Biographies of Distinguished Scientific Men Part 5

In proportion as we advanced, our troops became increased by a certain number of Kabyls, who wished to go to Algiers to work there in the quality of seamen, and who dared not undertake alone this dangerous journey.

The third day we encamped in the open air, at the entrance of a forest.

The Arabs lighted a very large fire in the form of a circle, and placed themselves in the middle. Towards eleven o'clock, I was awakened by the noise which the mules made, all trying to break their fastenings. I asked what was the cause of this disturbance. They answered me that a "_sebaa_" had come roaming in the neighbourhood. I was not aware then that a "_sebaa_" was a lion, and I went to sleep again. The next day, in traversing the forest, the arrangement of the caravan was changed. It was grouped in the smallest s.p.a.ce possible; one Kabyl was at the head, his gun ready for service; another was in the rear, in the same position. I inquired of the owner of the mule the cause of these unusual precautions. He answered me, that they were dreading an attack from a "_sebaa_" and that if this should occur, one of us would be carried off without having time to put himself on the defensive. "I would rather be a spectator," I said to him, "than an actor in the scene you describe; consequently, I will give you two piastres more if you will keep your mule always in the centre of the moving group." My proposal was accepted. It was then for the first time that I saw that my Arab carried a yatagan under his tunic, which he used for p.r.i.c.king on the mule the whole time that we were in the thicket. Superfluous cautions! The "_sebaa_" did not show himself.

Each village being a little republic, whose territory we could not cross without obtaining permission and a pa.s.sport from the Mahomedan priest _president_, the priest who conducted our caravan used to leave us in the fields, and went sometimes a good way off to a village to solicit the permission without which it would have been dangerous to continue our route. He remained entire hours without returning to us, and we then had occasion to reflect sadly on the imprudence of our enterprise. We generally slept amongst habitations. Once, we found the streets of a village barricaded, because they were fearing an attack from a neighbouring village. The foremost man of our caravan removed the obstacles; but a woman came out of her house like a fury, and belaboured us with blows from a pole. We remarked that she was fair, of brilliant whiteness, and very pretty.

Another time we lay down in a lurking-place dignified by the beautiful name of caravansary. In the morning, when the sun rose, cries of "_Roumi! Roumi!_" warned us that we had been discovered. The sailor, Mehemet, he who figured in the scene of the oath at Palamos, entered in a melancholy mood the enclosure where we were together, and made us understand that the cries of "Roumi!" vociferated under these circ.u.mstances, were equivalent to a sentence of death. "Wait," said he; "a means of saving you has occurred to me." Mehemet entered some moments afterwards, told us that his means had succeeded, and invited me to join the Kabyls, who were going to say prayers.

I accordingly went out, and prostrated myself towards the East. I imitated minutely the gestures which I saw made around me, p.r.o.nouncing the sacred words,--_La elah il Allah! oua Mahommed racoul Allah!_ It was the scene of Mamamouchi of the "Bourgeois Gentilhomme," which I had so often seen acted by Dugazon,--with this one difference, that this time it did not make me laugh. I was, however, ignorant of the consequences it might have brought upon me on my arrival at Algiers. After having made the profession of faith before Mahomedans--_There is but one G.o.d, and Mahomet is his prophet_, if I had been informed against to the mufti, I must inevitably have become Mussulman, and they would not have allowed me to go out of the Regency.

I must not forget to relate by what means Mehemet had saved us from inevitable death. "You have guessed rightly," said he to the Kabyls; "there are two Christians in the caravansary, but they are Mahomedans at heart, and are going to Algiers to be adopted by the mufti into our holy religion. You will not doubt this when I tell you that I was myself a slave to some Christians, and that they redeemed me with their money."

"In cha Allah!" they exclaimed with one voice. And it was then that the scene took place which I have just described.

We arrived in sight of Algiers the 25th December, 1808. We took leave of the Arab owners of our mules, who walked on foot by the side of us, and we spurred them on, in order to reach the town before the closing of the gates. On our arrival, we learnt that the Dey, to whom we owed our first deliverance, had been beheaded. The guard of the palace before which we pa.s.sed, stopped us and questioned us as to whence we came. We replied that we came from Bougie by land. "It is not possible!" exclaimed all the janissaries at once; "the Dey himself would not venture to undertake such a journey!" "We acknowledge that we have committed a great imprudence; that we would not undertake to recommence the journey for millions; but the fact that we have just declared is the strict truth."

