142 A Ramble with the Travellers. [FEB. 



Moors, and one so peculiarly characteristic of the people, that we are 

 induced to translate it from his own work. 



A Portuguese surgeon was accosted one day by a young Moor from 

 the country, who, addressing him by the usual appellation of foreign 

 doctors in that place, requested him to give him some drogues to kill 

 his father, and as an inducement, promised to pay him well. The sur- 

 geon was a little surprised at first, as might be expected, and was 

 unable to answer immediately ; but quickly recovering himself, (for he 

 knew the habits of the people well), he replied, with sang-froid equal 

 to the Moor's, " Then you don't live comfortably with your father, I 

 suppose ?" " Oh, nothing can be better/' returned the Moor ; " he has 

 made much money, has married me well, and endowed me with all his 

 possessions ; but he cannot work any longer, he is so old, and he seems 

 unwilling to die." The doctor, of course, appreciated the amiable 

 philosophy of the Moor's reasoning, and promised to give him what he 

 desired. He accordingly prepared a cordial potion, more calculated to 

 restore energy to the old man, than to take it away. The Moor paid 

 him well and departed. About eight days after he came again, to say 

 that his father was not dead. " Not dead !" exclaimed the apothecary, 

 in well-feigned surprise, "he will die." He composed accordingly 

 another draught, for which he received an equal remuneration, and 

 assured the Moor that it would not fail in its effects. In fifteen days, 

 however, the Moor came again, complaining that his father thrived 

 better than ever. " Don't be discouraged," said the doctor, (who doubt- 

 less found these periodical visits by no means unprofitable) ; " give him 

 another potion, and I will exert all my skill in its preparation." The 

 Moor took it, but returned no more. One day the surgeon met his 

 young acquaintance in the street, and inquired the success of the re- 

 medy. " It was of no avail," he replied, mournfully ; " my father is 

 in excellent health. God has preserved him from all our efforts ; there 

 is no doubt now that he is a Marabout" (a Saint). 



The Moors in Africa afford abundant matter for sad and melancholy 

 reflection. The territory of Algiers, it will be remembered, embraces 

 a considerable portion of the Numidia and Mauritania of the ancients, 

 The names of Massinissa and Jugurtha occur to the memory y the first 

 rendered immortal by the picturesque and affecting narrative of Livy, 

 and the second by the fiery and melo-dramatic history of the penetrat- 

 ing Sallust. If the traveller be inclined to seek for the descendants of 

 those men who bearded the Roman power with so much vigour and 

 intrepidity, he will find them, to borrow the words of M. Renaudot, 

 miserably clothed, and knowing nothing of their ancestry, or the names 

 of the places which the} 7 themselves inhabit, and acquainted only with 

 the deserts, which ignorance and barbarity are daily extending around 

 them. Wonderful and inscrutable to our aspurged eyes are the changes 

 of time ! Over how many hundred cities, once the thrones of magni- 

 ficence, has the river of years rolled since the brief segment of time 

 from the creation until now ! The Turkoman looks out from his black 

 tent upon the broken temples and ruined pillars of the gorgeous Perse- 

 polis, and the wretched and half-starved peasant hides himself among 

 the aqueducts and triumphal arches of Imperial Carthage ! W. 



