Travels in the footsteps of Bruce in Algeria and Tunis

by Sir R. Lambert Playfair

In calm weather vessels, chiefly French, have loaded at Ptolometa both wheat and oats, but this year famine was everywhere.

This is the only city of the Cyrenaicum that has any considerable remains of architecture standing. We finished our drawings on December 30. On the north-west side of the city are the very large quarries from which the stone for building the city was taken. We see with surprise the large blocks which were raised for the architraves and other principal parts of the building. Large grottos in the form of houses are cut into these rocks, and on the side of one of them, among other designs, the amusement of the quarriers, is hewn a frontispiece of an Ionic temple, touched with considerable spirit and intelligence, about four feet high.

Here we met a small Greek vessel unloading corn, belonging to an island not far from Crete; and here we received bad news, that the Welled Ali, the Arabs that mostly occupy the whole country between this and Alexandria, were at war amongst themselves, and had plundered the caravan of Morocco going to Mecca, that great dearth or famine had been at Derna, and the plague had followed it, that that town, divided into upper and lower, were at war among themselves, and that the Welled Habeeb were at war with the Arabs of Ptolometa, where we now were, and that we could pass no further.

This torrent of many woes was irresistible; we determined to stay no longer, but to fly from this inhospitable coast, and thus save to the public at least the knowledge we had already acquired for them.

We embarked on board the Greek caique very ill-armed and accoutred. We sailed by the dawn of day from Ptolometa in as favourable and pleasant weather as I ever saw at sea. A light and steady breeze, though not perfectly fair, promised a short and agreeable voyage, but the wind soon turned so fresh that our vessel with her large latine sails and without ballast, fell vastly to leeward; we turned prow upon Bengazi, and not far from shore we struck upon a rock, which went fairly through the vessel, and she, as it were, sat down upon it. The wind providentially calmed, but there was still a great swell at sea.

Two boats were still astern and had not been hoisted in. M‘Cormack, my Irish servant, had been a sailor on board the ‘Monarch’ before he deserted to the Spanish service; he and the other, who had likewise been a sailor, presently unlashed the largest boat and we all three got down into her, followed by a multitude of people whom we could not hinder, and there was indeed something bordering on cruelty in preventing poor people from using the same means that we had done for preserving their lives.

The most that could be done was to get loose from the ship as soon as possible, and two oars were prepared to row the boat ashore.

I had stripped myself to an under-waistcoat and linen drawers, a silk sash or girdle was wrapt round me; a pencil, small pocket-book and watch were in my breast pocket; two Moorish and two English servants followed me, the rest wisely abode by the wreck.

The vessel had in it a number of poor people, men, women and children, flying from famine, who all got over the ship’s side into the boat likewise—they were too many, it is true, but who was to hinder them? We were not twice the length of the boat from the vessel before a wave nearly filled her. I saw our fate was to be decided by the next wave that was rolling in upon us, and satisfied that some woman, child, or helpless man would lay hold upon me, entangle my arms, and weigh me down, I cried to my servants, ‘We are all lost, follow me if you can swim,’ and I let myself down in the face of the wave. Whether that or the next swell filled the boat I know not. I was a good, strong and practised swimmer, in the flower of life, full of health and exercise, and I suppose at the time one of the strongest men in the world.

All this, however, which might have availed me much in deep water, was not sufficient when I came into the surf. I received a violent blow on my breast with the eddy wave and reflux; it seemed to be with a billet of wood, and threw me upon my back and made me swallow a considerable quantity of water, which almost suffocated me.