Arrived at the consular house, we were, as on the first occasion, very cordially welcomed. We received a visit from a dragoman sent by the Dey, who asked whether we persisted in maintaining that Bougie had been our point of departure, and not Cape Matifou, or some neighbouring port. We again affirmed the truth of our recital; it was confirmed, the next day, on the arrival of the proprietors of our mules.

At Palamos, during the various interviews which I had with the dowager d.u.c.h.ess of Orleans, one circ.u.mstance had particularly affected me. The Princess spoke to me unceasingly of the wish she had to go and rejoin one of her sons, whom she believed to be alive, but of whose death I had been informed by a person belonging to her household. Hence I was anxious to do all that lay in my power to mitigate a sorrow which she must experience before long.

At the moment when I quitted Spain for Ma.r.s.eilles, the d.u.c.h.ess confided to me two letters which I was to forward in safety to their addresses.

One was destined for the Empress-mother of Russia, the other for the Empress of Austria.

Scarcely had I arrived at Algiers, when I mentioned these two letters to M. Dubois Thainville, and begged him to send them to France by the first opportunity. "I shall do nothing of the sort," he at once answered me.

"Do you know that you have behaved in this affair like a young inexperienced man, or, to speak out, like a blunderer? I am surprised that you did not comprehend that the Emperor, with his pettish spirit, might take this much amiss, and consider you, according to the contents of the two letters, as the promoter of an intrigue in favour of the exiled family of the Bourbons." Thus the paternal advice of the French Consul taught me that in all that regards politics, however nearly or remotely, one cannot give himself up without danger to the dictates of the heart and the reason.

I enclosed my two letters in an envelope bearing the address of a trustworthy person, and gave them into the hands of a corsair, who, after touching at Algiers, would proceed to France. I have never known whether they reached their destination.

The reigning Dey, successor to the beheaded Dey, had formerly filled the humble office of "_epileur_"[5] of dead bodies in the mosques. He governed the Regency with much gentleness, occupying himself with little but his harem. This disgusted those who had raised him to this eminent post, and they resolved upon getting rid of him. We became aware of the danger which menaced him, by seeing the courts and vestibules of the consular house full, according to the custom under such circ.u.mstances, of Jews, carrying with them whatever they had of most value. It was a rule at Algiers, that all that happened in the interval comprised between the death of a Dey and the installation of his successor, could not be followed up by justice, and must remain unpunished. One can imagine, then, why the children of Moses should seek safety in the consular houses, the European inhabitants of which had the courage to arm themselves for self-defence as soon as the danger was apparent, and who, moreover, had a janissary to guard them.

Whilst the unfortunate Dey "epileur" was being conducted towards the place where he was to be strangled, he heard the cannon which announced his death and the installation of his successor. "They are in great haste," said he; "what will you gain by carrying matters to extremities?

Send me to the Levant; I promise you never to return. What have you to reproach me with?" "With nothing," answered his escort, "but your insignificance. However, a man cannot live as a mere private man, after having been Dey of Algiers." And the unfortunate man perished by the rope.

The communication by sea between Bougie and Algiers was not so difficult, even with the "_sandalas_," as the Cad of the former town wished to a.s.sure me. Captain Spiro had the cases landed, which belonged to me. The Cad sought to discover what they contained; and, having perceived through a c.h.i.n.k something yellowish, he hastened to send the news to the Dey, that the Frenchmen who had come to Algiers by land had among their baggage cases filled with zechins, destined to revolutionize the Kabylie. They immediately had these cases forwarded to Algiers, and at their opening, before the Minister of Naval Affairs, all the phantasmagoria of zechins, of treasure, of revolution, disappeared at the sight of the stands and the limbs of several repeating circles in copper.

We are now going to sojourn several months in Algiers. I will take advantage of this to put together some details of manners which may be interesting as the picture of a state of things anterior to that of the occupation of the Regency by the French. This occupation, it must be remarked, has already fundamentally altered the manners and the habits of the Algerine population.

