Algeciras

“ Our old friend Tarik was here,—witness the great aqueduct he built, that still brings Algeciras his royal gift of water, always the legacy of Roman or of Moor.
To-day, Gibraltar is England’s key to the Mediterranean; yesterday, Algeciras was the Moors’ key to Spain. They held the Peninsula seven hundred years, think of it!—nearly twice as long as white men have held America ”

“ The streets of Algeciras are wide and regularly built, remarkably well paved, and lined with good houses; but it is a sun-burnt place, without a tree to shelter, or a drain to purify it. Being the port of communication between Spain and her presidario, Ceuta, as well as the military seat of government of the Campo de Gibraltar, it is a place of some bustle, and carries on a thriving trade, by means of felucas and other small craft, with the British fortress. The population may be reckoned at 8,000 souls, exclusive of a garrison of from twelve to fifteen hundred men. ”

“ Apart from the great highways traversing the province, which are excellent, the roads are few and ill-kept. The railway from Madrid enters the province on the north and bifurcates north-west of Guadix; one branch going eastward to Almería, the other westward to Loja, Malaga and Algeciras. Baza is the terminus of a railway from Lorca. The chief towns include Granada, the capital (pop. 1900, 75,900) with Alhama de Granada (7697) , Baza (12,770) , Guadix (12,652) , Loja (19,143) , Montefrío (10,725) , and Motril (18,528) . These are described in separate articles. ”

“ In following the road that runs from Campamiento along the bay, the charming little town of Algeziras is reached. It lies on the western shore, exactly opposite Gibraltar, with which it is in regular correspondence by daily steamers.40
Algeziras, formerly a poor fishing-village, has greatly increased in extent and prosperity, through the smuggling trade. This clean and pretty-looking place has a population of 10,000 souls, and makes by contrast an extremely pleasant impression on coming from the dismal and gloomy fortress. Men and things here have quite an Andalusian appearance. ”

“ All the houses are built round a spacious court, which, in the dwellings of the rich, is paved with marble and adorned with a fountain. The only difference is, that the Spanish cities were evidently built during the most flourishing times of the Moors, as the style of the houses in Spain is far grander and more ornate than of those in Africa.
Algiers contains a population of about forty or fifty thousand souls, two-thirds of which are Jews and Arabs, and the rest Frenchmen, Spaniards, and Italians. ”

“ Neither would this town have been so thronged with trippers had it been miles away in the desert without a railway, but it is so easy to get into the train at Algiers one night and detrain the next day in time for lunch in the Sahara that more people come here than to any other place in the south.
Of course, from the point of view of the country, the change has brought in a great deal of money and the town has an air of fat prosperity unknown in the other places we have visited. Arab guides are paid the wages of colonels and the hiring of camels is as expensive as a motor-car. ”

“ Algesi′ras (12) , a town and port in Spain on the Bay of Gibraltar, 5 m. across the bay; for centuries a stronghold of the Moors, but taken from them by Alfonso IX. after a siege of twenty months.
Algiers′ (75) , the capital of Algeria, founded by the Arabs in 935, called the “silver city,” from the glistening white of its buildings as seen sloping up from the sea, presenting a striking appearance, was for centuries under its Bey the head-quarters of piracy in the Mediterranean, which only began to cease when Lord Exmouth bombarded the town and destroyed the fleet in the harbour. ”

“ To-day, if you inquire of a stranger your way in French he will very likely reply by asking if you have the Spanish, and if you have it not you must try again. But the Spaniards, great builders in Europe and beyond the seas, built little but fortifications on the African shore. Oran is frankly modern and European in aspect; the most Oriental-looking building is the railway-station. The French have built fortifications too; a picturesque fort crowns a hill to the west, a thousand feet above the town; and there is much show of strength below. And there is an important garrison. ”

“ Algiers has a special atmosphere all its own. It lacks those little graces which we identify as thoroughly French, in spite of the fact that the city itself has become so largely Frenchified; and it lacks to a very great extent—from almost every view-point—that Oriental flavour which one finds at Cairo and Tunis. But for all that, Algiers is the most wonderful exotic and conventional blend of things Arab and European on top of earth.
The environs of Algiers are rugged and full of character, opening out here and there into charming distant vistas, and wide panoramas of land and sea and sky. ”

“ Algiers is such a city of contrasts, of dark memories and present prosperity, of Christian slavery and Christian rule, brilliant sun and tropical rain, of wide modern streets and networks of narrow alleys, with the slow dignity of movement of the old race and the rapid vivacity of their new rulers, that it makes all the difference in the world in what spirit and at what moment you arrive. At times the city is all sunshine, “a diamond in an emerald frame,” as the Arabs call it; at others only a dim outline is visible blotted out by the tropical rain. ”

“ I had to recount to him all my adventures at Dschigeli, which caused him to stroke his beard fiercely, whilst he muttered one caramba after another.
I have been several times to Algiers, which is about a league and a half from Buterback, to take a nearer view of the curiosities there.
The upper, which is the old part of the town, bears a striking resemblance to the old Moorish cities of Andaluzia, such as Cordova and Eccija. The streets are very narrow, and the houses have but few windows looking into the streets, and those few are defended by close gratings. ”

“ Voyage to Mostaganem—Storm—Funeral at Sea—Landing—Bivouac—Matamon—Bey of Mostaganem—Arabic Music—Captain Lièvre—African Spring—French and Arab Soldiers. Mostaganem, October, 1841.
On the 4th instant our battalion went on board a brig-of-war, of fourteen guns, which was to take us from Algiers to Mostaganem. We sailed under the most favourable auspices: a gentle easterly breeze filled our sails and we soon lost sight of Algiers. At noon we passed La Torre Chica where the French landed in 1830, and from whence they marched upon Algiers. It is the best landing-place on the whole coast. ”

