place, that spoils it for sketching; although nothing can control, or render formal, the wild strength of the gigantic aloes, or make the palm-trees grow in line.
From the 'Garden of Marengo,' just outside the western gates, we may obtain good subjects for sketching, including both mosques and palm-trees, such as we have indicated on our title-page; and from the heights behind the Casbah, some beautiful distant views across the plain of the Mitidja. Of one of these an artistic traveller thus speaks: 'Standing on a ridge of the Sahel, far beneath lies the Bay of Algiers, from this particular point thrown into a curve so exquisite and subtle as to be well nigh inimitable by art, the value of the curve being enhanced by the long level line of the Mitidja plain immediately behind, furnishing the horizontal line of repose so indispensable to calm beauty of landscape; whilst in the background the faintly indicated serrated summits of the Atlas chain preserve the whole picture from monotony. The curve of shore, the horizontal bar of plain, the scarcely more than suggested angles of the mountains, form a combination of contrasting yet harmonising lines of infinite loveliness, which Nature would ever paint anew for us in the fresh tints of the morning, with a brush dipped in golden sunshine and soft filmy mist, and with a broad sweep of cool blue shadow over the foreground.'
But our favourite rendezvous, our principal 'Champ de Mars,' was a little Arab cemetery, about six miles from Algiers; on the heights westward, in the direction of Sidi Ferruch, and near to a little Arab village called the 'Bouzareah.' This spot combined a wondrous view both of sea and land, with a foreground of beauty not easy to depict. It was a half-deserted cemetery, with tombs of Marabout priests over which the palm-trees waved, and little gravestones here and there surmounted with crescents. Sheltered from the sun's rays, hidden from the sight of passers-by, surrounded with a profusion of aloes, palms, cacti; and an infinite variety of shrubs and flowers peeping out between the palmettos, that spread their leaves like fans upon the ground—it combined everything that could be desired.
Here we worked, sitting close to one of the tombs for its shade, with the hush of the breeze, the distant sighing sound of the sea, the voices of bees, and butterflies, the flutter of leaves, and one other sound that intermingled with strange monotony of effect close to our ears, which puzzled us sorely to account for at first. It turned out to be a snore; the custodian of one of the tombs was sleeping inside with his fathers, little dreaming of our proximity. We struck up an acquaintance with him, after a few days of coyness on his part, and finally made him a friend. For a few sous a day he acted as outpost for us, to keep off Arab boys and any other intruders; and before we left, was induced to sit and be included in a sketch. He winced a little at this, and we confess to an inward reproach for having thus degraded him. He did not like it, but he sat it out and had his portrait taken like any Christian dog; he took money for his sin, and finally, by way of expiation let us hope, drank up our palette water at the end of the day!
If there is one spot in all Algeria most dear to a Mussulman's heart, most sacred, to a Marabout's memory, it must surely be this peaceful garden of aloes and palms, where flowers ever grow, where the sun shines from the moment of its rising until it sinks beneath the western sea; where, if anywhere on this earth, the faithful will be the first to know of the Prophet's coming, and where they will always be ready to meet him.
But if it be dear to a Mussulman's heart, it is also dear to a Christian's, for it has taught us more in a few weeks than we can unlearn in years. We cannot sit here day by day without learning several truths, more forcibly than by any teaching of our schools; taking in, as it were, the mysteries of light and shade, and the various phases of the atmosphere—taking them all to heart, so that they influence our work for years to come.
How often have we, at the Uffizi, or at the Louvre, envied the power and skill of a master, whose work we have vainly endeavoured to imitate; and what would we not have given in those days, to achieve something that seemed to approach, ever so little, to the power and beauty of colour, of a Titian or a Paul Veronese. *
Is it mere heresy in art, or is it a brighter light dawning upon us here, that seems to say, that we have learned and achieved more, in studying the glowing limbs of an Arab child as it plays amongst these wild palmettos—because we worked with a background of such sea and sky as we never saw in any picture of the 'Finding of Moses;' and because in the painting of the child, we had not perforce to learn any 'master's' trick of colour, nor to follow conventional lines?
