CHAPTER XV.

The only drawing which he has left of Carthage is a rough pen-and-ink sketch of the interior of the great reservoirs.

We determined to make two excursions from Tunis before setting out on our journey into the remote interior—the first to Zaghouan, where is one of the springs which supplied ancient Carthage, and the other to Bizerta; both these can be done in carriages, and this enabled me for a little while to enjoy the society of a brother, whose health would not enable him to make a long journey on horseback. It also happened that His Highness the Bey was absent for a time from his usual place of residence, and we could not possibly set out on our journey without presenting our respects to him, and obtaining the necessary letters of recommendation.

We left Tunis early on the morning of March 29, by the Bab el-Djizira, or gate of the island, by a road which has been cut through an Arab cemetery, surrounding the shrine of Sidi Ali ben Ahsan. The heights above are crowned by two very picturesque forts, which are prominent objects in the landscape from every point of view round Tunis. The ground being somewhat undulating, the great salt marsh or lake, called Sebkha es-Sedjoumi, which extends to five miles to the south-west of the town, is concealed from sight till we approach its southern extremity. During the winter months this contains a considerable body of water, but in summer it becomes little more than a fetid marsh, with a broad efflorescence of salt around its margin.

Kingston spent several hours yesterday in shooting around this lake, and reports that snipe, plover, and other wading birds are most abundant.

As we approached the Mohammedia we observed, lying in the middle of the road, a very fine cippus of white marble, which had recently been found at Ain Segal, and was being conveyed to Tunis by order of General Kheir-ed-din. It was so heavy that the caratoni on which it was placed broke down. On our return it had disappeared, and as the inscription is probably unpublished I was glad to have copied it, though very hurriedly, on the outward journey. Its dimensions were 4 ft. 7 in. long, 23 inches broad, and 25 deep.

At eleven miles from Tunis is the Mohammedia, an immense ruined palace, or rather a mass of palaces, built by Ahmed Bey, who died in 1855, at an expense of many millions of piastres, and decorated with great magnificence, but which since his death has been allowed to go to ruin. It has served as an inexhaustible mine for materials with which to build and adorn other palaces; its marble columns have disappeared, its walls have been stripped of their covering of tiles, the roofs have nearly all fallen in, and it is impossible to imagine a more perfect picture of desolation than is presented by this modern ruin. Probably, when the present Bey dies, his successor will choose a new residence, and the Kasr Saeed will fall into decay as this palace has done. The aqueduct from Zaghouan passes through one of the courts of the palace, but it is here low, and by no means a striking object. We observed in one of the dependencies a cippus similar to the one before described, but without any trace of inscription. It was while excavating the foundations of one of the buildings here that the two inscriptions now preserved in the Church of the Capuchins at Tunis were found. These have been frequently reproduced; one contains the names of three bishops, but without designating their sees, the other that of a sub-deacon of the African Church.[99]

Shortly after leaving the Mohammedia the ruins of the ancient aqueduct come in sight, and at a distance of about fourteen miles from Tunis the road crosses the Oued Melian, the Catada of Ptolemy. Here is seen, in all its surpassing beauty, one of the greatest works the Romans ever executed in North Africa, the aqueduct conveying the waters of Zaghouan and Djougar to Carthage.[100]

During all the time that Carthage remained an independent State the inhabitants seem to have contented themselves with rain-water caught, and stored in reservoirs, both from the roofs of houses and from paved squares and streets. Thirty years after the destruction of this city by Scipio it was rebuilt by a colony under Caius Gracchus, but it was not till the reign of the Emperor Hadrian (A.D. 117 to 138) that the inhabitants, having recovered their ancient wealth, and having suffered from several consecutive years of drought, represented their miserable condition to the Emperor, who himself visited the city and resolved to convey to it the magnificent springs of Zeugitanus Mons, the modern Zaghouan. This, however, was not sufficient for the supply of the city, and after the death of Hadrian another fine spring at Mons Zuccharus, the present Djebel Djougar, was led into the original aqueduct—probably in the reign of Septimius Severus, as a medal was found at Carthage with his figure on the reverse, and on the obverse, Astarte seated on a lion beside a spring issuing from a rock.

