Arrangements concluded, it was time to say good-bye to Sidi Boubikir. I asked delicately to be allowed to pay rent for the use of the house, but the hospitable old man would not hear of it. "Allah forbid that I should take any money," he remarked piously. "Had you told me you were going I would have asked you to dine with me again before you started." We sat in the well-remembered room, where green tea and mint were served in a beautiful set of china-and-gold filagree cups, presented to him by the British Government nearly ten years ago. He spoke at length of the places that should be visited, including the house of his near relative, Mulai el Hadj of Tamsloht, to whom he offered to send me with letters and an escort. Moreover, he offered an escort to see us out of the city and on the road to the coast, but I judged it better to decline both offers, and, with many high-flown compliments, left him by the entrance to his great house, and groped back through the mud to put the finishing touches to packing.
The young shareef accepted a parting gift with grave dignity, and assured me of his esteem for all time and his willing service when and where I should need it. I had said good-bye to the "tabibs" and "tabibas," so nothing remained but to rearrange our goods, that nearly everything should be ready for the mules when they arrived before daybreak. Knowing that the first day's ride was a long one, some forty miles over an indifferent road and with second-rate animals, I was anxious to leave the city as soon as the gates were opened.
THE JAMA'A EFFINA
Right above my head the mueddin in the minaret overlooking the Tin House called the sleeping city to its earliest prayer.[47] I rose and waked the others, and we dressed by a candle-light that soon became superfluous. When the mueddin began the chant that sounded so impressive and so mournful as it was echoed from every minaret in the city, the first approach of light would have been visible in the east, and in these latitudes day comes and goes upon winged feet. Before the beds were taken to pieces and Salam had the porridge and his "marmalade" ready, with steaming coffee, for early breakfast, we heard the mules clattering down the stony street. Within half an hour the packing comedy had commenced. The Susi muleteer, who was accompanied by a boy and four men, one a slave, and all quite as frowzy, unwashed, and picturesque as himself, swore that we did not need four pack-mules but eight. Salam, his eyes flaming, and each separate hair of his beard standing on end, cursed the shameless women who gave such men as the Susi muleteer and his fellows to the kingdom of my Lord Abd-el-Aziz, threw the shwarris on the ground, rejected the ropes, and declared that with proper fittings the mules, if these were mules at all, and he had his very serious doubts about the matter, could run to Mogador in three days. Clearly Salam intended to be master from the start, and when I came to know something more about our company, the wisdom of the procedure was plain. Happily for one and all Mr. Nairn came along at this moment. It was not five o'clock, but the hope of serving us had brought him into the cold morning air, and his thorough knowledge of the Shilha tongue worked wonders. He was able to send for proper ropes at an hour when we could have found no trader to supply them, and if we reached the city gate that looks out towards the south almost as soon as the camel caravan that had waited without all night, the accomplishment was due to my kind friend who, with Mr. Alan Lennox, had done so much to make the stay in Marrakesh happily memorable.
It was just half-past six when the last pack-mule passed the gate, whose keeper said graciously, "Allah prosper the journey," and, though the sun was up, the morning was cool, with a delightfully fresh breeze from the west, where the Atlas Mountains stretched beyond range of sight in all their unexplored grandeur. They seemed very close to us in that clear atmosphere, but their foot hills lay a day's ride away, and the natives would be prompt to resent the visit of a stranger who did not come to them with the authority of a kaid or governor whose power and will to punish promptly were indisputable. With no little regret I turned, when we had been half an hour on the road, for a last look at Ibn Tachfin's city. Distance had already given it the indefinite attraction that comes when the traveller sees some city of old time in a light that suggests every charm and defines none. I realised that I had never entered an Eastern city with greater pleasure, or left one with more sincere regret, and that if time and circumstance had been my servants I would not have been so soon upon the road.
The road from Marrakesh to Mogador is as pleasant as traveller could wish, lying for a great part of the way through fertile land, but it is seldom followed, because of the two unbridged rivers N'fiss and Sheshoua. If either is in flood (and both are fed by the melting snows from the Atlas Mountains), you must camp on the banks for days together, until it shall please Allah to abate the waters. Our lucky star was in the ascendant; we reached Wad N'fiss at eleven o'clock to find its waters low and clear. On the far side of the banks we stayed to lunch by the border of a thick belt of sedge and bulrushes, a marshy place stretching over two or three acres, and glowing with the rich colour that comes to southern lands in April and in May. It recalled to me the passage in one of the stately choruses of Mr. Swinburne's Atalanta in Calydon, that tells how "blossom by blossom the spring begins."
The intoxication that lies in colour and sound has ever had more fascination for me than the finest wine could bring: the colour of the vintage is more pleasing than the taste of the grape. In this forgotten corner the eye and ear were assailed and must needs surrender. Many tiny birds of the warbler family sang among the reeds, where I set up what I took to be a Numidian crane, and, just beyond the river growths, some splendid oleanders gave an effective splash of scarlet to the surrounding greens and greys. In the waters of the marsh the bullfrogs kept up a loud sustained croak, as though they were True Believers disturbed by the presence of the Infidels. The N'fiss is a fascinating river from every point of view. Though comparatively small, few Europeans have reached the source, and it passes through parts of the country where a white man's presence would be resented effectively. The spurs of the Atlas were still clearly visible on our left hand, and needless to say we had the place to ourselves. There was not so much as a tent in sight.
At last M'Barak, who had resumed his place at the head of our little company, and now realised that we had prolonged our stay beyond proper limits, mounted his horse rather ostentatiously, and the journey was resumed over level land that was very scantily covered with grass or clumps of irises. The mountains seemed to recede and the plain to spread out; neither eye nor glass revealed a village; we were apparently riding towards the edge of the plains. The muleteer and his companions strode along at a round pace, supporting themselves with sticks and singing melancholy Shilha love-songs. Their mules, recollection of their good meal of the previous evening being forgotten, dropped to a pace of something less than four miles an hour, and as the gait of our company had to be regulated by the speed of its slowest member, it is not surprising that night caught us up on the open and shut out a view of the billowy plain that seemingly held no resting-place. How I missed the little Maalem, whose tongue would have been a spur to the stumbling beasts! But as wishing would bring nothing, we dismounted and walked by the side of our animals, the kaid alone remaining in the saddle. Six o'clock became seven, and seven became eight, and then I found it sweet to hear the watch-dog's honest bark. Of course it was not a "deep-mouthed welcome:" it was no more than a cry of warning and defiance raised by the colony of pariah dogs that guarded Ain el Baidah, our destination.