And do we not, amongst other things, learn to distinguish between the true and conventional rendering of the form, colour and character, of palm-trees, aloes and cacti?
First of the palm. Do we not soon discover how much more of beauty, of suggested strength, of grace, lightness and variety of colour and texture, there is in this one stem, that we vainly try to depict in a wood engraving, than we had previously any conception of; and how opposed to facts are the conventional methods of drawing palm-trees (often with a straight stem and uniform leaves looking like a feather broom on a straight stick), which we may find in almost any illustrated book representing Eastern scenes, from Constantinople to the Sea of Galilee.
Take, for instance, as a proof of variety in colour and grandeur of aspect, this group of palm-trees * that have stood guard over the Maho-medan tombs for perhaps a hundred years; stained with time, and shattered with their fierce battle with the storms that sweep over the promontory with terrible force. ** Look at the beauty of their lines, at the glorious colour of their young leaves, and the deep orange of those they have shed, like the plumage of some gigantic bird; one of their number has fallen from age, and lies crossways on the ground, half-concealed in the long grass and shrubs, and it has lain there to our knowledge, undisturbed for years. To paint the sun setting on these glowing stems, and to catch the shadows of their sharp pointed leaves, as they are traced at one period of the day on the white walls of the tombs, is worth long waiting to be able to note down; and to hit the right tint to depict such shadows truly, is an exciting triumph to us.
Second of the aloe; and here we make as great a discovery as with the palm. Have we not been taught (in paintings) from our youth up, that the aloe puts forth its blue riband-like leaves in uniform fashion, like so many starched pennants, which painters often express with one or two strokes of the brush; and are we not told by botanists that it flowers but once in a hundred years?
Look at that aloe hedgerow a little distance from us that stretches across the country, like a long blue rippling wave on a calm sea, and which, as we approach it, seems thrown up fantastically and irregularly by breakers to a height of six or eight feet, and which (like the sea), on a nearer view changes its opaque cold blue tint, to a rich transparent green and gold. Approach them closely, walk under their colossal leaves, avoid their sharp spear-points and touch their soft pulpy stems. What wonderful variety there is in their forms, what transparent beauty of colour, what eccentric shadows they cast upon each other, and with what a grand spiral sweep some of the young shoots rear upwards! So tender and pliable are they, that in some positions a child might snap their leaves, and yet so wonderful is the distribution of strength, that they would resist at spear-point the approach of a lion, and almost turn a charge of cavalry. If we snap off the point of one of the leaves it is a needle, and a thread clings to it which we may peel off down the stem a yard long—needle and thread—nature-pointed, nature-threaded! Should not artists see these things? Should not poets read of them?
Here we are inclined to ask, if the aloe flowers but once in a hundred years, how is it that everywhere in Algeria, we see plants of all ages with their long flowering stems, some ten or twelve feet high? Have they combined this year to flower, or are botanists at fault?
Of the cactus, which also grows in wild profusion, we could say almost as much as of the palms and aloes, but it might seem like repetition. Suffice it, that our studies of their separate leaves were the minutest and most rewarding labour we achieved, and that until we had painted the cactus and the palmetto growing together, we had never understood the meaning of 'tropical vegetation.'
Many other subjects we obtain at the Bouzareah; simple perhaps, and apparently not worth recording, but of immense value to a student of Nature. Is it nothing, for instance, for a painter to have springing up before him in this clear atmosphere, delicate stems of grass, six feet high, falling over in spray of golden leaves against a background of blue sea; darting upward, sheer, bright, and transparent from a bank covered with the prickly pear, that looks by contrast, like the rock-work from which a fountain springs? Is it nothing to see amongst all this wondrous overgrowth of gigantic leaves, and amongst the tender creepers and the flowers, the curious knotted and twisted stem of the vine, trailing serpent-like on the ground, its surface worn smooth with time? Is it nothing for an artist to learn practically, what 'white heat' means?
