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We know little about these poor captives, although we are so near Wadnoun, and are continually trading with Sous and this country. Mr. Davidson casually mentions them in his journal.
Then I was shipwrecked off the Canaries; thrown on the coast of Wadnoun, and made a slave by the wild Arabs wandering in the Desert I awoke. Mr. Phillips, mine host, soon became my right-hand man. His extraordinary character, and the adventures of his life are worth a brief notice. In person, Phillips was a smart old gentleman, with the ordinary lineaments of his race stamped on his countenance.
Over the provinces of the south, Sous and Wadnoun, the Sultan has no real power; so the south is cut off as an integral portion of the empire. Over the Rif, or the northern Berber provinces, the Sultan exercises a precarious sovereignty, every man's gun or knife is there his law and authority. Fez contains a disaffected population, teeming some years since with the adherents of Abd-el-Kader.
The annexed is a sketch of Wadnoun after the design left by Mr. Davidson. Wadnoun is an important rendezvous of caravans. Many Timbuctoo caravans break up here, and some Saharan. Several Saharan merchants come no further north, disposing of their slaves and goods to Maroquine merchants, who meet them in this place.
Certainly some representations should be made to the Emperor, who pretends to have jurisdiction over Wadnoun, and the adjacent countries, that these captives may be delivered up to the Consuls of Mogador. A fair remuneration might be given to the persons bringing them safely to this town.
In Tunis they are scattered throughout the Jereed; in Algeria they are established at the oases of Souf and Mezab; in Morocco we find them at Sous and Wadnoun; and in Tripoli they are located in nearly every town of the coast, whilst a few visit The Mountains. But, to the credit of the Jews and their mercantile genius, it is not their fault.
This is considered an extraordinary high price. Slaves are sold by criers about the streets in Morocco, and most towns, and not in bazaars, as in the East. But the most remarkable feature of slavery in this part of the world, is the Christian or European slavery carried further south, in the regions extending on the line of coast below Wadnoun, and the adjacent Sahara.
Wadnoun is a quasi-independent Sheikhdom of the empire. The Sheikh of Wadnoun pays no tithes nor other imposts, and only sends an annual present as a mark of vassal-homage to the Emperor. Sous, which adjoins this province, is more immediately under the power of the Sultan of the Shereefs, but the tithes are not so easily collected in the south as in the north.
The countries of Sidi, Hashem, and Wadnoun nominally acknowledge the Emperor, and occasionally send a present; but the most mountainous, between Sous and Wad-Draha, which has been called Guezoula or Gouzoula, and is said to be peopled by a Berber race, sprang from the ancient Gelulir, is entirely independent.
Other courier distances are as follows: Tangier to Rabat 4 days Rabat to Fez 2 days Fez to Mickas 12 hours Rabat to Morocco 8 days Mogador to Morocco 2½ days Mogador to Santa Cruz 3 days Mogador to Wadnoun 8 days Santa Cruz to Teradant 1½ days A notice of the interesting, though now abandoned part of Aghadir, may not be out place here. It is the Gurt Luessem of Leo Africanus.
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