It was certainly destroyed by Gilimer, the last of the Vandal kings, when endeavouring to reconquer Carthage, and again restored by Belisarius, the lieutenant of Justinian. On the expulsion of the Byzantines it was once more cut off, and restored by their Arab conquerors, and finally destroyed by the Spaniards during their siege of Tunis. It was reserved for the present Bey, Sidi Saduk, once more to restore this ancient work, and to bring the pure and abundant springs which formerly supplied Carthage into the modern city of Tunis.

M. Collin, a French engineer, planned and executed this work. Of course, the advanced state of hydraulic science at the present day rendered it unnecessary to make use of the ancient arches. The aqueduct originally consisted, for a great part of its course, of a covered masonry channel, running sometimes quite underground, sometimes on the surface. This was comparatively uninjured by time, and served, with little repair, for the modern work. Where the old aqueduct passed high over the surface of the country, iron pipes and syphons have been substituted.

The contract price was 7,800,000fr., but the work certainly cost the Bey nearly 13,000,000fr.; and, useful as it certainly is, there is no doubt that it was the commencement of his financial difficulties.

The original aqueduct started from two springs, those of Zaghouan and Djougar; and to within sixteen miles of the present city of Tunis—namely, to the south side of the plain of the Catada—it simply followed the general slope of the ground without being raised on arches. From this point, right across that plain—a distance of three Roman, or two-and-a-half English miles—with slight intermissions, owing to the rise in the ground, and so on to the terminal reservoir at the modern village of Mäalika, it was carried over a superb series of arches—sometimes, indeed, over a double tier. The total length of the aqueduct was sixty-one Roman miles, or 98,897 yards, including the branch from Mons Zuccharus, which measured twenty-two miles, or 36,803 yards; and it was estimated to have conveyed 32,000,000 litres (upwards of 7,000,000 gallons) of water a day, or eighty-one gallons per second, for the supply of Carthage and the intermediate country.

The greatest difference is perceptible in the style of construction, owing to the frequent restorations which have taken place. The oldest and most beautiful portions are of finely-cut stone, each course having a height of twenty inches; the stones are bossed, with a squared channel worked at the joints, and the voussoirs are single stones reaching quite to the bottom of the specus, in which there exist, at intervals all along its course, circular manholes, both to admit air and to permit the repair and cleansing of the channel.

Here and there on the faces of the piers may be seen stones projecting from the surface, which it was the custom of the Romans to leave, in order to support the scaffolding used in reparation. The impost of each arch is a course of masonry of the same height as the other courses, but rounded to a semicircular profile, and projecting half its diameter from the face of the pier; it is, in other words, a bead roll. The voussoirs are stepped on the extrados. The cut-stone masonry never extends higher than two courses above the voussoirs, the remaining height being of rubble masonry or concrete.

A great part of the aqueduct, however, is built in a far less solid manner—of concrete blocks or of small irregular stones. The arches were still of cut masonry, but much inferior in execution, and there was a considerable space between the top of the extrados and the bottom of the specus. The mere fact of masonry of this character being used, pisé in fact, by no means proves it to be of modern origin, as Pliny informs us that this description of masonry was much in use amongst the ancient Carthaginians.[101] In some places a threatened danger had been guarded against by the erection of rough and massive counterforts. Along the plain of the Oued Melian, in a length of nearly two miles, we counted 344 arches still entire.

The aqueduct passed the river on a double series of arches. These were all destroyed in order to make use of their foundations for the modern bridge which now carries the water across, and serves at the same time as a viaduct. One cannot but deplore that such a miserable economy was effected at so great a price. We dare hardly vent our feelings of indignation at the wholesale destruction of antiquities daily carried on by the Arabs, after such an act of needless Vandalism.

From this point to Carthage, along the plains of the Mohammedia, the Manouba and Ariana,[102] the ancient aqueduct is completely ruined. It is not clear when Bruce visited this locality, probably during the ‘some weeks excursion of no moment’ which followed his first return from the south. He thus describes the aqueduct:—

Bruce’s illustrations of this work are:

1. A perspective view of five bays of the aqueduct, probably from the plain of Ariana, where it has been entirely destroyed to supply building material for the modern city of Tunis (Pl. X.)

2. A drawing in Indian ink to scale, of elevation of an arch and a half of the above. Also a section and an enlarged drawing of four of the stones.

