e mueddin in the minaret overlooking the Tin House
called the sleeping city to its earliest prayer.[47] I rose and waked the
others, and we dressed by a candle-light that soon became superfluous.
When the mueddin began the chant that sounded so impressive and so
mournful as it was echoed from every minaret in the city, the first
approach of light would have been visible in the east, and in these
latitudes day comes and goes upon winged feet. Before the beds were
taken to pieces and Salam had the porridge and his "marmalade" ready, with
steaming coffee, for early breakfast, we heard the mules clattering down
the stony street. Within half an hour the packing comedy had commenced.
The Susi muleteer, who was accompanied by a boy and four men, one a slave,
and all quite as frowzy, unwashed, and picturesque as himself, swore that
we did not need four pack-mules but eight. Salam, his eyes flaming, and
each separate hair of his beard standing on end, cursed the shameless
women who gave such men as the Susi muleteer and his fellows to the
kingdom of my Lord Abd-el-Aziz, threw the _shwarris_ on the ground,
rejected the ropes, and declared that with proper fittings the mules, if
these were mules at all, and he had his very serious doubts about the
matter, could run to Mogador in three days. Clearly Salam intended to be
master from the start, and when I came to know something more about our
company, the wisdom of the procedure was plain. Happily for one and all
Mr. Nairn came along at this moment. It was not five o'clock, but the hope
of serving us had brought him into the cold morning air, and his thorough
knowledge of the Shilha tongue worked wonders. He was able to send for
proper ropes at an hour when we could have found no trader to supply them,
and if we reached the city gate that looks out towards the south almost as
soon as the camel caravan that had waited without all night, the
accomplishment was due to my kind friend who, with Mr. Alan Lennox, had
done so much to make the stay in Marrakesh happily memorable.

It was just half-past six when the last pack-mule passed the gate, whose
keeper said graciously, "Allah prosper the journey," and, though the sun
was up, the morning was cool, with a delightfully fresh breeze from the
west, where the Atlas Mountains stretched beyond range of sight in all
their unexplored grandeur. They seemed very close to us in that clear
atmosphere, but their foot hills lay a day's ride away, and th