It is well worth coming to North Africa in winter, if only to see the flowers, but of these we cannot trust ourselves to speak—they must be seen and painted.
It is difficult to tear ourselves away from this spot, and especially tempting to dwell upon these details, because they have seldom been treated of before; but perhaps the question may occur to some—are such subjects as we have depicted worth painting, or, indeed, of any prolonged or separate study? Let us endeavour to answer it by another question. Are the waves worth painting, by themselves? Has it not occurred to one or two artists (not to many, we admit) that the waves of the sea have never yet been adequately painted; and have never had their due, so to speak, because it has always been considered necessary to introduce something else into the composition, be it only a rope, a spar, or a deserted ship? Has it not been discovered (though only of late years) that there is scope for imagination and poetry, and all the elements of a great and enthralling picture, in the drawing of waves alone; and should there not be, if nobly treated, interest enough in a group of colossal vegetation in a brilliant atmosphere, without the usual conventional adjuncts of figures and buildings?
So far, whilst sketching at the Bouzareah, we have spoken only of the foreground; but we have been all the time in the presence of the most wonderful panorama of sea and land, and have watched so many changing aspects from these heights, that we might fill a chapter in describing them alone.
The view northward over the Mediterranean, westward towards Sidi Ferruch, southward across the plains to the Atlas, eastward towards Algiers and the mountains of Kabylia beyond; each point so distant from the other that, according to the wind or time of day, it partook of quite distinct aspects, fill up so many pictures in our mind's eye that a book might be written, called 'The Bouzareah,' as seen under the different phases of sunshine and storm.
It has often been objected to these Eastern scenes, that they have 'no atmosphere,' and no gradation of middle distance; that there is not enough repose about them, that they lack mystery and are altogether wanting in the poetry of cloudland.
But there are clouds. We have seen, for the last few mornings (looking through the arched windows of the great aloe-leaves) little companies of small white clouds, casting clearly-defined shadows across the distant sea, and breaking up the horizon line with their soft white folds,
'They come like shadows, so depart.'
—reappearing and disappearing by some mysterious law, but seldom culminating in rain.
Yes, there are clouds. Look this time far away towards the horizon line across the bay, and watch that rolling sea which looks like foam, that rises higher and higher as we watch it, darkening the sky, and soon enveloping us in a kin of sea fog, through which the sun gleams dimly red, whilst the white walls of the tombs appear cold and grey against a leaden sky. See it all pass away again across the plain of the Mitidja, and disappear in the shadows of the lesser Atlas. There is a hush in the breeze and all is bright again, but a storm is coming.
Take shelter, if you have courage, inside one of the Marabouts' tombs (there is plenty of space), whilst a tempest rages that should wake the dead before Mahomet's coming. Sit and wait in there, perhaps an hour, whilst one or two strong gusts of wind pass over, and then all is still again; and so dark that we can see nothing inside but the light of a pipe in one corner. We get impatient, thinking that it is passing off.
But it comes at last. It breaks over the tombs, and tears through the plantation, with a tremendous surging sound, putting to flight the Arabs on guard, who wrap their bournouses about them and hurry off to the village, with the cry of 'Allah il Allah;' leaving the care of the tombs to the palms, that have stood guard over them so long. Oh, how they fight and struggle in the wind! how they creak, and moan, and strike against one another, like human creatures in the thick of battle! How they rally side by side, and wrestle with the wind—crashing down suddenly against the walls of the tomb, and scattering their leaves over us; then rallying again, and fighting the storm with human energy and persistence!
It is a fearful sight—the rain falling in masses, but nearly horizontally, and with such density that we can see but a few yards from our place of shelter—and it is a fearful sound, to hear the palm-trees shriek in the wind.
