The Pirate City: An Algerine Tale

by R. M. Ballantyne

In which Danger looms very Dark in and around the Pirate City.

About this time four vessels entered the port of Algiers. One was a French man-of-war with a British merchantman as a prize. The other was an Algerine felucca with a Sicilian brig which she had captured along with her crew of twenty men.

There were a number of men, women, and children on board the Frenchman’s prize, all of whom, when informed of the port into which they had been taken, were thrown into a state of the utmost consternation, giving themselves up for lost—doomed to slavery for the remainder of their lives,—for the piratical character of the Algerines was well-known and much dreaded in those days by all the maritime nations. Newspapers and general knowledge, however, were not so prevalent then as now, and for a thousand Englishmen of the uneducated classes who knew that the Algerines were cruel pirates, probably not more than two or three were aware of the fact that England paid tribute to Algiers, and was represented at her Court by a consul. The crew of the prize, therefore, were raised from the lowest depths of despair to the highest heights of extravagant joy on hearing that they were free, and their gratitude knew no bounds when the consul sent Ted Flaggan and Rais Ali to conduct them from the Marina to his own town residence, where beds and board, attendance and consolation, were hospitably provided for them. We might add with truth that they were also provided with amusement, inasmuch as Ted Flaggan allowed the effervescence of his sympathetic spirit and wayward fancy to flow over in long discourses on Algerine piracy and practice in general, in comparison with which the “Arabian Nights” is tameness itself.

With the poor Sicilian captives, however, the case was very different, for the felucca which brought them in brought also a report that the Sicilian government had behaved very brutally to some Algerines whom they had captured. The immediate result was that all the Sicilian captives then in Algeria were ordered to be heavily ironed and put to the severest work at the quarries and on the fortifications, while some of the most refractory among them were beaten to death, and others were thrown upon the large hooks outside the town-wall, or crucified.

To the latter death Francisco Rimini and his sons were condemned, and it is certain that the sentence would have been carried into immediate effect—for legal processes among the pirates were short, and judicial action was sharp—had not an event occurred which arrested for a brief period the hand of piratical justice.

This event was the arrival of a Sicilian priest, who was commissioned to treat for the exchange of prisoners and the ransom of a certain number of Sicilian slaves. The ransom of these slaves varied much according to their position, but a very common price demanded and paid was from 200 pounds to 400 pounds sterling. Of course noblemen, bankers, wealthy merchants, etcetera, were rated much higher than others, but not too high to render their ransom impossible, for the Algerines were adepts at this species of traffic, having been engaged in it more or less for several centuries! As the settlement of these ransoms, and the ascertaining as to who were the fortunate ones whose friends had succeeded in raising the necessary funds, required time, the execution of the Riminis and other Sicilians was, as we have said, delayed.

When Paulina and her sister heard of the arrival of the priest, they flew into each other’s arms, never doubting that the husband of the former must have at last raised the required sum for their ransom, but on being reminded that the priest was commissioned to redeem only captives of Sicily, they sat down and relieved themselves by giving way to floods of tears. Paulina, however, soon comforted herself by kissing her baby, and Angela consoled herself with the reflection that, at all events, Mariano and his father and brother would be ransomed, which, she naturally argued, would enable the first to move heaven and earth in order to effect the ransom of herself, and sister also. She did not know, poor girl, of the dreadful fate to which her lover was already doomed, for the consul, although aware of it, could not prevent it, and had not the heart to tell her.

Previous to this event the British consul had endeavoured to use his influence to bring about peace between the Algerines and Sicilians, but the former, having no desire for peace, made the terms such as could not be agreed to, namely, that the Sicilians should pay them 450 pounds before any negotiations for peace should be entered on. The rejection of this proposal did not, of course, facilitate the arrangements that were now being made, and when Omar demanded that, in cases of exchange of prisoners, two Algerines should be returned for each Sicilian slave set free, it was seen that the prospect of a speedy termination of hostilities was not bright.

After some days spent in useless discussion, the worthy priest was obliged to return home without accomplishing his mission.

One good result, however, followed. Those captives who had been condemned to death, and for whom ransoms had been offered, were reprieved; nevertheless, they were treated with cruel severity. Of course the unfortunates for whom no ransom had been offered were treated with the utmost rigour, and the sentences of such as had been condemned to die were ordered to be carried out. In the case of poor Mariano the sentence was altered, for that headstrong youth had in his despair made such a fierce assault on his jailers that, despite his chains, he had well-nigh strangled three of them before he was effectually secured. He was therefore condemned to be buried alive in one of the huge square blocks of concrete with which the walls of a part of the fortifications were being strengthened. (See Note 1.)