News and citizen. [volume] (Morrisville, Vt. ;) 1881-current, 1889-07-11
A MUSSULMAN UNIVERSITY.
The Education of Oriental Students
in North Africa.

The greatest native educational cen
tire in North Africa is the University OF
Garaouin, at Fez, in Morocco. Hither
flock students not only from all parts OF
Morocco, but also from Algeria and
Tunis, because the religious education
given in the mosques in the latter
countries is not, it would appear, all
that it should be, and hence students
go to Fez to complete their studies. M.
Dolphin, professor of Arabic in the
University of Oran, communicates to
the Revue Franchise some details re-
specting the life led by the Mussulman
students there, which were communi-
GATED to him by a native professor at the
great mosque of Tlemcen. They number
about 700, and usually devote themselves
to some special sui. ects under particu-
lar professors. Of these latter there are
about forty, each following a daily
course which might be only the COM
mentary on q particular work on Mus
sulman theology. But students come
from afar to study this work, as they do
to study rhetoric, dialectics, logic, elo-
quence, grammar and law. Students
belonging to Fez live at home, or in
certain medersls, or homes reserved for
them those who come from other
places and have no friends in the town
live in such me,tersas rs they please,
usually with druggists Or vendors of
copperware. After morning prayer they
all repair to the university, where they
attend lectures until midday, when they
return for food and ablutions, resuming
work at l o'clock, and continuing until
3 or o'clock, when they again return
home. At sunset, after the usual
prayer, those who are attached to the
mosques as public readers of the koran
repair to their duties After this there
are supplementary discourses at differ
ent mosques at which the students at
tend, and at 9. 80 o'clock they are free.
Those who are supported by an inhabit-
ant of the town pay their evening visit
to their patron; the rest do much as they
please; but after the last meal they are
not allowed to leave their m,edersa. The
breakfasts are provided by certain
mosques, and are distributed by the
caretaker of the mederSH who, if q stu
dent is absent, casts his little loaf out
into the street. On Tuesday there is
no work, and the students must fast,
their little allowance of food being
stopped on that day. But the charitable
people of Fez supplement the meagre
official fare, happily for the students.
Each one follows what course he pleases.
Work begins at $50 a. m. to a. M,
according to the season, the first series
of lectures being devoted exclusively to
the explanation of commentators on the
koran, the text of which is already
known to each student At sunrise a
second batch of professors, numbering a
dozen, arrive, and discourse on exegesis,
law and dogmas. The afternoon is
given to grammar and rhetoric, tho
later hours to logic, astronomy, arith-
metic, geography, history, medicine,
literature, and the talismanic numbers,
or the determination by calculation of
the influences of angels, spirits and
stars, of the names of the conqueror and
the conquered, and of other future
events. The difficulty experienced in
obtaining n professor intimate with the
to lmpart his information Is Salu 10 De
incredible. The tobias, or students,
have no examinations. Each professor
knows how to distinguish those of his
hearers whose qualities render them
worthy of diplomas, which are bestowed
on them in more or less eulogistic
terms. The diploma is very highly
valued, and gives those possessing it a
veritable prestige in the Mussulman
world London Times.