Italian occupation would ensure peace and prosperity to his people. The Colonel assured him that it would do so, whereupon, shaking hands again, the old Arab raised his eyes to Heaven and exclaimed: 'It is Allah's will.' The last stage of our march was short but difficult, for the wheels of our trucks and artillery buried themselves deep in the treacherous sand, and even stony stretches of the road were broken and rough. We had proceeded about ten kilometres when we reached a sort of marsh from which rose a great shrub looking like a pine tree and forming a mass of green among the bare stones. A little farther on at the foot of a mound we came across the partially decomposed body of a Negro who had died of thirst. Our column made a short halt at a place called El Msalla, or the Sacred Square, because the Mahdi stopped here and prayed for a long time before he entered Jarabub. While we were resting a bombing plane and four scouting planes circled over us and dropped red discs with white centres as a sign that all was quiet ahead. A short march of five kilometres finally brought us to Garet-el-Barut, 'Rifle Shot,' so called because it is where the faithful coming from the west and north first catch sight of Jarabub, and fire their guns as a sign of joy. For a person who has spent days and perhaps weeks in the monotonous desolation of the desert the scene that greets the vision at this point is certainly overwhelming. Upon reaching the summit of the ridge, we find ourselves facing a sharp descent of about one hundred feet to a flat-bottomed basin of which we have no inkling until we reach the very brink of the slope. Below us stretches a broad plain, whose walls are striped white, shining black, and gray, according to the stratification. It is dotted by little rocky mesas, rounded by the wind and undercut by the driven sand, that look like toadstools. Others resemble formal flights of steps, others turreted fortresses, and still others contemplative sphinxes. Here and there in the midst of the plain, or along its sides, or at the height of the horizon, stand groves of rock that rise aloft like the tops of cypresses. And it is all motionless and lifeless like a lunar landscape. At the eastern end of this long cornucopia are three little green spots, the oases of Jarabub, the first evidence of verdure for three hundred kilometres. The white city itself is entirely surrounded by a high wall which has fallen into ruins at several points. It is dominated by the great central dome of the mosque, which is supported on an octagon of pillars. Around it and connected with it are various religious buildings, including the School of the Koran. Most of the dwellings are within the wall. Their occupants are permitted to reside there only with the permission of the Head of the Zavia. To the east of the wall lies a long, hornlike extension of the plain, where the advance guard of our cavalry is already visible. By eleven o'clock the place is completely invested. Not a sign of life reaches us from the town. Sherif el Gariani and Sidi Hilal entered it half an hour ago, in an automobile which carried them to the foot of the western approach. They find the streets deserted the women in the houses, the men in the mosque. The Sherif addresses the latter for several minutes, urging them to have no fear and begging their chiefs to come out and meet the commander of the Italian expedition. At length a tiny troop of men appears in the square before the mosque, descends the steps, and slowly approaches, with El Gariani and Sidi Hilal in advance. Colonel Ronchetti with his staff officers grouped around him awaits their arrival at the foot of a little mound. The notables advance with evident hesitation, but finally they reach the point where we are gathered some twenty men in all, among them a few Fezzan Negroes and Ahmed Ben Shef, uncle of the Grand Senussi. After they have been presented one by one, the Colonel addresses them in a short speech, in which he repeats his promise that they will suffer no violence and that their sacred places will be rigorously respected. Little by little as the interpreter translates his words the faces of the notables clear, and when the Colonel concludes by asking the people of Jarabub to show equal consideration for Italy his listeners express their assent at once by placing their right hands on their breasts. We make a short excursion around the walls of the city, which is already guarded by our own native sentries, who prevent anyone entering, even our officers. Groups of Arabs come out and with intense interest watch our troops make camp in the usual way. Near a spring between the wall and the nearest oasis a few Senussi are performing the ritual ablutions. Among them I notice a lad of distinguished countenance wearing trousers and shirt of fine cloth and a blue jubbah trimmed with black silk. The slave who accompanies him tells us he is the son of Ahmed Ben Shef and one of the best students in the school. Passing beyond the cemetery, we take a short stroll in the oasis, whose orchards already hang heavy with fruit and whose gardens are full of vegetables. We come to a deserted-looking hut, in the vicinity of which we surprise a Fezzanese working near a spring. He tries to avoid us at first, but not being able to do so comes directly toward us carrying a bunch of onions just pulled in his garden. Thrusting them into our