38 
arriol, is the most common specie of the country; the 
value of it is, however, very fluctuating: it is commonly 
worth twelve ounces of the country, and the Spanish 
piecette three ounces, which establishes a difference of 25 
per cent, between these two; and though they give four 
piecettes and a half for the duro, which reduces the 
profits, yet this encourages the smuggling trade in coin, 
because most of the ships or vessels coming from Eu- 
rope fraudulently introduce quantities of Spanish pie- 
cettes, in order to exchange them against duros. 
Bad money is very common here; it comes from other 
countries, and the result of all my inquiries about it 
was, that it was supposed to be coined in England. 
The balance of commerce is very favourable with re- 
gard to provisions, but quite the contrary with regard to 
objects of manufactures. Notwithstanding the fine situ- 
ation of the port of Tangier, its trade is reduced to a very 
moderate exportation of provisions, to a trifling smug- 
gling trade with Spain, and to some faint relations with 
Tetuan and Fez, where a few European articles are im- 
ported. With regard to the trade of Morocco in general, 
it shall be treated of afterwards.* 
The ground which forms the basis of the coast at 
Tangier is composed of different beds of secondary 
granite of a compact or fine granulated texture. These 
beds are inclined to the horizon, and form with it an 
angle of 50 to 70 degrees. They are generally one foot 
and a half to two feet thick; their direction runs from 
east to west, and their inclination by which the angle is 
formed is northerly. 
* The shops are so extremely small, that the shop-keeper, 
when seated in the middle of his shop, has no occasion to rise in 
order to reach any part of his goods and present them t© the 
buyer. 
