| [4] | The Argan Forest is in Southern Morocco, and takes its name from the Argan, a species of olive tree. |
THE STORY OF A SLAVE
In the early days Marzuk saw life from a secure position on his mother’s back. So soon as morning dawned, the pair would leave their mud hut beyond the northern gate of Timbuctoo, and seek the market, there to spread out and arrange such produce as had been collected overnight for the day’s sale.
In their season Aminah, the mother of Marzuk, sold the three fruits we have never seen in our western world, the rich karita or butter fruit, the satisfying nata which yields a sort of sweet flour in pods, and the cheese fruit, upon which a man may dine and not go hungry.
Marzuk’s mother was a black woman from below the Niger, in the Soudan, and very ugly to the eyes of all save her little boy. But her white loin cloths and shifts were cleaner than those of most of her neighbours, and worn with some nicety.
She wore her hair in three rolls on the top of her head, supported by a white fillet about her brows, and she was so industrious and cheery that the day’s end seldom found any of her market stock unsold, and generally saw quite an imposing heap of cowries in the old calabash that was kept for use as a till. Money was unknown.
So Marzuk, well-fed, grew strong and straight and comely, learning to help his mother in her work, and to play truant from his duties and adventure alone into Timbuctoo itself, and to the Niger banks beyond. When he returned Aminah would beat him soundly, and cry over him in mother fashion, while painting for him luridly the dangers of the road.
She spoke with rolling eyes and bated breath of the fierce Touaregs, the brigands from the Sahara, who went through the streets of Timbuctoo veiled against the glare of the African sun; of the hippopotami by the Niger’s bank that were ever lying in wait to make meals of naughty boys; of the treacherous and pathless sand-dunes to the north, and of hungry monkeys chattering in the trees—monkeys that were really little children changed from their natural shape for disobedience to parents. But neither stripes nor warnings could keep Marzuk’s feet from straying.
The grass lands near the river, where the sheep pastured, were Marzuk’s favourite resort, because of the white ospreys that dwelt there. These birds loved to follow the sheep from place to place, taking no notice of shepherds or farmers, but ever intent upon the actions of their four-footed friends.