FREE BOOKS

Author's List




PREV.   NEXT  
|<   46   47   48   49   50   51   52   53   54   55   56   57   58   59   60   61   62   63   64   65   66   67   68   69   70  
71   72   73   74   75   76   77   78   79   80   81   82   83   84   85   86   87   88   89   90   91   92   93   94   95   >>   >|  
d. A resident of this country reduces the population of Salee as low as two or three thousand. For many years, the port of Salee was the rendezvous of the notorious pirates of Morocco, who, together with the city of Rabat, formed a species of military republic almost independent of the Sultan; these Salee rovers were at once the most ferocious and courageous in the world. Time was, when these audacious freebooters lay under Lundy Island in the British Channel, waiting to intercept British traders! "Salee," says Lempriere, "was a place of good commerce, till, addicting itself entirely to piracy, and revolting from the allegiance to its Sovereign, Muley Zidan, that prince in the year 1648, dispatched an embassy to King Charles 1, of England, requesting him to send a squadron of men-of-war to lie before the town, while he attacked by land." This request being acceded to, the city was soon reduced, the fortifications demolished, and the leaders of the rebellion put to death. The year following, the Emperor sent another ambassador to England, with a present of Barbary horses and three hundred Christian slaves. Rabat, or Er-Rabat, and on some of the foreign maps Nuova Sale, is a modern city of considerable extent, densely populated, strong and well-built, belonging to the province of Temsna. It is situated on the declivity of a hill, opposite to Salee, on the other side of the river, or left side of the Bouragrag, which is as broad as the Thames at London Bridge, and might be considered as a great suburb, or another quarter of the same city. It was built by the famous Yakob-el-Mansour, nephew of Abd-el-Moumen, and named by him Rabat-el-Fatah, _i.e._, "camp of victory," by which name it is now often mentioned. The walls of Rabat enclose a large space of ground, and the town is defended on the seaside by three forts, erected some years ago by an English renegade, and furnished with ordnance from Gibraltar. Among the population are three or four thousand Jews, some of them of great wealth and consequence. The merchants are active and intelligent, carrying on commerce with Fez, and other places of the interior, as also with the foreign ports of Genoa, Gibraltar, and Marseilles. In the middle ages, the Genoese had a great trade with Rabat, but this trade is now removed to Mogador, Many beautiful gardens and plantations adorn the suburbs, deserving even the name of "an earthly paradise." The Moors of Rabat are mostly from S
PREV.   NEXT  
|<   46   47   48   49   50   51   52   53   54   55   56   57   58   59   60   61   62   63   64   65   66   67   68   69   70  
71   72   73   74   75   76   77   78   79   80   81   82   83   84   85   86   87   88   89   90   91   92   93   94   95   >>   >|  



Top keywords:

foreign

 
British
 

Gibraltar

 
England
 

commerce

 

thousand

 
population
 

suburb

 

London

 

Thames


Bridge

 
quarter
 

considered

 

famous

 

Moumen

 

beautiful

 

nephew

 
Mansour
 

plantations

 

gardens


paradise

 

belonging

 

province

 

densely

 

populated

 
strong
 
Temsna
 

earthly

 
deserving
 

Bouragrag


opposite
 

situated

 

declivity

 

suburbs

 
middle
 

furnished

 

ordnance

 

Genoese

 
wealth
 

consequence


places

 
interior
 

Marseilles

 

merchants

 

active

 
intelligent
 

carrying

 
renegade
 

English

 

mentioned