The dimensions marked on this are:

Leaving the Oued Melian the road follows the line of aqueduct, but our object being to visit the ruins of Oudena before proceeding to Zaghouan, we kept rather to the east of the usual track and arrived there after a drive which occupied us about three hours and a half.

The ancient city of Uthina is mentioned by Ptolemy[104] and Pliny;[105] and in the tables of Peutinger it is indicated, evidently by a typographical error, as Uthica. In Morcelli’s ‘Africa Christiana,’[106] a city of Utina, or Uthina, is mentioned as situated on the Bagradas, which in spite of this error is no doubt the same, celebrated, he says, not only in the records of the Church, but in the works of profane writers. Its bishop, Felix, attended the Council of Carthage in A.D. 258; another, Lampadius, went to the Council of Arles in A.D. 314; Isaac assisted at Carthage in 411; and Felicissimus was its bishop during the Vandal invasion, when the place was probably destroyed by Genseric.

The present condition of the ruins proves it to have been a place of very considerable importance; they cover an area of several miles, and it must certainly have contained a very large population.

Pelissier[107] imagines this to have been the Tricamaron where Belisarius overcame Gilimer, and where all the hoarded treasure of the Vandals and the piratical spoil of Genseric fell into the hands of the Byzantines. The position of that city has never been satisfactorily determined; all that we know of it is, that it was 140 stadia from Carthage, and on the banks of a river which never dried, but so small that the natives attached no name to it. They must have had very different customs then to what prevail at the present day, as there is hardly a stream in the country that does not bear at least three names, in different parts of its course. In fact, in a country like this, where most of the rivers are dry during a portion of the year, it is not so much the water itself as its bed to which a name is attached, and that varies with the locality in which it occurs; thus a stream passing Sbeitla and Sbiba is called in part of its course the River of Sbeitla, and further down the River of Sbiba.

The central and highest point in the city was crowned by a citadel covering an area of about sixty-six yards long and thirty-three wide. The entrance-gate was on the north-west front, facing the amphitheatre. The walls were of great thickness and constructed of large blocks of cut stone.

The upper terrace was surrounded by a parapet; below were several chambers with strong vaulted roofs, still nearly entire. The largest of these measures sixty-six feet long by thirty-three wide. The vaults are supported on square piers, with a very bold and massive cornice, each stone being twenty-four inches in breadth, thirty in height, and three feet in depth. On the northern side is a large arch twenty-three feet in diameter, loosely filled up with squared stones. From the centre of this a passage about three feet in width runs perpendicular to it, and after a distance of about sixteen feet the passage bifurcates to the right and left, and descends at an angle of 45° till it reaches a vast subterranean apartment, which encircles the whole building, and was no doubt intended to serve as a reservoir. The descent is very difficult, owing to the accumulation of débris; but the chamber appears to have been about fifteen or twenty feet high, and nearly the same width, occupying three sides of a square, of which the passages before-mentioned formed the fourth side. We found some human bones and fragments of old pottery, but time did not permit of our making a thorough exploration of it.

To the north-west of this building is a very perfect amphitheatre, with an elliptical arena; the major axis is about seventy-seven yards in length, and the minor one fifty-five. Four principal entrances led into it, and these, together with many of the upper arches, are still in a very perfect condition. No doubt, in the construction of this, advantage was taken of a natural depression on the top of a mamelon in which it is sunk.

Behind this monument, towards the north, may be seen a small bridge of three arches, spanning the bed of a watercourse.

To the south-west of the citadel are the remains of a theatre, and to the south-east of it two very magnificent reservoirs, the northern one intended to contain rain-water, but that to the south was supplied from a well at some little distance, between which and the reservoir are the remains of a solidly constructed aqueduct.

Perhaps the most remarkable of the ruins is one due east of the citadel; it must have been a building of immense size, but it is impossible from its present appearance to form any conjecture as to its original destination. The walls, which were built of rubble masonry, of great thickness, have been rent asunder into huge masses, too large to have been moved by any mere mechanical power likely to have been employed, and yet they lie scattered about, without any apparent order, in every direction. In the midst of these huge masses, confusedly hurled together, we observed a small opening, through which it was just possible to crawl, giving entrance to a series of reservoirs of immense height and size, separated by partitions, yet connected together by arched passages. The cistern by which we entered was about thirteen feet square, beyond it were two larger ones, 79 feet long by 13 broad. There were at least six others, deserving of a much closer examination than we had time to give to them. Semicircular recesses were made in the walls here and there to enable the water to be drawn easily from above. The masonry throughout was quite perfect, not a trace visible of any great convulsion of nature, which alone, one would think, could have effected the ruin of the superincumbent building.