I am about to report a curious fact, and one which shows that politics, which insinuate themselves and bring discord into the bosom of the most united families, had succeeded, strange to say, in penetrating as far as the galley-slaves' prison at Algiers. The slaves belonged to three nations: there were in 1809 in this prison, Portuguese, Neapolitans, and Sicilians; among these two latter cla.s.ses were counted partisans of Murat and those of Ferdinand of Naples. One day, at the beginning of the year, a dragoman came in the name of the Dey to beg M. Dubois Thainville to go without delay to the prison, where the friends of the French and their adversaries had involved themselves in a furious combat; and already several had fallen. The weapon with which they struck each other was the heavy long chain attached to their legs.

Each Consul, as I said above, had a janissary placed with him as his guard; the one belonging to the French Consul was a Candiote; he had been surnamed _the Terror_. Whenever some news unfavourable to France was announced in the cafes, he came to the Consulate to inform himself as to the reality of the fact; and when we told him that the other janissaries had propagated false news, he returned to them, and there, yatagan in hand, he declared himself ready to enter the lists in combat against those who should still maintain the truth of the news. As these continual threats might endanger him, (for they had no support beyond his mere animal courage,) we had wished to render him expert in the handling of arms by giving him some lessons in fencing; but he could not endure the idea that Christians should touch him at every turn with foils; he therefore proposed to subst.i.tute for the simulated duel a real combat with the yatagan.

One may gain an exact idea of this savage nature when I mention that, having one day heard a pistol-shot, the sound of which proceeded from his room, people ran, and found him bathed in his blood; he had just shot off a ball into his arm to cure himself of a rheumatic pain.

Seeing with what facility the Deys disappeared, I said one day to our janissary, "With this prospect before your eyes, would you consent to become Dey?" "Yes, doubtless," answered he. "You seem to count as nothing the pleasure of doing all that one likes, if only even for a single day!"

When we wished to take a turn in the town of Algiers, we generally took care to be escorted by the janissary attached to the consular house; it was the only means of escaping insults, affronts, and even acts of violence. I have just said it was the only means. I made a mistake; there was one other; that was, to go in the company of a French "lazarist" of seventy years of age, and whose name, if my memory serves me, was Father Joshua; he had lived in this country for half a century.

This man, of exemplary virtue, had devoted himself with admirable self-denial to the service of the slaves of the Regency, and had divested himself of all considerations of nationality;--the Portuguese, Neapolitans, Sicilians, all were equally his brethren.

In the times of plague he was seen day and night carrying eager help to the Mussulmans; thus, his virtue had conquered even religious hatreds; and wherever he pa.s.sed, he and the persons who might accompany him received from mult.i.tudes of the people, from the janissaries, and even from the officials of the mosques, the most respectful salutations.

During our long hours of sailing on board the Algerine vessel, and our compulsory stay in the prisons at Rosas, and on the hulk at Palamos, I gathered some ideas as to the interior life of the Moors or the Coulouglous, which, even now when Algiers has fallen under the dominion of France, would perhaps be yet worth preserving. I shall, however, confine myself to recounting, nearly word for word, a conversation which I had with Ras Braham, whose father was a "_Turc fin_," that is to say, a Turk born in the Levant.

"How is it that you consent," said I to him, "to marry a young girl whom you have never seen, and find in her, perhaps, an excessively ugly woman, instead of the beauty whom you had fancied to yourself?"

"We never marry without having obtained information from the women who serve in the capacity of servants at the public baths. The Jewesses are moreover, in these cases, very useful go-betweens."

"How many legitimate wives have you?"

"I have four, that is to say, the number authorized by the Koran."

"Do they live together on a good understanding?"

"Ah, sir, my house is a h.e.l.l. I never enter it without finding them at the step of the door, or at the bottom of the stairs; then, each wants to be the first to make me listen to the complaints which she has to bring against her companions. I am about to utter blasphemy, but I think that our holy religion ought to prohibit a plurality of wives to those who are not rich enough to give to each a separate habitation."

