We next find Captain Geyling back in Morocco, dressed in a single-breasted black frock-coat and fez, and turned in the interval into a pseudo-Turk under the title of Abdul Kerim Bey. Here history says, as the advance agent of the Globe Venture Syndicate he travelled like a prince, taking as many tents as would befit a travelling menagerie, plate and more plate, servants and horses, mules, guns, presents for the Kaids, and impelled by a consuming thirst to get concessions for his paymasters. With him as military adviser, attaché, or what not, went Major Spilsbury, and why he let himself be towed about the place by Geyling only he can tell.
Quiet but determined, a linguist, leader of men, and one of those willing to risk his life ten times a day for any syndicate, upon most reasonable terms, Spilsbury was a born filibuster. Always about to make a fortune with schemes innumerable, in which if you embarked you still stayed poor, or became poorer; but with this difference from the schemes of most men of his class, that he himself was never richer by a penny by any one of them. Geyling had said he knew the Sultan well, and as that potentate was somewhere in the south, Geyling proceeded north and waited upon the Sherif of Wazan, the spiritual head of all things in Morocco. There he seems not to have had much luck, and then went east to Fez, back to the coast, and after two or three months’ perambulation up and down the land, went to Morocco city, where he ought to have gone first. There neither Sultan nor Vizir would see him, and with his tail between his legs, he returned to Mogador, and in a little inn kept by a Jew quarrelled with Spilsbury, who, if reports be true, threatened to beat him with a stirrup leather, and the companionship broke up. Geyling Kerim went homewards to Vienna, Novi Bazaar, or for all I know joined his repatriated co-religionists in their new colony in Palestine. But Spilsbury, being apparently determined to play things out “on a lone hand,” remained in Mogador, and then embarked upon a series of adventures, the more extraordinary when one remembers that he speaks no Arabic.
How, wherefore, in what manner, or by what means, he came across him I do not know, but he fell in with an acquaintance of my own, one Mr. Ratto, born in Mogador, and speaking Arabic, and Shillah, French, English, Spanish and apparently all other tongues with equal ease. What actually they did, only themselves are in a position to record, but I suppose that, taking advantage of the unsettled state of things, the Sultan’s absence punishing refractory tribes, and the desire which every Arab chief has of getting arms to make himself quite independent of all mankind, they must have entered into negotiations with some of the chiefs of the wild tribes in Sus. Spilsbury seems to have satisfied the Syndicate in London that they could trade direct with Sus, receive concessions from the chiefs, land and construct a factory, and in time make themselves sole masters of the place. No doubt they reasoned: If we are once established, when troubles come, England must for her honour protect her subjects, and in protecting them, protect their interests, and they knew that England once committed to interference in any country (said to be rich), must of necessity remain to restore order, introduce good government, and generally to further the cause of progress and morality, which is specially her aim in every country peopled by an inferior race. What treaty Spilsbury took home is matter of conjecture, but not unlikely he got signatures from chiefs, who signed, thinking if all went well they would gain something, and if things turned out badly they could say they had been deceived, and signed a document that they had not understood. One name is certain was appended to the deed, that of M’barek-ou-Ahmed, who is now securely chained in some pestilential prison in Fez or Mequinez. Be all that as it may, Spilsbury was shortly back again in Mogador, trying to hire a vessel to convey himself, a Jew interpreter, and several samples of his goods down to Akssis, a port between Wad Nun and Agadhir. But by this time the Sultan had got wind of the affair, and sent his emissaries into the Sus to bribe the chiefs into allegiance, and what is more he had communicated with the English Ambassador in Tangier, who having sent the news to London, the expedition and its aim was laid before the Foreign Office. Presently an official notice appeared declaring that the British Government viewed with concern the meditated attempt to open trade with a part of the Emperor of Morocco’s territory against his will, and if any person went for such a purpose, he must go at his own risk. Spilsbury probably cared nothing for the protection or the displeasure of either Government, so he pushed on his preparations just as if nothing had occurred worth mentioning.
The ukase of the British Government had made it difficult to operate from Mogador, but Spilsbury, nothing dismayed, engaged a Jew interpreter, and all alone, or at the most with two or three companions, sailed for the Canaries, hired or bought a schooner, and after a passage of an abnormal length, contending all the time with contrary winds, sailed to Akssis, landed, and started to palaver with the chiefs who were expecting him, with several thousand men encamped upon the shore, having been warned most probably by Mr. Ratto to hold themselves in readiness against his coming.