There was one part of the scene we could not describe, one which no other than Dante's pen, or Doré's pencil, could give any idea of; we could not depict the confused muttering sound and grinding clatter (if we may call it so), that the battered and wounded aloes made amongst themselves, like maimed and dying combatants trodden under foot. Many scenes in nature have been compared to a battle-field; we have seen sheaves of corn blown about by the wind, looking like the tents of a routed host; but this scene was beyond parallel—the hideous contortion, the melancholy aspect of destruction, the disfigured limbs in hopeless wreck, the weird and ghastly forms that writhed and groaned aloud, as the storm made havoc with them.
And they made havoc with each other. What would the reader say, if he saw the wounds inflicted by some of the young leaves on the parent stems—how they pierce and transfix, and sometimes saw into each other, with their sharp serrated edges, as they sway backwards and forwards in the wind. He would say perhaps that no sea monster or devil-fish, could seem more horrible, and we wish him no wilder vision than to be near them at night, when disturbed by the wind.
We have scarcely alluded to the palmetto-leaves and branches that filled the air, to the sound of rushing water, to the distant roar of the sea, nor to many other aspects of the storm. It lasted, not much more than an hour, but the water covered the floor of our little temple before the rain subsided, and the ground a few feet off where we had sat, was completely under water. Everything was steaming with vapour, but the land was refreshed, and the dark earth was richer than we had seen it for months—there would be no dust in Algiers until to-morrow.
HE Atlas Mountains, of which we have spoken so often, are almost separated from the hills of the Sahel on which the town of Algiers is built, by the broad plain of the Mitidja, averaging between twenty and thirty miles across; and at the inland extremity of this plain, nestling close under the shadow of the lesser Atlas, is situated the town of Blidah, half Arab, half French, with its little population of European colonists and traders; its orange-groves and its orange-merchants, who here pass their monotonous, semi-successful lives—varied by occasional earthquakes and Arab émeutes.
It was not particularly to see Blidah, but because it was on the high road to the Atlas Mountains, and to Medeah, a strongly fortified town situated 2900 feet above the sea-level—approached by a military road cut through the celebrated gorge of 'La Chiffa'—that two of our party left Algiers on horseback, on the 14th of December, on a sketching expedition.
We made other interesting tours at different times; but it will be sufficient for our purpose to speak of two expeditions—the one to Medeah; the other, to the celebrated 'Fort Napoléon,' on the Kabyle Hills.
It seems to say something for the peculiarly invigorating character of the climate that, at an average temperature of 70° Fahrenheit, our little horses did their thirty or forty miles a day, laden with our well-stored saddle-bags and sketching paraphernalia; and it speaks volumes for the security with which travellers can move about from town to town, that we were merely by chance provided with firearms, and that we started without any guide or escort. *
We pass through the eastern gate before sunrise, and winding up the hills behind Mustapha Supérieure (keeping to the road) we begin to descend on the southern side and have the broad plain of the Mitidja before us, just as the day is breaking. As we come down towards the plain, we pass several farms of the French colonists; and here and there, a tobacco plantation where both Arabs and French are employed. At Birkadem, which is in the midst of a farming district, we halt to breakfast, and run considerable risk of getting into a controversy on French colonization, with some friendly and pleasant, but rather desponding agriculturists.
But, happily for ourselves and for our readers, we do not attempt to master the subject, and with a sketch of the little Moorish café with its marble columns and arcades, we continue our journey; over a wide waste—half moorland, half desert—passing at intervals little oases of cultivation, with houses, shrubs and gardens surrounding. Straight before us, apparently only a few miles off, but in reality twenty, stretches the chain of the lesser Atlas; the dark shadows here and there, pointing out the approaches to a higher range beyond.
