48 JEWS OF TETUAN. oh. ii. 



tinct fumitory {Fwmaria africana of Lamarck), which he 

 had gathered nearly at the same spot twenty years before. 

 The red-flowered Polygala of Beni Hosmar (P. Webbiana 

 of Cosson) was seen in a few spots near the town along 

 with Arabis pubescens ; and that singular plant, the 

 DrosophylluTn, hitherto seen in Marocco only on the hills 

 west of Tangier, was here found within sight of the 

 ]\Iediterranean, growing along with Heliwnthemum wm- 

 bellatum and several other less rare species of the Cistus 

 tribe. 



During our stay here we had a good opportunity of 

 seeing something of the life of the Marocco Jews, who 

 form a distinct and important element in the population 

 of the empire. Tetuan has long been one of the head- 

 quarters of the Hebrew race. When most of the chief 

 Moorish families took refuge here after their expulsion 

 from Spain — and some are said still to preserve the keys 

 of their own houses in Granada — many Jews, flying from 

 the faggots of the Inquisition, preferred the comparative 

 toleration of Moslem rule, to the oppression and social 

 disabilities that awaited them in Christian Europe. It 

 was more tolerable to submit to occasional injustice and 

 cruelty which was shared by all classes of society around 

 them than to be daily reminded that they formed a class 

 apart — the proper objects of general contempt and aver- 

 sion. It is true that until late years the Marocco Jew 

 was exposed to some vexatious regulations. He was 

 required to put off his sandals on passing the outside of a 

 mosque, to wear a peculiar dress, and is still confined to a 

 separate quarter in each town. But in ordinary inter- 

 course between man and man the Jews of the coast towns 

 seemed to us to have attained a footing of almost complete 

 equality, due as well to their superior intelligence and 

 commercial instinct, as to the tolerance which affinity of 

 race and creed has developed among the people of Arab 

 stock. In truth, the Moor feels that the Jew is indispen- 

 sable to him. In despite of his aversion to intercourse 



