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There were bushels of kesk'soo; there were several live sheep, which were speedily despatched and put into pots to cook; there were jars of honey, of oil, and of butter; there were camel-loads of barley for the beasts of burden, and trusses of hay for their dessert; there were packets of candles by the dozen, and loaves of sugar and pounds of tea; not to speak of fowls, of charcoal, of sweet herbs, of fruits, and of minor odds and ends.
These are flavoured with anise and carraway seeds, and are very acceptable to a hungry traveller when bread is scarce, though fearfully searching to hollow teeth. Then there is a goodly supply of the national food, kesk'soo or siksoo, better known by its Spanish name of couscoussoo.
There is abundant scope for elegance of gesture in the eating of the stews, but still greater opportunity when the pièce de résistance of a Moorish dinner, the dish of kesk'soo, is brought on. This kesk'soo is a small round granule prepared from semolina, which, having been steamed, is served like rice beneath and round an excellent stew, which is heaped up in the centre of the dish.
In the midst of a sea of broth rose mountains of steamed and buttered kesk'soo, in the craters of which had been placed the contents of the stew-pot, the disjointed bones of chickens with onions and abundant broad beans.
Such of the Asni men as were not mourners, now assembled in the open space of their village to be feasted by their women as victors. Basins, some two feet across, were placed on the ground filled with steaming kesk'soo. Round each of these portions sat cross-legged some eight or ten of the men, and a metal bowl of water was handed from one to the other to rinse the fingers of the right hand.
With the thumb and two first fingers of the right hand you are expected to secure some succulent morsel from the stew, meat, raisins, onions, or vegetable marrow, and with it a small quantity of the kesk'soo. By a skilful motion of the palm the whole is formed into a round ball, which is thrown with a graceful curve of hand and wrist into the mouth.
Making a virtue of necessity, the Arab prefers sour milk to fresh, for with this almost total lack of cleanliness, no milk would long keep sweet. Their food is of the simplest, chiefly the flour of wheat, barley, or Indian millet prepared in various ways, for the most part made up into flat, heavy cakes of bread, or as kesk'soo.
This consists chiefly of braziers for charcoal and kesk'soo steamers for stewing meat and vegetables as well. A native café here attracts our attention. Under the shade of a covered way the káhwajî has a brazier on which he keeps a large kettle of water boiling. A few steps further on we light upon the sellers of native salt.
But in the market-place there are exposed for sale the more perishable things of Moorish living. Some of the small cupboards are grocers' shops, where semolina for the preparation of kesk'soo, the national dish, may be purchased, as well as candles for burning at the saints' shrines, and a multitude of small necessaries for the Moorish housewives.
The gravy was eaten daintily with sops of bread, conveyed to the mouth in a masterly manner without spilling a drop, while the kesk'soo was moulded in the palm of the right hand into convenient sized balls and shot into the mouth by the thumb. The meat was divided with the thumb and fingers of the right hand alone, since the left may touch no food.
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