At the foot of the mountains we can distinctly see with our glasses, the white Moorish houses and villas that are built near Blidah, and the thick clusters of trees that shelter them. Our way across the plain for the next two or three hours is rather solitary, and although we keep up a steady pace, we seem to get no nearer to our destination. We pass a number of Arabs leading camels, and overtake a troop of twenty or thirty donkeys, laden with goods and ridden by their owners (who sit upon the top of their piles), shambling along almost as fast as a horse can trot. They beat us hollow before noon, because they never stop, and reach Bouffarik, the midday resting-place, long before us.
At Bouffarik we are again amongst the colonists, and hear the peculiar French dialect of Provence and Languedoc, with occasional snatches of German and Maltese. We rest until about two hours of sunset, and become thoroughly imbued with the idea that we must be again in the south of France; so completely have the French realised, in the midst of an African plain, the dull uniformity of a poor French town, with its 'place,' its one street of cobble-stones, and its two rows of trees. Here we can obtain bad coffee, just as we can in France, and read the 'Moniteur' but four days old. It is altogether French, and when the white Arab mare belonging to one of our party turns restive at starting again, and proceeds through the village on its hind legs; it is just in time to remind us that it was here that Horace Vernet worked, and painted those rampant white steeds that we know so well, in the centre of his battle pictures. The war horse, (with the light upon him) was more to Horace Vernet perhaps, than the glory of the whole plain of the Mitidja; but how he could have lived in Algeria so long, and have been so little influenced by the scene around him, it is hard to tell.
It is tempting (indeed it is almost impossible to avoid) at Bouffarik, going a little into the question of colonization, and speaking from personal observation, of the progress made during the last few years. But as English people care little or nothing for the prospects of Algeria, we will merely remark en passant, that the insurmountable evil of Algeria being too near the home country, seems to blight its prospects even here, and that the want of confidence displayed by private capitalists retards all progress. Nearly all the capital employed by the colonists at Bouffarik and Blidah has been raised by a paternal government; but, notwithstanding help from the home country, the tide of wealth neither flows nor ebbs, with great rapidity.
At Bouffarik we see the Arabs calmly settled under French rule, and learning the arts of peace; taking to husbandry and steam ploughs, and otherwise progressing in a scientific and peaceful direction. We see them in the evening, sitting by their cottages with their half-naked children, looking prosperous and happy enough, and hear them droning to them in that monotonous 'singsong' that is so irritating to the ear.
There is a musician at the door of our hostelry now, who is as great a nuisance as any Italian organ grinder in Mayfair; he taps on a little piece of stretched parchment, and howls without ceasing. It is given to the inhabitants of some countries, who have what is commonly called 'no ear for music' to hum and to drone in more sensitive ears to the point of distraction, and it seems to be the special attribute of the Arab to fill the air with monotonous sounds; when he is on a journey or resting from it, it is the same—he hums and moans like a creature in torment. In contact with Europeans we perhaps see him at his worst; for however orderly and useful a member of society he may be, however neat and clean, there is something cringing and artificial in him at the best. But we must hasten on to Blidah.
Again we cross a wide plain, again do we overtake and are overtaken by, the tribe of donkeys; and just as the sun goes down we enter the city gates together, dismounting in the principal square, which is filled with idlers, chiefly French soldiers and poor Arabs who have learned to beg. We had chosen the time for this journey when the moon was nearly full, and our first near view of the town was by moonlight. Nothing can be conceived more beautiful than Blidah by night, with its little white domes and towers, and the mountains looming indistinctly in the background. In the Moorish quarter, the tower of the principal Mosque stands out clearly defined in the moonlight, whilst all around it cluster the little flat-roofed houses, set in masses of dark foliage—the olives and the date-trees, and the sharp-pointed spires of the cypresses, just tinged with a silver light.
So peaceful, so beautiful does it look at night, so complete the repose with which we have always associated Blidah, that it is a rude disenchantment to learn that but a few years ago, this city was upheaved and tossed about, like the waves of the sea. In 1825, eight or nine thousand people perished from an earthquake; and in 1866, a lady who was staying at our hotel, thus wrote home to her friends: *