1830.] A Visit to Tangier*. 539 



Shortly after this clock was introduced into the mosque, it stopped. 

 The inconvenience of not knowing the exact hour of the day was 

 acknowledged to be a great evil, but that of admitting a Christian into 

 the sanctuary to repair it a still greater. A divan was assembled for 

 the purpose of deciding on the propriety of getting the clock mended, 

 or of ejecting it altogether. After various debates, in which the nega- 

 tive evidence of the Koran was not considered sufficient to overcome all 

 difficulties, an ingenious Iman settled the point by asking " How the 

 materials for building the mosque were brought together?" "On 

 mules and asses/' was of course the reply. " Then why not," said this 

 sage, " allow an animal of a Christian to come into the mosque to perform 

 the work we require to be done ?'' 



Without the town is the Zoco, or market-place of Tangiers, a large 

 open space, where all the cross roads from the interior meet. In the centre 

 is the tomb of a celebrated saint, decorated with a number of small flags 

 mounted on sticks. Twice a week the surrounding country here pours 

 forth its productions of live and dead stock, which are all jumbled toge- 

 ther in curious confusion. Veterinary surgeons may be here seen admi- 

 nistering physic to a camel, which the patient animal kneels to receive ; 

 here a travelling dentist extracts the sufferer's tooth with an instrument 

 resembling the picker used for a horse's feet ; and here a perambulating 

 auctioneer traverses the market with his merchandize on his back, invit- 

 ing, in a voice of thunder, a fresh bid for his wares, swearing the most 

 dreadful oaths to the truth of the offer already made. 



Women attend these markets, who may be seen squatting beside 

 their heaps of soft soap, or butter thickly mixed w4th goat-hair, the 

 negociation for which they carry on beneath the impenetrable curtain of 

 the el-haicke, and the broad brimmed straw hat, which gives them the 

 appearance of speaking automatons ; notwithstanding w r hich they take 

 care never to make blind bargains. Beggars and saints likewise take 

 their stations here, whose lazar-like appearance completes the panorama 

 of a Moorish market. 



The gardens of the consuls are the next object of attraction ; these, 

 together with some caverns at Cape Spartel, which open on the ever- 

 agitated and tremendous Atlantic, whose breakers dash into their mouths 

 with the foam and noise of angry lions, are almost the only objects of 

 curiosity in this neighbourhood. 



During the visit of the Sultan* of Morocco, Muley Abderachman, to 

 this place, in the spring of the year, he afforded us some specimens of 

 his dexterous horsemanship, by racing with several of his officers along 

 the sands of the sea-beach. At full gallop, some of the horsemen raised 

 handfuls of sand from the earth and scattered it in the air ; they like- 

 wise fired their guns at full speed, reloaded, and twirled them over their 



* If stories of scandal are to be credited, many of which were current at this time at 



Tangiers, the sultan is most keenly alive to the charms of a fat woman. Mr. was in 



the train of suitors awaiting his majesty's arrival from Fez. Admitted to an interview, he 

 commenced the oft-conned speech ; but the sultan, impatient of the discourse, frequently in- 

 terrupted him by asking, " If it was true his daughters were so beautifully fat as he had 

 heard reported ?" " No, no," replied the affrighted suitor, " I do assure your majesty 



that both and (who, by-the-by, are celebrated for their rotundity of shape) are 



nothing but skin and bone !" The unhappy gentleman hastened from the royal presence, 

 bewailing the envious reports, so calculated to injure his loyalty and peace of mind, and so 

 destructive of the success of the suit he had to prefer. 



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