Twenty minutes more brought us from Oudena to the southern end of the plain spanned by the aqueduct, where is a domed building, from which the syphon of the modern aqueduct starts; this is sixteen miles from Tunis, and twenty-and-a-half from Zaghouan.

From this spot we continued our journey through an undulating country overgrown with brushwood, and after a few miles arrived at the ruins of a Roman post, called by the Arabs Bab Khalid, the ancient name of which is unknown.[108] The gate, or small triumphal arch, which gives its name to the place, and which was entire when Guérin visited it in 1860, has now fallen; one half however remains upright. There are numerous cisterns and foundations of buildings scattered about, but nothing of much interest. At thirty-three miles from Tunis is the spot called Magaran, where the two sources from Zaghouan and Djougar unite, and are conveyed in a single stream to Tunis, as they formerly were to Carthage.

The former source will be described hereafter; the latter, Ain Djougar, is situated twenty-three miles further to the west, close to the village of Bent Saida, which occupies the site of the ancient Zucchara Civitas. Like the other, this one also issued from a monumental fountain, now in a very bad state of preservation, but when visited by Shaw the frieze of the building still existed, and bore the following inscription—[109]

At Magaran there is a very neat house, surrounded by a garden, occupied by the French employé in charge of the waterworks, and close to it an establishment, also belonging to a Frenchman, for the collection of alpha grass, which grows abundantly on Djebel Zaghouan.

Continuing our route from this spot, which is thirty-three miles from Tunis, and four from the village of Zaghouan, we reached the latter place in about an hour, having travelled thirty-seven miles in eight hours, or at the rate of 4⅝ miles per hour.

Here we were hospitably received by the Khalifa, Si Hamoud Wuled Fadhel, who lodged us in the Dar el-Bey, and very kindly attended to all our wants. We had taken the precaution to obtain an amra, or recommendation, from the Bey of Tunis, without which it is quite impossible to travel in this country.

The Dar el-Bey is a large and by no means handsome building, used for the reception of guests, but it affords what alone travellers require—a complete shelter, and a few rude beds on which they can pass the night. We found it perfectly free from vermin of all sorts.

After the first destruction of Zaghouan it was rebuilt by a colony of Andalusian Moors from Spain; but, notwithstanding its exceptionally favourable position and the abundance of its water supply, it appears to be falling into decay, half the houses are ruined, and there is no appearance of any modern construction going on. Yet the land in the wide plain below it appears everywhere capable of being cultivated; when cleared it seems to yield satisfactory results, but a large proportion is still covered with lentisk scrub. The olive woods around are very extensive, and ought to be a source of great riches; but the trees are all old, and there is no evidence of the formation of new plantations.

The principal industry of Zaghouan for many generations has been the dyeing of the red caps worn in all Mohammedan countries throughout the basin of the Mediterranean, and here called chachias. In Turkey such a cap is called fez, and in Egypt tarboosh. This is the only place in the Regency where the operation has ever been performed, and the secret is carefully preserved, and descends from father to son.

Many fragments of Roman masonry still remain about the town, and frusta of columns are built into the angles of houses, but its vicinity to Tunis has made it a sort of happy hunting-ground for antiquaries and tourists, and most of the inscriptions have been carried away as soon as they have been published by a traveller.

The Zeugitana regio gave its name to the province of Africa proper, or Zeugitana, and formed the boundary between it and the more southern one of Byzacium. A town of Zeugis is mentioned by Aethicus,[110] and Mons Zeugitanus by Solinus. The modern town of Zaghouan, no doubt, occupies the same site as the ancient one, the crest of a spur proceeding from the north-east side of the mountain bearing the same name.

The only ruin of any importance is the entrance-gate, called Bab el-Goos,[111] which, no doubt, served the same purpose to the ancient city.

