CHAPTER IV

PRIDE OF RACE

When a Sherif of Yemen tells his lineage he generally begins with Noah, and, passing through the legendary Kahtan and Johtan, explains the union of Ishmael the son of Abraham with an ancestress of the Koreish, of whom was the family of the blessed Mohamed. Mulai Ahmed ibn Mohamed ibn Abdullah el Raisuli el Hasani, el Alani, began his with the Prophet.

“My house is of the Beni Aros, who are descendants of Abd es Salam Sherif, buried on the highest point of Jebel Alan. We are the greatest of the Western Sherifs, whose power has always rivalled that of the Caliphs. Go to Tetuan and you will see the veneration paid to the Qubba of our ancestor, Sidi Ali ibn Isa, and all through the country you will hear of the Sherifs Raisuli. When we go to visit (the tomb of) Sidi Abd es Salaam, we are fifteen thousand of the line of Jebel Alan, his descendants, though of the family of Raisuli there are but seventy. We have held great posts in the past and stood between our people and the oppression of the Sultans. It is our duty to protect the people, for they honour us as holy. For us who have the “baraka,”[11] the blessing of Allah, they would give their lives and their property. If I tell a man, ‘Start today for Cairo, or for Mecca,’ he would ask no questions, but pick up his jellaba and go.

“No one dies of starvation in Islam, but a Sherif may sit at the door of his house and the whole countryside will come to him to kiss the edge of his robe and pour their tribute into his basket. I remember when I was a boy, small so”—he made a gesture towards the ground—“my father, on whom be peace, was angry with a slave. He ordered him to go out and tell the others to beat him—so many lashes. I met the man on the way and asked him where he was going. He told me, to get so many lashes. I asked him what crime he had committed, and he answered, ‘I do not know, but the Sherif knows, and without doubt it is a bad one.’

“Once it was necessary that someone should die for a crime that had been done, and it was not politic that the murderer should be given up at Tangier. The Sherif sent for a poor man and said to him, ‘Would you have your family live in plenty, and yourself gain a paradise? If so, remember that on such-and-such a date, you killed a certain person.’ The man answered, ‘If the Sherif wills it—it must be that I am guilty,’ and the Lord gave him wisdom to answer all questions that were put to him.

“Such has been the power of my house, and that is why men follow me in battle. Death beside me is a blessing, and, were I to kill a man, his family would know that I had sent him to paradise. Oh! Mubarak, bring me my keys.” The slave, who had been listening eagerly, brought a great leather box and, from it, el Raisuli extracted a key. “I will show you a paper that you may understand my words and see that my family are greater than the line of Mulai Idris who ruled in Fez.” Here is the translation of the document laid before us:

“Praise be to Allah. The genealogical relation of our Master the Sherif, the gifted, the great, the venerated, the excellent, the unique of his epoch, the chosen among those endowed with majesty and goodness in these times, the majestuous by his origin, of whom there is no peer or equal at this moment, my master and lord Ahmed el Raisuli, el Hasani, el Alani—may Allah grant him holiness and power. My lord Ahmed; the son of Sidi Mohamed; son of Sidi Abdullah; son of Sidi el Mecki, who was the first Sherif Raisuli and who, by order of our master, Mulai Ismail—whom may Allah receive in his bosom, conceding him mercy—for the purpose of ennobling this city, came to Tetuan, which longed for a bond of union with Allah, the Almighty, through the baraka (blessing) which, by reason of descent from the Prophet, this family possesses—May prayer and peace be with him. Sidi el Mecki was son of Sidi Buker, son of Sidi Ahmed; son of Sidi Ali; son of Sidi Hassani; our master and lord Mohamed; son of our lord and master Ali, he who was first to bear the name of Raisuli, who died in the year of the hejira 930; son of Sidi Aissa and of Lal-la Raisuli;[12] son of Sidi Abderrahman, son of Sidi Ali; son of Sidi Mohamed; son of Sidi Abd-Alah; son of Sidi Yunis, brother of Sidi Mechich the celebrated, very holy and powerful Mulana Abd es Salaam, most learned Imam, also known as Sidi Abi-el Hassam Chedli. May Allah keep him in his mercy and pity. Our master Yunis was the son of Sidi abu Beker; son of Sidi Ali; son of Sidi Hormat; son of Sidi Aissa; son of Sidi Salaam; son of Sidi Mazuar; son of our master and the Prince of the Faithful the Sultan of Morocco, Mulai Ali, who was known by the name of El Hidarat, he who is always in places of danger in battle; son of the Prince of the Faithful, Sidi Mohamed; son of the Emir Al-mumenina our master Mulai Idris, founder of the holy capital of Fez, the white city which shines from a distance, the noble, the generous and beautiful; son of the Prince of the Faithful Sidi Idris the Great, a Conqueror for Islam of the Empire of the West, el Aksa. His tomb is in Mt. Serhen, venerated by all Moslems who believe in God. He was the son of Inulana Abdallah el Kamel the Perfect, pretender to the throne of his ancestors in the Orient, which was usurped by the Abasides who, having defeated him, caused him to die loaded with chains; son of Sidi Hassan el Muzenna. In the person of Muzenna the trunk of the descendants of the Prophet divides into two branches; one of these we have already followed, and the other is that of Alanien, in whose hands today is the sceptre of empire and who are the descendants of Sidi Mohamed el Nefs Ezzakia, brother of our master Abdallah el Kamel. They came to Morocco more than fifty years after the ancestors of the Shorfa Raisuli, which proves that these Sherifs possess a greater right to the throne than the present Emperors. Hassan el Muzenna is son of the Emir Almumenina, our lord and owner, Hassan the 7th—may God receive him in his mercy;—son of the Prince of the Faithful, the fourth Caliph of the Mehidie (the Reformers), Sidi Ali; son of Abu Talib, uncle of the Messenger of God;[13] may peace and prayer be upon him and may his face be venerated and may he be united before God with our mistress Fatima, the daughter of our owner, the Prophet of Allah on earth. As the rain from heaven falls, rejoicing the earth, may there fall upon him prayer and peace.”

The slave kissed the document when it was given back to him, and el Raisuli continued, his voice rumbling at the back of his throat: “Once, when I was a boy, I was riding with an important Sherif, and, as we went by the outskirts of a village, a man was lying on the ground in the shade of an olive. It was hot and he did not trouble to salute the traveller, who stopped his mule quickly and asked the reason. ‘The sun was in my eyes, Sidi,—I did not see,’ answered the man. ‘You do not use your eyes, so you have no need of them,’ said the Sherif, and, from that moment, the man was blind.

“It is also told of one of the brothers of the Sultan that when he was in prison in Rabat, having rebelled against his ruler, he found, by means of his friends, that the way was open for him to escape. A sentry stood at the door and tried to stop him, as was his duty. ‘If you do not let me pass, you will go blind for the rest of your life,’ threatened the Sherif. The sentry hesitated, but he knew that he would lose his head if he allowed the prisoner to escape, so reluctantly he still barred the way. ‘Very well, then, you are blind,’ said the brother of the Sultan, and the man fell back, putting up his hands to his face, for he could see nothing.” There was a moment’s silence. Then the slave, Mubarak, murmured, “These things are well known, and all me know that those who disobey my master lose their sight.”

“Yes,” whispered the Spaniard, “that is quite true; but by means of hot coins pressed on the eyelids, not by autosuggestion!”

“How old am I?” said el Raisuli. “I can tell you I was born in the year of the hejira . . . (1871 A.D.), but what matter the number of my years? No Arab keeps count of time. Ask Mubarak—oh, man, then, how old are you?” “As old as my lord wills.” Then, evidently anxious to satisfy, “Ten, eleven perhaps . . . or thirty. By Allah, I do not know.”