hands, he hurries off to town at a rapid pace. In the afternoon our men form in a square and present arms while the colors of Italy are raised to the top of our portable radio mast and a salute of twenty-one guns is fired. This ceremony concludes with three cheers for the King and a wild yell from our ascari, saluting the first appearance of our flag over Jarabub the Holy; and afterward the five chief notables of the city are entertained at tea in the Commander's tent. We are erecting a fortified post at Jarabub upon which we began work the first day after we arrived. It will occupy the summit of two little hills rising thirty feet above the valley bottom, five hundred yards northwest of the town. Two towers already crown these elevations. They were evidently seen by one of the very few Europeans who have managed to catch a distant glimpse of Jarabub, who mistook them for fortresses. In sober truth, however, they are peaceable windmills. Thus vanishes one of the minor myths that travelers have spun about this town of mystery. We have heard wonderful tales of the city's vast extent, the magnificence of its Zavia, and the splendors of its mosque. It proves on close acquaintance to be only an ordinary desert town of low, commonplace structures built, as is the custom in this region, of rough stone, palm trunks, and mud mortar, and far less imposing than the native coast towns or even several other oasis settlements in the central desert. The Zavia and the mosque strike one as remarkable only because it is surprising to find buildings of even modest pretensions in so remote and isolated a locality. The travelers who brought back such wonderful stories of Jarabub, sur 1 This morning I was one of the first Christians to penetrate the sacred portals of the Holy City. Removing my shoes, as the Moslem law demands, I entered barefooted the mysterious Zavia and the mosque, where I knelt in front of the lattice that surrounds the tomb of Mohammed Ben Ali-esSenussi. The instinctive reverence that I cherish for all sincere religion, although it may not be of my own confession, made me feel as if I were committing a sacrilege, as if I were as if I were an unlawful intruder. My tourist garb seemed strangely out of place and banal amid such surroundings. rounded with lofty walls and fortified with massive bastions, were allowed merely to catch a glimpse of the town from the top of the elevation that bounds the northern approaches of the valley. From that point, five or six miles away, Jarabub merges itself in the dazzling desert sunshine with its fantastic background of wind-eroded rocks, whose regular contours and peculiar fashioning might well be mistaken at that distance for massive walls and fortifications. But although Jarabub loses its profaning something sacred to others, legendary magnificence when seen with the disillusioned eye of the close observer, it still retains a certain fascination and impressiveness. This is due partly to its picturesque situation in the centre of the wonderful panorama presented from the surrounding valley walls; to its setting of golden sand, graceful palm trees, blossoming orchards, and fresh green gardens, which seem fairylike and unreal in this vast expanse of silent, arid, lifeless landscape. It is also impressive for another reason because it is saturated with the spirit of faith, of mysticism, of ecstatic Oriental devotion. In fact, this famous monastery of Islam, until yesterday untrodden by the unbeliever's foot, carries the mind back irresistibly to the hermits of Thebaid and to the great ascetics of all religions who have sought refuge in the desert to draw near to God. Later, in the golden light of the declining sun, a muezzin called forth from the tall white minaret, in slow, guttural cadences, and turning to all four points of the compass, his summons to worship. And it seemed to me that this call, whose last echoes were lost in the great inscrutable solitude of the darkening desert, was addressed to all the thousands and thousands of the faithful who at that hour were praying to Allah and His prophet Mohammed; that it went out to countless hosts of believers summoned to prayer from all the minarets of Islam, from the Mediterranean to the Yellow Sea, and from the farthest coasts of Asia to the Gulf of Guinea despair. a war cry and a wail of A MOROCCO FESTIVAL1 BY HENRY D. DAVRAY AID EL KEBIR is the great religious anniversary of the Moors, sometimes called Aid el Kebch, the Festival of the Sheep. On that day no good Mohammedan fails to sacrifice a sheep or a lamb a custom that goes back to the early days of the faith. According to legend, a wise man of the days of the early prophets, wishing to show his love of the Lord, took his son with him. to the top of a lofty mountain, 'so high that one felt he was drawing near to God.' When he arrived at the summit the holy man drew his poniard from his burnoose and said to his son: 'My child, I shall sacrifice you to the Master of the World. May His will be done.' ble, for prices rise as the festival approaches. Many houses in Fez contain a little stable, often paved with mosaic, for the special use of the sacrificial lamb, where the little victim receives the utmost attention. The children of the household come several times a day to pet it with their hennatinted hands and to bring it fresh water, chopped grass, and even bread and cakes. They talk to it, to persuade it that its lot is a happy one: 'Instead of being dragged off ignominiously to the slaughterhouse like your brothers, and eaten by ordinary people who never knew you, you will be stained with henna, and so gentlyoh, so gently!