The record-union., 1892-01-30

But just now we have rounded Cape
Malabar and Tangier lies bcfore us like a
mass of foam charned in the seething
tides of the Gibraltar Strait and tossed
into structural semblance upon the
mountain-rimmed shore OF the bay.
Soon the mass of white resolves itself into
splatches of more brilliant white and
seams and checkers of shade; then into
white cubes OF varying dimensions.
Gradually projecting corners and nights
OF snowy masonry take shape to the eye;
and then the pale pinks. yellows and
blues OF the painted walls blend into
rosy whole, broken only by slender
square tower, with glistening porcelain
sides, and one huge, ruinous mass, 10
which the city seems to lead in giant
housetop steps. The one is the tower
from the minaret of which the Moslem
muezzin calls the faithful TO prayers. cry
ing Mohammed and Allah to the four
quarters OF the earth. The other is the
Kasba or castle where the heartless Kirke,
during the brief English occupancy OF
Tangier, which gave the world at least the
famous "Pepy'S DiarY,o was guilty of
more wanton crimes and butcheries than
were ever charged TO tiercest and fellest
tyrant Moor
There is no mole, quay or pier at Tan
gler, and we came to anchor near the
shelving shore, where the harborsiGe
traffic goes on with wondrous din, and
their launches transacting their duties III
severe silence and gravity. On either
side were numberlesS fellucas, with
strange craft from the lower Mediterra-
mean, and perhaps two score OF French,
Spanish, English and Dutch schooners,
barks and brigs. Rather lonesome
harbor seems that of Tangier; and the
two huge British men n-of-war, which had
been lying here several days in view OF
possible danger to British interests, from
the threatened revolt of interior tribes,
who seem to be always about to be doing
something unpleasant, brought again the
keen and humiliating longing / have had
in an hundred other ports, that the Amer
lean Government possessed sufficient
character and dignity TO make our flag
tlthe as well respected as any other that
floats the seas.
Getting ashore at Tangier is not alto
gether stately performance. Scarcely
mad our steamer anchored when there
came sWarming over the rail from all
quarters horde Of swarthy turbaned
harbor porters, dressed in the natural
black leathern skin of Morocco, many
with huge rings in their ears, danglets and
banglets of tinkling metals and bright
sashes, barelegged and baretooted, or
shod with loose sandals; all as uncanny
and weird lot as ever looted ship and
butchered its crew in the good Old days
OF Moorish piracy and pillage.
Formerly these black imps grabbed
travellers bodily, lifted them astride their
backs or shoulders and waded ashore
with them. Recently a dirninutiye land
ing stage has been built, but the treatment
is quite as ferocious. Ordinarily the
strangers belongings are seized and
pitched into half dozen different small
boats and himself made the unwilling
subject of fierce scramble, after which
the victor pulls and hauls his victim
I,fn still L
to the landing, where a separate bribe
must be paid for the recovery of
each article, and a final heavy trib-
ute is eXacted for ones own liberia
ton. Precisely the same form of pir-
acy is repeated on your way TO hotel
with your own effects; but once within
the great gate leading into the city from
the harbor side, and you are safer from
annoyance and exaction than in any
other Moorish or Christian city in the
world.
Good fortune had more than once at
tended me through the alert and cunning
service of Dobrado, and it stood me now
III good stead, getting me on African soil
unrelieyed OF as much as a copper flu,
although his rugged diplomacy at first
subjected me to some disquiet. Standing
in front Of me, as each furious onslaught
by porter was made, and without ap-
parent effort OF his giant strength, first
his left, he sent African, Moor, Berber
and what not, alike sprawling to the
steamers deck. Each jumped nimbly to
his feet and SUNK humbly away.
Suddenly fellow, swarthy as a Moor,
with hair and matted beard, black, curl
ing and glossy as Astrakhan wool, sprang
from the crowd full upon Dobrado. Nis-
ions of tragedies, dungeons in the Kasba.
consular courts of inquiry and interna-
tional complications flashed before me.
The two clinched; parted; clinched again;
and, after various alarming contortions.
fell in what still seems to be a terrific en-
brace together upon their knees. Then
such kissing and embracing began as [
have never before seen between man and
man, man and woman, or stranger still,
between woman and woman.
Soon they arose utterly breathless. but
radiant. Dobrado half dragged the hulk
ing fellow TO me, and after the latter had
embraced my still trembling knees. Do
brado said apologetically but laconically:
Il feared / would not meet him, Senor.
He is my kinsman from Mondonedo,
beside the Ria de FoZ. You know the
Gallegans go wherever there is money for
toll. He is half-time portero and half
time does some service for merchant
here who has traffic with Valladolid.'
And then, hesitatingly, Perhaps Senor
could find him useful in Tangier?''
''Senor' could and did. ''Senor," the
writer, shuns great hotels in his wander
ings; loves TO know the lowly, and, from
their standpoint OF thinking, feeling and
condition, TO thus look through the back
windows of foreign life and ways.
No one can wholly tell another what
| Tangier is like within it's ancient city
walls. 1t has no street geography. Though
it contains scarcely more than 20, coo souls.
| its own inhabitants get lost within it; and
there is but one street or way in which
| ha ctr iC fn oh Int
of consciousness of location. This ex-
tends upward from the harbor side to the
Soc-de- Barra, the great outside market
place of Tangiers, just where you leave
the city on the way to Fez, Morocco's
capital. Once a dozen yards away from
this narrow thproughfare of bazars, and
the prompting to prayer TO Allah or
Allah'S subjects for Succor is quickly
realized experience.
But for Dobrado and his kinsman /
should have turned back, passed the
night outside the great city gate upon the
shore beneath the stars and some handy
/ tarpaulin, and incontinently fled the
place upon the next days steamer for
Gibraltar. AS it was, l kept close to my
Gallegan guides. The evening had fallen
before we had entered the city. The
single donkey thoroughfare was a babel
ofdonkeys, camels, goats, water-carriers,
bare-legged African soldiers and mer-
chants closing their tiny shops The din
of "Balak !-Balak !-Balak - the equiv
alent for our Look out ~ shrieked by
thousand of voices in the choky, chasm-
like street was deafening. Scores of times
on our half-mile way we were ground
against buildings, wedged between cam
els or flung into pitch black archways.
After an hours struggle we turned from
this main thoroughfare and plunged in
and upward among a maze of streets. so
narrow that the opposing walls could be
tOuPhpd bV OutStratchad hands The