Chapter XII

OWING to the want of means of communication with England, we had not yet (September) received answers to our letters sent home by the _Assurance_ in June, so that we were quite uncertain about the arrival of a ship. In writing to Lord Russell and Mr. Panizzi, we had recommended that a much larger vessel than the _Assurance_ should be sent, as it was of importance to save time by having a working party on shore large enough to take three waggons at a time. In the case of the _Assurance_ we had found that thirty men, which was the largest number that could be spared, were about the proper force for a single waggon. Three waggons would therefore require ninety men, a number as large as we could safely undertake to supply with the necessary water, camels, &c.

We had also recommended that the vessel sent should arrive at Marsa Sousah before the middle of September, to insure our having time enough for the transport and embarkation of whatever statues we might find, before the fine summer weather should break up. As the very lightest wind from the north caused a heavy surf all along the beach, it was impossible to carry on boat operations except in perfectly calm weather. Day after day, however, passed without any word of the arrival of the vessel, and we began to contemplate our continued stay in the country for another winter, and to consider how we might best occupy the time. As we had already dug every promising spot at Cyrene not occupied by the crops of the Arabs, we purposed going to Benghazi to dig in the ancient cemetery there, previously burying all the marbles we could not carry with us, to protect them from being destroyed by the Bedouins. If the vessel came in the following year, they could be exhumed with little difficulty.

Since the end of August I had been confined to the tomb, and most of the time to bed, by a severe attack of fever, caused, most probably, by fatigue and exposure at night during the journey to Benghazi in July. With one of our party thus laid up on the “sick list,” and with a prospect every day more certain of a further residence of eight months in the country, we looked with some anxiety for the expected ship. As usual on such occasions, the number of false alarms was so great that we at last paid little attention to them. Our Maltese servants, quite beside themselves with excitement at the chance of soon returning to Malta—their “Fiore del mondo,”—stood gazing at the sea from morning to night, and raised a shout of joy whenever they detected the slightest speck on the distant horizon.

Their hopes were at last realized on the 26th of September, by the appearance of a large frigate standing in towards Marsa Sousah, which proved to be H.M.S. _Melpomene_, Captain Ewart, from whom we soon after received a note announcing his arrival. As I was still unable to leave the tomb, Porcher went down to the ship by himself early next morning, to make the necessary arrangements with Captain Ewart, and to accompany the working party, while I remained to look after the packing and other affairs at Cyrene. Our friend Mohammed El Adouly had, unfortunately for us, gone to Benghazi; so that we had not the benefit of his assistance, as on the former occasion. The chances of difficulties and misunderstandings were, moreover, much increased by the presence of a large number of Arabs from the southward, who had lately come to water their flocks till winter at the springs in the neighbourhood of Cyrene. Having no occupation at this season of the year, they wandered about perfectly idle, and therefore in readiness for any mischief. Even before the arrival of the _Melpomene_, they had subjected us to considerable annoyance, and were becoming daily more and more unfriendly in their general demeanour; and there was little doubt that the large addition to our numbers brought by the _Melpomene_ would proportionately add to their hatred of the “dogs of Nazarenes,” as we were not too courteously called. There were, consequently, more than the usual difficulties with the numerous camel-drivers we required, who adopted a peculiarly insolent tone in dealing with us. In the course of the subsequent operations, they frequently refused to take any loads but such as they themselves selected, and sometimes struck work altogether, thereby causing us a vast amount of unnecessary trouble.

Owing to the excellent arrangements made by Captain Ewart while on the passage from Malta, everything was ready for beginning the work immediately after the arrival of the ship. The working party had already been told off and thoroughly equipped and organized. The shafts of the waggons had been taken off and long capstan bars substituted, by which the guiding or steering was greatly facilitated—a point of some importance, as it was only by means of such powerful levers that the heavy waggons could be guided with ease and safety over the rough and stony roads. The drag-ropes, too, were fitted with canvas straps to pass over the men’s shoulders, by means of which the dragging was done much more easily than by hand.

All the plank and other stores required for packing the statues were landed immediately after the arrival of the ship, and sent up to Cyrene as rapidly as we could get camels to carry them. Ten carpenters and a guard of ten marines under the command of Lieutenant Saunders, R.M., came up to Cyrene the same day, and the work of making cases and packing was begun at once under the superintendence of Mr. Dennison. A working party of ninety men, fully equipped with tents, water-breakers, provisions, &c., was then disembarked under the command of Lieutenant Carter, R.N., ten camels with their drivers being told off to attend to their wants. The waggons, three in number, were the artillery platform waggons of the service, the same as those used by us on the former occasion. Each waggon had its own “crew” of thirty men, under the immediate command of one of the three midshipmen attached to the party,—Messrs. Jackson, Cane, and Wade.

The ship was anchored about two miles to the westward of Marsa Sousah, directly opposite our new road over the Augubah, in nearly the same position as the _Assurance_ had taken up for the embarkation of the statues in June. As communication with the shore was very liable to be interrupted by the heavy surf on the beach, Captain Ewart caused a depôt of provisions and fresh water to be established on land under the protection of a guard. From this depôt, which was replenished from time to time as the state of the weather permitted, the working party could at all times draw its supplies, and the cases of sculpture brought down from Cyrene could be safely left in charge of the guard, until a favourable opportunity occurred for taking them on board. This arrangement was the more necessary as we knew that the transport of the objects too heavy to be carried by camels would require three if not four trips of the waggons. Moreover, at so late a season of the year, a continuance of fine weather could not be reckoned upon, and the ship herself might not improbably be obliged by an equinoctial gale to put out to sea.