- will the sharp knife be drawn across your throat that you will never know it. You will never feel but a little prick. Then you will go to sleep to wake up in the glory of the Elysium reserved for the Aid lambs, instead of becoming nothing like ordinary animals.' The son obediently lay down, 'with his forehead against the ground,' that his father might slit his throat in ritual fashion. But the sharp blade refused to cut. Instead, an angel appeared in a column of blinding light and, pointing to a lamb tied to a jujube tree, said: 'God accepts thy sacrifice and is well disposed toward thee. Spare thy beloved son, and sacrifice in his place this animal that Almighty Allah sends thee.' Obviously we have here an Arab life come running up to them whenever version of Abraham's sacrifice. For months beforehand each family prepares for the coming sacrifice. Poor people save up money, copper by copper, to buy an animal; and it is wise to make the purchase as early as possi1 From Mercure de France (Paris ClericalConservative monthly), January 15 In fact, it is a common belief among the people that the sheep slaughtered during the Aid go directly to Paradise and that when the faithful die all the sheep they have sacrificed during their the anniversary recurs. Thereupon, surrounded by these four-footed companions, the spirits of the blest defile in a great procession before the throne. of the Lord. In order that he may shine worthily on that occasion, every Mohammedan takes pains to pick out for the sacrifice the finest lamb or sheep that he can find. festival ap- it, to per- lief among aughtered › Paradise lie all the ring their whenever hereupon, ted comlest defile he throne he may ɔn, every pick out or sheep A MOROCCO FESTIVAL At Fez, just before the Aid, little girls, powdered, perfumed, and clad in brocades and gold like princesses of the Arabian Nights, go from house to house singing, I am little Arfa who brings happiness; You will stain his finger-nails with henna; On the day of the Aid! And seldom do the little Arfas depart without receiving more or less mouzuna. A mule is supposed to be an obstinate animal, but he is 'as docile as a lamb' compared with a sacrificial sheep on the morning of the Aid. You see approaching the city from every direction peasants and tribal patriarchs, each leading one of these animals, who, as soon as it has passed the town gates and entered the narrow streets, braces itself against a wall, and baaing pitifully, as if with a presentiment of its fate, refuses to budge. It seems to say, 'Your promise of perennial green pastures in the Elysian Fields hath no charms for me.' or more The owners, expert shepherds though they are, seem at a loss how to proceed. They push the animals with main strength from behind, pull them by their tails or their ears, grab them by their wool, but merely manage to get them forward a step or two. Boys grip them behind by the feet and try to wheelbarrow them forward - whereupon the frightened beasts jib, and that is the end of progress. Finally, unless the animal be too heavy, its owner slings him across his shoulders, as shepherds do in the Bible pictures. That is the only radical solution of the problem. All day long you see these nomads of the bled, bare-armed and barelegged, a tiny twisted white turban around their heads that leaves the crown uncovered, wearing only a vest 23 like, sleeveless cloak of striped woolen goods and short breeches that do not reach the knees, and without jelab or burnoose, walking through the streets, carrying slung across their shoulders, not the beribboned paschal lamb of the Christians, but the sheep of the Aid of the Mohammedans, with its fleece freshly washed and silky and stained with henna, the ears darker than the rest. The The celebration lasts several days, and is seen at its best in Fez, where the Sultan, who is a spiritual as well as a temporal ruler, presides. All day long little clusters of people dot the surrounding plain moving toward the M'salla, a curved wall built in the open country with the convex side toward Mekka. In the centre is a mihrab, or structure found in mosques to indicate the direction of Mekka, toward which the faithful turn in prayer. M'salla occupies a hillside northwest of the city, from which there is a view over a wide sweep of country to the southward. On the left and east lies New Fez, already several centuries old, with its lofty walls and massive gates; and on higher land Old Fez, founded in 808 A.D. In the same direction is the Sultan's palace, embracing within its crenelated walls mosques and minarets, prisons, armories, gardens, and reservoirs, and occupying altogether nearly two hundred acres. To the right and west one can see, amid groves of young trees planted since the French occupation, the broad avenues and white buildings of the European city. At the M'salla gather, not only the people of Fez and the surrounding country, but cadis and tribesmen from all parts of Morocco. They come on horseback, on muleback, and by automobile. It is indeed a picturesque and multicolored throng that waits patiently here long before the hour of the sacrifice, in a sort of disorderly calm. |