The Irish standard., 1891-06-13
rHE MOORISH STORY TELLER.
How He Entertains His People with Fan
ciful Tales of the East.

How He Entertains His People with Fam
ciful Tales of the East.
Hall Game, author of ''The Deem
ster'' and other novels, has discovered a
Moorish story teller. The Moorish
story teller is not usually a Moor,
properly so called, but Of negro blood,
and comes from beyond the Atlas. He
is familiar figure on the Mohammedan
holiday, Friday, in the solz, or market
place, of Moorish towns. Surrounded
by two, three or four lines Of listeners,
in a semi-circle, he strums on a sort of
guitar, and tells his stories in gasps and
and spasms and with great fe1vor. His
stories are not always of a kind that
bear repetition, but some are harmless;
and of that sort Mr.. Caine gives, as an
example, a story which he himself heard
in the sok at Tangier, and had trans
lated to him by a resident. Most Of
this oral literature of the market place
seems to be sort of apocrypha to the
sArabian Nights ''Once there was a
good man, and his name was Ali. He
had Christian captive, beautiful
English girl. Ali was willing to make
her his wife if she would become a true
believer. Praise the merciful Allah
and his prophet the Lord Mohammed!
(Story teller and audience touch their
foreheads.) She, on her part, was will
ing to be Ais wife if he would become
a Christian. One day Ali told her to go
down to his stable under his house and
saddle his favorite horse.
'sWhen she got to the stable the horse
lifted both it's forefeet and struck her
down. For time she was insensible,
and when she recovered consciousness
she took the blow of the horse as a
proof of her unbelief in the true God
and his prophet. Allah save and bless
us. (All touch foreheads AGAIN. So
she went up to Ali and told him she be-
lieved and would become his wife. Then
Ali said: Go down again and saddle my
horse She went down, and the horse
struck her again. Once more she re-
turned to Ali. You were not a true be-
liever,' said Ali: go down again. Yet
again she went down to the stable, and
then Ais favorite horse suffered her to
saddle. him, and she brought him to Ali,
and Ali married her, and she was a true
believer for ever after. (Storyteller
stops to make a collection: a good num-
Der of copper coins are handed to him,
then he resumes.) Now we leave Ali
and 20 far away into the desert. There
was q fight between a good Moor and a
great Christian chief. The Moor had a
beautiful wife, and the Christian killed
him and took his wife and rode away
with her. And one day he met Ali and
challenged him to fight. But Ali had a
magic sword, with which he could kill
whatever he could see, no matter how
far away; SO while the chief WAS boast
ing Ali drew his sword and swept it in
the air. And when the Christian chief
cried: Come and fight me- Ali an
swered him: You are dead already,
turn yourself round and you shall see.
''Then the chief found that he had
been cut so clean by Ali's magic sword
that he did not know that he was dead.
But he fell asunder as he twisted about
and rolled off his horse into the sand.
So the Moorish woman whom he had
made captive rejoiced, and she looked
upon Ali and saw that he was a goodly
uldu stlu OIlcIcu ASISS1I w HA11A W. OC 1AAS,
wife. But Ali had got a wife already,
even the captive who had once been a
Christian. So he would not take the
Moorish woman, but gave her to an
other, and thus all was well and every
body was happy. Give thanks to Allah,
the merciful and mighty. (More touch
ing of foreheads and another collec-
tion.)' Then a story of finer flavor,
told with infinite and too obvious pam
tomime, amid shrieks of laughter from
men and women, little boys and girls.