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Updated: May 27, 2025
From where the tents are set no other human habitation is in sight. A great spur of rock, with the green and scarlet of cactus sprawling over it at will, shuts off lighthouse and telegraph station, while the towering hills above hide the village of Mediunah, whence our supplies are brought each day at dawn and sun-setting.
For bread we have the flat brown loaves of Mediunah, and they are better than they look ill-made indeed, but vastly more nutritious than the pretty emasculated products of our modern bakeries. Bargain and sale are concluded before the morning walk is over.
At first the tents were the cynosure of native eyes. Mediunah came down from its fastness among the hilltops to investigate discreetly from secure corners, prepared for flight so soon as occasion demanded it, if not before. Happily Salam's keen glance pierced the cover of the advance-guard and reassured one and all.
Yet the district has not always been solitary. Where now the tents are pitched, there was an orange grove in the days when Mulai Abd er Rahman ruled at Fez and Marrakesh, and then Mediunah boasted quite a thriving connection with the coasts of Portugal and Spain.
The tale of prices is hardly told before, with a series of rapid movements, he has tied every bundle up, and is thrusting the good things back into the hands of their owners. His vocabulary is strained to its fullest extent; he stands up, and with outspread hands denounces Mediunah and all its ways. The men of the village are cowards; the women have no shame. Their parents were outcasts.
They will remain ill-at-ease until, somewhere in the heights where Mediunah is preparing for another day, a cock crows. This is a satisfactory omen, atoning for the donkey's performance. A cock only crows when he sees an angel, and, if there are angels abroad, the ill intentions of the djinoon will be upset.
Two or three old headmen, finding their way in the dark like cats, have come down from Mediunah to chat with Salam and the town Moor. The social instinct pervades Morocco.
I have brought food from Mediunah," says the elderly advance-guard, by way of opening the campaign. "Allah is indeed merciful, O my Aunt," responds Salam with lofty irrelevance. Then follows a prolonged pause, somewhat trying, I apprehend, to Aunt, and struggling with a yawn Salam says at length, "I will see what you would sell."
Yet they look healthy enough, and are full of dignity. You may offer them fruit or sweetmeats or anything tempting that may be on the table, and they will refuse it. I fancy they regard the invitation to partake of Nazarene's food as a piece of impertinence, only excusable because Nazarenes are mad. The days slip away from the plateau below Mediunah. March has yielded place to April.
Your wise Moor waits to gather in his corn and see it safely hoarded in the clay-lined and covered pits called mat'moras. That work over, he is ready and willing, nay, he is even anxious, to fight, and if no cause of quarrel is to be found he will make one. Every year or two a party of travellers settles on this plateau, says the headman of Mediunah.
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