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What navy the Maroquines have, is still laid up here, but the dock-yard is now nearly deserted, and the few remaining ships are unserviceable. The population, all of whom are Mahometans, are now, as in Corsair times, the bitterest and most determined enemies of Christians, and will not permit a Christian or Jew to reside among them. The amount of this population, and that of Rabat, is thus given,
We were fully prepared to encounter the strongest opposition from the Shereefian Court; but, at the same time, we thought there could be no insuperable obstacle in our way. The Maroquines had the same religion and form of government as the Tuniseens, and by perseverance in this, as well as any other enterprise, something might at last be effected.
This circumstance certainly does not arise from any inherent inaptitude in the Moorish character to entertain friendly relations with Europeans, and can only have resulted from that crouching and subservient policy which the Gibraltar authorities have always judged it expedient to show towards the Maroquines.
On getting away from these convict establishments, they adopt the Mahometan religion, are pretty well received by the Maroquines, and generally pass the rest of their days tranquilly among the Moors. I imagine the better sort of them remain Christians at heart, notwithstanding their public assumption of Islamism.
He received us very politely, and Mr. Gagliuffi tells me he is really a very good sort of man. His Highness gave us pipes and tea, which is becoming now a favourite beverage amongst the Moors of East, as it has long been in West Barbary, amongst all races of the Maroquines, who have introduced the fashion of tea-drinking and teetotalism at Timbuctoo. His Highness was very talkative and affable.
Besides, during the last thirty years, many of the Maroquines have visited Europe, and their eyes are becoming opened, the film of Moorish fanaticism has fallen off; even on their aggressive neighbours, they see the exercise of a government less rapacious than their own, and more security of life and property. Still, the Emperor will use every means to build up a barrier against innovation.
Abd-el-Kader is a marabout warrior, greatly revered and idolized by all enthusiastic Mussulmen throughout North Africa, more especially in Morocco, the terre classique of holy-fighting men; but though the Maroquines were disaffected, groaning under the avarice of their Shereefian Lord, and occasionally do revolt, nevertheless they would not deliberately set aside the dynasty of the Shereefs, the veritable root and branch of the Prophet of God, for an adventurer of other blood, however powerful in arms and in sanctity.
It is probable that, from some knowledge of them, the Emperor presumed lately to call the Spaniards "the vilest of nations," and yet at various times, the Maroquines have shown great sympathy for the Spaniards. Some of these renegades were found at the Battle of Isly in charge of field-pieces, where, according to the French reports, they displayed great devotion to the cause of the Emperor.
In this way, the Maroquines will be relieved from the embarrassments occasioned by the presence of Europeans, Jews, or Christians, under the protection of foreign consuls. The Emperor, also, has a fair share of trade, and gets a good return on what he exports; the balance of commercial transactions is always in his favour.
We might be counting upon the resistance of the Maroquines against an invasion of the French, and find, to our astonishment, the invaders received as deliverers from the exactions and tyrannies of the Shereefian oppressor.
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