“I was born at Zinat,” said the Sherif. “You have seen the village, small houses with great roofs that you cannot pick out at a distance, and the hedges of cactus that even the dogs cannot get through. It was but a gun-shot to the top of the mountain, which commanded a wide view. I used to sit up there for hours and look at the country— not like these hills but a rolling plain, golden with corn. I could see the women gleaning, and imagine how they cried ‘A-ee, A-ee!’ when the thistles tore their skin like needles. They used to make a shelter out of a haik spread on a pole for the heat of noon, and later, when it was cool, they would sit in a circle among the corn-sheaves and beat out the grain with wooden flails. I could hear their song like a thread, and away by the river I could see the boys bathing, but I never wished to be with them. I was happier alone. On the horizon were the hills of Beni Mesauer, from which came my mother, and I used to wonder why the others were content to work in the plain, when there was a great country beyond, full of valleys and rocks, where one could hunt in a different mountain each day. The ideas of a boy!

“When I was ten or eleven, I was already a ‘talib’[14] able to read and write and repeat the sayings of the Prophet. For this reason an ‘alim,’ a very learned man who came to the village, was interested in me and told me many things. I used to look after his mule for him in order that he would talk the more. He had the gift of speech, and he could make men weep or laugh. I decided that I would do the same; so I collected some of my friends (many were older and bigger than myself), and we went round the neighbouring villages with small white flags, to collect money for the alim who, as many wise men, was very poor. Sometimes people laughed at us, and would not give. Then I spoke to them, and, remembering the eloquence of my master, my words became swords to pierce their hearts, and they said to us, ‘Take this and that,’ even more than they could afford.

“When, after some days, we returned and poured the money into the alim’s robe, he blessed me and said that I should travel much and acquire much wealth. After that my spirit was restless, and I would make up speeches on the mountain and declaim them to the birds and the goats. All that was told me I could remember, and, to this day, I can repeat every word that has been said in conversation between such and such people on such and such days. It is a blessing from Allah, but it astonished my master, as did my love of history. I wanted to know everything that had happened in the past, for, in those days, I believed that all wisdom lay in books. The right was not with me, for it is the study of one’s neighbours that brings wisdom. What book can tell you that which lies in the heart of your enemy?—it matters not about your friend, for you will see your own thoughts there—and how can you conquer him if you do not know his designs?

“When my feet grew too restless, I collected the same boys once more and, with white handkerchiefs tied round our heads, and staffs cut from olive-trees, our jellabas kilted up, we made a pilgrimage round the shrines of the neighbourhood. You have seen them, perhaps,—a pile of whitewashed stones under a bush from which flutters a strip of white stuff, or a Qubba high on a hill. We took nothing with us, neither water nor food, but the villagers gave to us plentifully—we had no need to beg—and some of them, who remembered me, said, “Here is the little messenger. Tell us stories, oh, master! Make us a speech, so that we see if our ears played us tricks.” I told them many stories, but always of war.

“It was at Tetuan that I finished my education, and there I lived till the death of my father, who is buried in the tombs of our family in the mosque of Sidi Isa. By this time I had studied law and jurisprudence. I knew the four codes of Islam and could interpret them according to the Koran. The mountains were shut out by the walls of Tetuan, and I thought of them no more. It was my intention to be a lawgiver and a poet, for my world was closed between the covers of my books. When I went back to Zinat, people said, ‘He is a Faqih,’[15] and came a long distance to consult me. In the daytime I used to explain to them the law of the Prophet and the solution of their difficulties, and, at night, I used to walk on the mountain-side and watch the stars. Have you thought how great a part the stars play in our lives?—how the Prophet (may Allah bless him) spent nights in the desert, communing with them, how Jesus, the Breath of God, and David the father of Solomon, studied them while they kept their flocks? It was in those nights that I wrote verses, but none that were worthy of remembrance. Most of my wealth I gave away, for it seemed to me then that earning and silver did not live well together. The people heard of this, and, knowing that I had the ‘baraka,’ they came to me the more for advice, and carried out all that I said to them.”

[Illustration: Rosita Forbes, on white horse, amidst Raisuli’s people on the way to Tazrut]

[Illustration: A halt on the way to Tazrut. Author and Mulai Sadiq seated]