Bruce has made two illustrations of this.

1. A rough pencil perspective sketch, on which the measurements are marked.

2. A finished Indian-ink drawing to scale, with ground plan, details of mouldings of impost and base, and of the keystone. The dimensions on this drawing are—

This monument is in a very ruined condition; the attic, if it ever existed, and the entablature had disappeared before Bruce’s visit. The arch is simple, without archivolt; the impost, which was bold and salient, probably encircled the building. Round-headed niches were sunk in the piers below the impost; only that on the left hand on entering now remains. No order decorated its façade.

On the keystone of the arch is the sculptured representation of a ram’s head, with an immense pair of horns, above which is a wreath inclosing the word

surmounted by a figure resembling a mason’s level, the angle being a right one.

Shaw is of opinion that the ram’s head indicates that the city was under the immediate protection and influence of Jupiter Ammon.[112]

At some period after Bruce’s visit, as he does not indicate it, the Arabs have filled up the doorway with a smaller ogival arch, which has contributed to strengthen the ancient one and ensure its preservation. Perhaps it was intended for this purpose; if so, they were more careful in those days than they are now, as not the slightest care is taken to preserve any of the Roman remains throughout the Regency.

The great interest of the place to the traveller is its vicinity to the springs from which the aqueduct is supplied; the distance is about a mile and a half, and there are two paths, one of which the traveller would do well to take in going and the other in returning. The first passes to the south of the delicious valley which runs east and west behind the town, and close to the spring Ain Ayat, which is the cause of its fertility; the other follows its northern border between it and the hill on which the shrine of Sidi Hashlaf is built. This valley is richly cultivated, and produces great quantities of fruit trees; the waters of Ain Ayat are also used to turn a few flour-mills.

The great source however, which flows into the aqueduct, issues from a spot a little further on, where are situated the remains of a charming Roman temple, known to the natives by the name of El-Kasbah, or the fortress.

Bruce, in his notes, dismisses this very unjustly with the following remark:—

He did not even make a finished sketch of it; there is a rough pencil outline on one sheet, and on another an equally rough plan with measurements, and a number of architectural details, but neither are capable of reproduction as illustrations.

The building is, in fact, extremely elegant, and in its original condition must have been one of the most charming retreats which it is possible to imagine. It is situated at the gorge of a narrow and precipitous ravine descending from Djebel Zaghouan, but at a very considerable elevation above the plain at its foot.

It consists of a paved area of a semicircular form, but with the two exterior limbs produced in straight lines as tangents. Round the perimeter was a raised colonnade, and at the end, in the middle of the circular portion, was a rectangular cella, which is still tolerably entire. The walls of this latter building are of rubble masonry, but at the extremity there is a niche lined with cut stone, surmounting what may either have been the base of a statue of an emperor or an altar to a divinity. I am inclined to the former hypothesis, as the mutilated trunk of such a statue, in white marble and of colossal size, is actually lying on the ground outside. Above the door are the remains of a beautiful architrave, which doubtless was surmounted by a pediment. To the right and left of this proceeded a lateral gallery, 13 ft. 9 in. broad. The posterior wall was of finely-cut stone, with thirteen square pilasters on each side, between every alternate pair of which a round-headed niche for statuary was sunk in the thickness of the wall. Towards the interior, a Corinthian column corresponded to each of the pilasters, but these have long since been removed, and now decorate the Djamäa el-Kebir, or principal mosque of Zaghouan. Fragments of richly sculptured entablature lie scattered around, and attest the original magnificence of the structure.

Each end of this colonnade was terminated by a handsome monumental gateway, crowned by an entablature, one side of which is still in very perfect condition; both appear to have been so at the time of Bruce’s visit. These gateways were intended for architectural effect and not as exits, as they abutted on the perpendicular face of the wall below them. From the lower surface of the area on either side, a flight of fifteen steps conducted to a basin or nymphæum, shaped like a heart in cards, but with a rounded instead of a pointed apex; in this the spring rose, and was conducted into the aqueduct. The spring is no longer visible, being led into the modern aqueduct before it emerges from the ground.