“ His first impressions of Algiers, rising out of the Mediterranean like a white bubble in a sea of sapphire, will be the best he will have of this once Turkish city, now a vast commercial town and only a little less noisy than Marseilles. The sight of the Arab quarter, piling itself up in a pyramid of white and blue roofs above the European houses, with the fresh gardens of Mustapha away to the left and the Turkish forts in the foreground, is a vision of delight. ”

“ Algiers is now a French province, but the greater part of its people are descendants of its ancient inhabitants, called Moors, and their conquerors, the Arabs, together with negroes from Soudan, French colonists, and a sprinkling of Turks, Maltese, and Spaniards.
Neither the Moors nor the Arabs think much of little girls. The latter—especially the poor ones—are sorry when one is born; but when a boy baby comes, they make him presents, and a bowl of "mughly"—a compound of rice flavored with sugar and spices, and sprinkled with delicious nuts—is given to each relative. ”

“ With this fleet he arrived at Gibraltar on the 9th of August, where he met with a Dutch squadron of five frigates and a corvette, commanded by Vice-admiral Von Capellem, who, on learning the object of the expedition, solicited and obtained leave to assist in the enterprise. The Algerines expected this attack, and had been preparing for it by the removal of every article of value, and by strengthening their already formidable fortifications. The city of Algiers is built on the declivity of a hill, in a triangular shape ”

“ The fortifications of Algiers were barriers which separated the growing civilization of Europe from the barbarian nether world, and they{256} fell only with the coming of the French in the second quarter of the nineteenth century. Such is the story of the entering wedge of progressive civilization in Algeria.
Algiers’ veiled women are one of the city’s chief and most curious sights for the stranger within her walls. On Friday, the jour des morts of the Arab women, they go to the cemetery to weep or to make gay, according as the mood is on. ”

“ The common idea of a fertile belt, more or less hilly and of varying width, between the sea on the north and the Sahara on the south, is imperfect and incorrect. As a very rough generalization, subject to innumerable variations of mountain and valley and plain, Algeria may be said to consist of two parallel ranges of mountains running north-east and south-west. The northern range slopes very gradually to the sea, often in a series of plains, providing with its copious rainfall that fertile tract known as the Tell, once the granary of Rome, and now again developing a great export trade. ”

“ The French, who had formerly felt that the Spaniards were getting no more than their deserts, and had even afforded Kheir-ed-Din a temporary refuge in the port of Marseilles during a storm, were naturally hurt at the ingratitude of these proceedings. They went so far, in the reign of the Grand Monarque, as to bombard Algiers on two occasions,—with the customary result. Their fleets sailed away; Algiers rebuilt itself, and proceeded upon its piratical way. No one has ever rivalled the Deys in the art of taking a beating, and coming up again with a smile,—unless it be their ultimate conquerors. ”

“ After passing through the straits of Gibraltar the attention of the traveler is soon centered on Algiers.
From the entrance to the harbor Algiers appears like a white diamond set in a circle of emeralds. The town consists of two parts, the French and the Arab quarters. To the visitor from the west Algiers is most interesting; for there he meets characters of all kinds, European peoples mixing with those of North Africa. The French quarters show that the Frenchman, when compelled to live in another country, takes a bit of Paris with him ”

“ How much more real Algiers was than the rock on the Rigi where we sat, or the lake beneath, or the mountains beyond. Algiers is very real, though I have never seen it, and my friend is my friend for ever, though I have lost his card and forgotten his name. ”

“ I have described Algiers as being built on the side of a mountain. The city possesses a commodious and safe harbour, where flutter the colours of every nation, from the red flag of the Swede to the Spaniard’s yellow ensign. Economy of space being a primary consideration in the laying out of the city, the houses have been built very high, and the streets made very narrow, so that there is no room for carriages. The Consul has a very fine Mauresque house in the old Turkish quarter, where he invited me to dinner and a soirée the day after my arrival ”

“ A plentiful spring of water gushes out of a rock close by, and tumbles down the hill on its way to the sea; so that nothing is wanting20 to the enjoyment of an inhabitant of the south. The house stands under Mustapha Superieur and affords a magnificent view over the sea and the bay of Algiers. On this spot some dozen Turks and Arabs dream away the greater part of their lives. The owner of the café is an old Turk who formerly served among the mamelukes of the Dey. He passed some years of his life a prisoner in Spain, where, besides corrupt and broken Spanish, he learned to drink and swear. ”

“ These are the times when Algiers very visibly puts on a quite new countenance, and it may well be compared to a great bee-hive. All is hurry, every one busy, and a cheerful aspect succeeds a strange gloom and discontent, like what is to be seen everywhere else, when the complaint of dullness of trade, scarcity of business, and stagnation of cash reigns universal; and which is constantly to be seen in Algiers during every interval between the taking of good prizes. ”

“ Towering above the lesser hills which front its opposite shore are the snow-clad mountains of the Djurjura range, guarding the highlands of Khabylia, and glistening as if with crystals in the strong southern light. All around, on the well-wooded heights, are countless villas, of high and low degree, almost all of dazzling white, the whiter for the sombre foliage of cypress and stone pine and olive in which they are set. Perhaps no city of the earth possesses a lovelier suburb. The Englishman will find himself quite at home. ”

“ It was Italy which objected to a French occupation of Tunis. Algeria has never been officially a French “colony.” It is in many respects administered as an integral portion of French territory, the governor-general, as agent of the central power, exercising wide jurisdiction. Although the Europeans in Algeria are less than a seventh of the population, and although the French are actually a minority of the European inhabitants—Spaniards prevailing in the west, Italians and Maltese in the east—the three departments of Constantine, Algiers and Oran are administered like three French departments. ”