Nothing more different than the inception of the Jameson affair and that so boldly planned by Spilsbury. Both gentlemen adventurers, or if you like, both advance agents of the British Empire. One flagwagging and backed up by all the “fruit secs” of the British army, champagne and sandwiches laid on at every twenty miles upon the road; the other almost alone upon a coast not visited twice in a century by Europeans, and in the hands of men who kill a man with as few compunctions as a settler up in North Queensland flogs a black to death. If he had goods to sell I know not, if he had samples of trade powder and trade guns, that is to me unknown, but anyhow, by the assistance of his interpreter, he entered into a council with certain of the chiefs, as the Sherif of Taserouelt, the aforenamed M’barek-ou-Ahmed, and others whom it is better not to name, and was about to sign a treaty with them, to open trade direct, put up a factory, work the mines, and generally prepare the way before the faces of the Globe Venture Syndicate.
But for an accident Spilsbury might have been Emperor of Agadhir, the Lord Protector of the Sus, or Rajah of Tamagrut, but Fate or the Sultan of Morocco had otherwise disposed.
Most of the chiefs of Sus were at Akssis with many of their followers, but one Sheikh with about fifty horsemen had kept aloof during the progress of the negotiations, either because he had not been considered big enough to square, or as some think because he was secretly acting under orders from the Moorish Court.
Just as the chiefs were about to sign, and each one had agreed how many rifles he was to receive on Spilsbury’s return with a well-laden ship, the Sheikh mounted his horse, marshalled his followers and plunged into the middle of the crowd, yelling and firing several shots, exclaiming: “Out with the Christians! I will not be a party to any dealings with our hereditary foes.” Thinking they were attacked in force, the followers of the other chiefs returned the fire, all was confusion, and Spilsbury, to save his life, had to retreat precipitately on board his ship, and to complete the scene, the smoke of a steamboat was seen coming down the coast. Now, as no vessels between Agadhir and the Wad Nun come near the coast, which is one of the most deserted in the world, Spilsbury knew at once it must be a vessel of the Moorish Government upon the search for him. Luckily night was near, and a fair wind sprang up which took him to the Canaries, from whence he shipped aboard a steamer and returned to England to plan another trip.
What actually he did in England during the next six months I do not know, but in November I met him at a London club, the proud possessor of the steam yacht “Tourmaline,” carrying a quick-firing gun, an assorted cargo of goods fit for the Morocco trade, and some nine thousand rifles with which he intended to arm his friends, the followers of Sidi Haschem, and the other Sheikhs of Sus. The vessel lay at Greenhithe, and was to sail next morning for Antwerp to take the rifles in; yet Spilsbury sat smoking quietly without a trace of “Union Jackism,” no word of “moral purpose,” not a suggestion of being, as Dr. Jameson seemed to think he was, a sort of John of Leyden going to set a people free. Simply an ordinary club man, talking of what he was about to do, as he had talked of fishing in Loch Tay. A well-dressed, quiet-mannered filibuster, not bellowing that he would make the Arabic language popular in Hell, after the “fighting Bob Tammany” style, but quite aware that he was venturing his life, and perilling for ever such reputation as he had. As a law-abiding citizen, I tried to show him all the error of his ways, spoke of the wickedness of all he was about to do, and watched him get into a cab with mingled feelings of disgust at the peddling syndicate which, for its wretched five per cent., was about to bring the name of England into contempt, and admiration for the man who was going quietly to risk his life in such a miserable cause.
How he sailed, reached Akssis, landed some rifles, was interrupted in his dealings by the arrival on the one hand of the Sultan’s troops under Kaid el Giluli, and on the other by the advent of the Moorish Government’s armed transport, “El Hassani”; how he exchanged shots with her, rescued his boat, but failed to save his four companions who remained captives; and how he with the yacht Tourmaline is still detained, or was up to the other day, under surveillance in Gibraltar, is well known to all. But what befel his four companions and the unfortunate M’barek-ou-Ahmed, his intermediary, has never been made public in this country yet. So, to make matters plain, I quote the letter of a French Algerian gentleman settled in Mogador:—