The colonnade was roofed by one general half-cylindrical vault in the direction of the length of the building, intersected by twelve other transversely directed cylindrical vaults rising from the pilasters in the walls, and the columns in front. A cornice of a bold outline ran all round, serving as impost to the vaults and ornamental doorways, and as capitals to the pilasters. A great portion of the vaults supported by the walls still remain, to show the nature of the construction.

The rear of the wall was strengthened exteriorly by a coating of immense blocks of cut stone to protect it from any rush of water which might flow from the ravine above after heavy rain. There is also a communication from the colonnade to the exterior by means of a small square-headed door in the posterior wall.

A magnificent view is obtained by mounting the hill immediately south of the town, crossing the valley watered by the Ain Ayat. The contrast between the past and present, even of the most modern times, is very striking. Almost every alternate house is in ruins, and the population, which M. Guérin states to have been 2,900 in 1860, has now diminished to little more than 700. We particularly noticed the urbanity and good humour of the people of Zaghouan. Wherever we went, alone or in company with Arabs, everyone we met had a pleasant word and smile for us, and even the little urchins seemed pleased to leave their favourite game of okkaf, the same as our English hockey, and accompany us in our strolls, without being in the slightest degree obtrusive, or seeming to expect a donation of kharoubs.

We returned to Tunis on March 31, the drive occupying seven hours and a quarter, including an hour for breakfast at the Mohammedia.

CHAPTER XVI.

About six miles and a half beyond Es-Sabala, the Medjerda is crossed by a bridge which was built about twenty-five years ago, on the site of an old Roman one. It is a solid structure of seven arches, with a niche between each pair, pierced so as to admit the passage of water when the floods are high. The original structure was entire when Peyssonnel visited it in 1724; it was a tolerably good one, he says, but the arches were badly constructed.[113] This river rises in the beautiful valley of Khamisa, in Algeria, amongst the ruins of Thubursicum Numidarum,[114] and traverses some of the richest parts of Tunis, districts rendered celebrated by many of the most stirring events in Roman history. It is none other than the far-famed Bagradas, on the banks of which took place the combat between the army of Attilius Regulus and the monstrous serpent, 225 years before Christ. Pliny repeats the fable as one well known in his day. They besieged it, says he, with ballista and implements of war, as one would have done to a city. It was 120 feet long, and its skin and jaws were preserved in a temple at Rome until the Numantine war.[115]

The tradition of such animals appears to have lingered long in the country. Leo Africanus says that ‘the Caves of the Atlas contain many huge and monstrous dragons, which are heavy and of a slow motion, because the midst of their body is grosse, but their necks and tails are slender. They are most venemous creatures, insomuch that whosoever is bitten or touched by them, his flesh presently waxeth soft, neither can he by any means escape death.’ Marmol’s account of these marvellous animals is even more amusing. He also says that they are very numerous in the caverns of the great Atlas; their bite and touch are mortal, but they are so heavy and so badly made that they can hardly move, for their body is very thick about the stomach, and the rest slender. They have the head and wings of a bird, the tail and skin of a serpent, the feet of a wolf; they are spotted with divers colours, and they have not strength to lift their eyelids. This pleasant animal is called by the Arabs Taybin, and is supposed to result from the amours of a female wolf and a male eagle.[116] The word Taybin is evidently Thäaban, the ordinary Arabic word for a serpent; and it is quite possible that, as wolves and bears have become extinct in the country, so there may have been larger species of serpents, like the python or the boa, which no longer exist.

The Medjerda has greatly changed its course within the limits of history; indeed, it is constantly cutting through the banks of alluvion, and depositing the débris elsewhere. Even at this season a considerable body of water enters the sea, but it is a mere thread in comparison to the width of its bed after continued rain. A passing shower will sometimes suffice to produce a torrent capable of washing away sheep and cattle, and even travellers.

The plain on the right bank of the river at this place goes by the name of Outa el-Kebir, or the large plain; that on the left is Outa es-Segheir, or the smaller one, while the crossing itself is called El-Fonduk, from an inn on its bank, more dirty and repulsive than such places generally are.

At seventeen miles from Tunis a second and smaller bridge is passed, spanning a watercourse running along the southern base of Djebel Zana. From this point the road to Bou-Shater, the ancient Utica, branches off. We saw it in the distance, and thought of the unnecessary self-sacrifice of Cato, but had not time to visit it. Bruce, however, did so. He says—