o carried
all before them is a great mistake, although a common one. Mulai
Idrees--"My Lord Enoch" in English--a direct descendant of Mohammed,
was among the first of the Arabian missionaries to arrive, with one or
two faithful adherents, exiles fleeing from the Khalifa of Mekka. So
soon as he had induced one tribe to accept his doctrines, he assisted
them with his advice and prestige in their combats with hereditary
enemies, to whom, however, the novel terms were offered of fraternal
union with the victors, if they would accept the creed of which they
had become the champions. Thus a new element was introduced into the
Berber polity, the element of combination, for the lack of which
they had always been weak before. Each additional ally meant an
augmentation of the strength of the new party out of all proportion to
the losses from occasional defeats.

In course of time the Mohammedan coalition became so strong that it
was in a position to dictate terms and to impose governors upon the
most obstinate of its neighbours. The effect of this was to divide the
allies into two important sections, the older of which founded Fez
in the days of the son of Idrees, accounted the second ameer of that
name, who there lies buried in the most important mosque of the
Empire, the very approaches of which are closed to the Jew and the
Nazarene. The only spot which excels it in sanctity is that at Zarhon,
a day's journey off, in which the first Idrees lies buried. There the
whole town is forbidden to the foreigner, and an attempt made by the
writer to gain admittance in disguise was frustrated by discovery
at the very gate, though later on he visited the shrine in Fez. The
dynasty thus formed, the Shurfa Idreeseein, is represented to-day by
the Shareef of Wazzan.

In southern Morocco, with its capital at Aghmat, on the Atlas slopes,
was formed what later grew to be the kingdom of Marrakesh, the city of
that name being founded in the middle of the eleventh century. Towards
the close of the thirteenth, the kingdoms of Fez and Marrakesh became
united under one ruler, whose successor, after numerous dynastic
changes, is the Sultan of Morocco now.[1]

[1: For a complete outline of Moorish history, see the writer's
"Moorish Empire."]

But from the time that the united Berbers had become a nation, to
prevent them falling out among themselves again it was necessary to
find some one else to fight, to occupy the martial instinct nursed