"But since the Koran allows you to repudiate even legitimate wives, why do you not send back three of them to their parents?"

"Why? because that would ruin me. On the day of the marriage the father of the young woman to be married stipulates for a dowry, and the half of it is paid. The other half may be exacted the day that the woman is repudiated. It would then be three half dowries that I should have to pay if I sent back three of my wives. I ought, however, to rectify one inaccuracy in what I said just now, that my four wives had never agreed together. Once, they were agreed among themselves in the feeling of a common hatred. In going through the market I had bought a young negress.

In the evening, when I retired to rest, I perceived that my wives had prepared no bed for her, and that the unfortunate girl was extended on the ground. I rolled up my trowsers and laid them under her head as a kind of pillow. In the morning the distracting cries of the poor slave made me run to her, and I found her nearly sinking under the blows of my four wives; for once they understood each other marvellously well."

In February, 1809, the new Dey, the successor of the "epileur," a short time after having entered on his functions, claimed from two to three hundred thousand francs,--I do not remember exactly the sum,--which he pretended was due to him from the French Government. M. Dubois Thainville answered that he had received the Emperor's orders not to pay one centime.

The Dey was furious, and decided upon declaring war against us. A declaration of war at Algiers used to be immediately followed by putting all the persons of other nations into prison. This time matters were not pushed to this extreme limit. Our names might be figuring on the list of the slaves of the Regency; but in fact, so far as I was concerned, I remained free in the consular house. By means of a pecuniary guarantee, contracted with the Swedish Consul, M. Norderling, I was even permitted to live at his country house, situated near the Emperor's fort.

The most insignificant event was sufficient to modify the ideas of these barbarians. I had come into the town one day, and was seated at table at M. Dubois Thainville's, when the English Consul, Mr. Blankley, arrived in great haste, announcing to our Consul the entrance into the port of a French prize. "I never will uselessly add," said he, generously, "to the severities of war; I came to announce to you, my colleague, that I will give up your prisoners on a receipt which will insure me the deliverance of an equal number of Englishmen detained in France." "I thank you,"

answered M. Dubois Thainville; "but I do not the less deplore this event that it will r.e.t.a.r.d, indefinitely, perhaps, the settlement of the account in which I am engaged with the Dey."

During this conversation, armed with a telescope, I was looking through the window of the dining-room, trying to persuade myself at least that the captured vessel was not one of much importance. But one must yield to evidence. It was pierced for a great number of guns. All at once, the wind having displayed the flags, I perceived with surprise the French flag over the English flag. I communicated what I observed to Mr.

Blankley. He answered immediately, "You do not surely pretend to observe better with your bad telescope than I did with my _Dollond_?"

"And you cannot pretend," said I to him in _my_ turn, "to see better than an astronomer by profession? I am sure of my fact. I beg M.

Thainville's permission, and will go this instant to visit this mysterious prize."

In short, I went there; and this is what I learnt:--

General Duhesme, Governor of Barcelona, wishing to rid himself of the most ill-disciplined portion of his garrison, formed the princ.i.p.al part into the crew of a vessel, the command of which he gave to a lieutenant of Babastre, a celebrated corsair of the Mediterranean.

There were amongst these improvised seamen a hussar, a dragoon, two veterans, a miner with his long beard, &c. &c. The vessel, leaving Barcelona by night, escaped the English cruiser, and got to the entrance of Port Mahon. An English "lettre de marque" was coming out of the port.

The crew of the French vessel boarded her; and a furious combat on the deck ensued, in which the French got the upper hand. It was this "lettre de marque" which had now arrived at Algiers.

Invested with full power by M. Dubois Thainville, I announced to the prisoners that they were about to be immediately given up to their Consul. I respected even the trick of the captain, who, wounded by several sabre-cuts, had contrived to cover up his head with his princ.i.p.al flag. I re-a.s.sured his wife; but my chief care was especially devoted to a pa.s.senger whom I saw with one arm amputated.

"Where is the surgeon," I said to him, "who operated on you?"

"It was not our surgeon," he answered. "He basely fled with a part of the crew, and saved himself on land."

"Who, then, cut off your arm?"

"It was the hussar whom you see here."