[8]Proc. Soc. Antiq., 2nd series, vol. ii. p. 96.
PART I.
CHAPTER I.
BRUCE APPOINTED CONSUL-GENERAL AT ALGIERS.
The circumstances which induced Bruce to accept the post of Consul-General at Algiers are contained in the following extracts from his autobiography:—
My Lord Halifax, in many conversations, laughed at me for my intention of returning to Scotland. He said, the way of rising in this King’s reign was by enterprise and discovery; that all Africa, though just at our door, was yet unexplored; that every page of Doctor Shaw, a writer of undoubted credit, spoke of some magnificent ruins which he had seen in the kingdoms of Tunis and Algiers; that now was the age to recover these remains of architecture and add them to the King’s collection.
Fortune seemed to enter into this scheme. At the very instant, Mr. Aspinwall, very cruelly and ignominiously treated by the Dey of Algiers, had resigned his consulship, and Mr. Ford, a merchant, formerly the Dey’s acquaintance, was named in his place. Mr. Ford was appointed, and, dying a few days afterwards, the consulship became vacant. Lord Halifax pressed me to accept this, as containing all sorts of conveniences for making the proposed expedition. The appointment was a handsome one, the salary was 900l. a year, and a promise was added that a vice-consul of my own appointment would be allowed to keep my place while on the discovery, and that, if I made wide excursions into Africa, and any considerable additions to the King’s collection, my former conditions of being made a baronet were to be preserved, and either a pension if I chose to retire, or my rank and advancement in the diplomatique line, preserved to me on my return.
Many conversations passed about the then unknown and despaired of fountains of the Nile; but this was considered as an enterprise above the power of extraordinary men, presumption to think it was within the reach of an untried ordinary man like me, but agreed on all hands that he that should achieve it, if he was a Briton, should not in this age despair of any reward.
In passing through Holland, I had collected all the printed books in the Arabic language, and at the time when I was to go to Algiers I was as good an Arabian as these books and dictionaries and this manner of study could make me.