A visitor to the Riviera will see the little towns and villages walled up, and with strong gateways and towers. They were protections against Algerine and Moroccan corsairs, who would land and raid the coast for captives; and there are old men still living who had heard from their fathers piteous stories of their being taken and carried off into bondage and cruel slavery in Africa.
There are still, and there have been in the past, numerous Europeans who have been renegades, and have lent their wits and experience to the Moors, but they are nearly all scoundrels of the worst description, forçats who have escaped from the prisons in Spain or Algiers, and other vagabonds unable to show their faces in Europe. Dr. Brown writes: "I know of no British renegade—the last and the most respectable of the order, a Scotchman, who lived at Rabat, much esteemed for his intelligence and honourable conduct, having died two years ago. Were the history of these turncoats fully known, the story of their lives would be a curious chapter in the annals of human nature. One of the most romantic of these tales was that of an old white-bearded man who, when the French military commission first entered Fez in 1877, was seen silently and sad-eyed, supported by two attendants, contemplating a uniform with which in days gone by he was very familiar. This aged renegade was known as Abd-er-Rhuman; but his christened name was Count Joseph de Saulty, formerly a lieutenant of engineers in the army of Algeria. In a weak moment he eloped with the commandant's wife, and remained in Tunis until she died. Then, becoming painfully anxious of the grave position in which he was placed as a deserter from the colours, he passed into Morocco, changed his faith, and as a military adviser of the then Sultan rose high in the imperial favour. He died in 1881, and is buried at the gates of Fez, though so thoroughly did he put the past behind him, that his son, now occupying a high position in the Court, is entirely ignorant of any language except Arabic. Another renegade of note was the English officer still remembered as Inglis Bashaw under whom Muley-el-Hassan, the present Sultan, learned the art of war, and who was the first individual to impart anything like discipline to the Moroccan army. Why he came to Morocco is not known, and so jealously was his identity kept dark, that in a recent work by the Viscount de la Montonère his real name is declared to be unknown. At this date there can be no reason for concealing that it was Graham; and I have been told by those who have every reason to know that, like so many others who incur the jealousy of the Moorish dignitaries, he died of poison."
The time of Morocco piracy is at an end, but that on land there are still captures has been of late years but too evident—the last being the capture of Sir Hugh Maclean.
But to return to Thomas Pellow.
After several ineffectual attempts at escape, and after incurring hairbreadth escapes, Pellow succeeded eventually in making his way to Gibraltar. But even there he was not safe. A Jew, agent for the Sultan of Morocco, claimed him, and demanded that he should be surrendered, as a Mussulman and as a subject of the Moorish Sultan. But General Field-Marshal Joseph Sabine, then Governor of Gibraltar, answered peremptorily that, as an English-born subject, he was an Englishman, and could not be surrendered. He went on board a vessel for England and reached Deptford, "and going on shore, directly to the church, returned public thanks to God for my safe arrival in Old England."
He remained in Deptford, very kindly received by a brother Cornishman, William Jones, and there, finding no vessel bound for Falmouth, he went to London and thence embarked on board a vessel commanded by Captain Francis, who readily offered him a passage to Truro.
He landed at Falmouth. The news of his coming had spread. "My father's house was almost quite at the other end of the town. I was, before I could reach it, more than an hour; for notwithstanding it was almost dark, I was so crowded by the inhabitants that I could not pass through them without a great deal of difficulty—every one bidding me welcome home, being all very inquisitive with me if I knew them, which, indeed I did not, for I was so very young at my departure, and my captivity and the long interval of time had made so very great an alteration on both sides, that I did not know my own father and mother, nor they me; and had we happened to meet at any other place without being preadvised, whereby there might be an expectation or natural instinct interposing, we should no doubt have passed each other, unless my great beard might have influenced them to inquire further after me."
He returned to Penryn on the 15th October, 1738, his birthday.
His narrative concludes with a touching account of his gratitude to God for having brought him back, and an expression of his earnest desire to serve God truly all the rest of his days upon earth.