Every precaution being thus taken to insure the success of the operations, the working party started from the depôt with the waggons on the morning of the 28th. Our new road proved quite practicable, and the party reached the summit of the Augubah and encamped there the same night. They arrived at Cyrene the following day, by which time the carpenters had a sufficient number of statues packed to load all the waggons. The 30th was occupied in securing the cases on the waggons, and on the 1st of October the party started for the shore. The descent of the Augubah was accomplished without accident, and the cases were safely deposited at the depôt on the evening of the 2nd. Two other trips were afterwards made with equal success, although not without serious apprehension on our part of a violent interruption by a tribe of hostile Bedouins.

Ever since the arrival of the marines and carpenters at Cyrene, scores of “ugly-looking” Arabs kept prowling about our tomb with the evident design of picking a quarrel with us. Occasion for doing so was likely to occur at any moment, and especially when we absolutely refused to comply with some extravagant demands on the part of the camel-drivers. An open quarrel, however, was fortunately avoided until the first arrival of the large waggon party.

The sailors, who were then encamped on the hill opposite our tomb, were in the habit of washing and bathing at the Fountain of Apollo, a practice at which the Arabs became greatly enraged. One evening, a little before sunset, as we were sitting down to dinner, we suddenly heard a few shots fired, and immediately afterwards, the loud screeching by which the Arabs were wont to call each other to an armed gathering. Numbers soon answered to the cry, and came pouring into the Wady from all directions. On inquiring into the cause of the disturbance, we learned that some sailors and marines had been bathing as usual at the fountain, when a number of Arabs, annoyed at what they thought their indecency, began pelting them with stones. A marine had thereupon loaded his rifle with blank cartridge, and fired in the direction of the Arabs, thinking thereby to frighten them away. His foolish act had, as might have been expected, a totally different result. In less than an hour, the Wady in front of our tomb was swarming with armed men. As we had in this instance been the aggressors, we at once sent Amor for the sheikhs of the collected force, and explained to them that we quite disclaimed the act of the marine, whose rashness, however, was somewhat excused by the previous conduct of the Arabs. The sheikhs, who seemed peaceably disposed, replied that the whole disturbance had been caused by our men occupying the fountain all day, and preventing the Arab women from coming to fill their waterskins. As there was some truth in this, we promised that in future the men should be allowed to use the fountain only at particular times; and we requested the sheikhs to come to us, if at any time they had cause of complaint, and not to speak to our men, who knew nothing of their language. The Arabs, only partly pacified by our assurances, remained where they were all night, and spent great part of the following morning in firing at marks close to our tomb, for the purpose of making an imposing show of their power to treat us as they pleased.

This disturbance was hardly settled when a certain Sheikh Said ’M Rubbut made his appearance at the head of his tribe, and demanded a large sum of money, under the pretence of harbour dues, or something of the sort. On our refusing to pay it, he went off in great wrath, vowing vengeance on our whole party. The following day, he returned with a similar demand, but this time for the much smaller sum of 200 piastres (18_s._). On our again refusing to acknowledge his right to any sum, however small, he lowered his tone considerably, and said that, having no wish to quarrel with us, he would forego his claim, but begged two or three bullock-skins which were of little or no value to us. To a request in this form we willingly acceded, as we were anxious at all hazards to keep the peace until the marbles were safely taken to the beach. By this time the waggons were on their way to the depôt on the shore, after their second trip to Cyrene.

The day after the departure of the waggon party, Sheikh Said again paid a visit to our tomb, and told me that he was not satisfied with the skins, and that he would not allow the waggons to pass, unless I paid him a large _bakshish_ besides. Seeing that his object was simply to levy “black mail,” and that yielding in any way to his demands would only encourage him to make further exactions, I refused to give him anything, and ordered him to leave the tomb. With the threat that none of us should leave the country alive, he went away, and encamped in the lower plateau, near a steep ravine which the waggons had to cross. He there barricaded the road with trunks and branches of trees, and for two days prevented any communication between Cyrene and the working party or the ship.[5] Some of our camels on their way from the depôt, laden with planks, were seized and detained. Our retreat from Cyrene was effectually cut off, and we were altogether in rather a helpless state.

In this dilemma, I thought of the sheikhs of the Haasa, whom we had befriended after the attack of the Castle of Ghegheb, and who had then expressed their desire to repay us in any way in their power. I accordingly sent for Husseim and Hadji Hassan, the two head sheikhs of the tribe, and after reminding them of our interference with the Pacha on their behalf, told them that they could never have a better opportunity of proving the sincerity of their gratitude than now, by ridding us of the presence of Sheikh Said and his followers. I also assured them, that as we were living in the territory of the Haasa, of which Sheikh Said’s tribe was a subdivision, they themselves would be held responsible by the Consul for our safety. They at once promised to request Sheikh Said to depart peaceably, and if he refused to do so, to drive him away by force. With some of their subordinate sheikhs, they immediately went to carry their promise into effect, and returned after two or three hours with the intelligence that Sheikh Said had gone when they ordered him, and that the road was therefore quite clear.

Although he had thus apparently obeyed the order of the sheikhs, he had by no means given up the game. Foiled at Cyrene, he merely shifted his ground, and lay in wait for the waggon party in a wood at the top of the Augubah, hoping, no doubt, to extract something from them by his threats. The waggons soon afterwards came up from the shore, and halted for the night. The tents were no sooner pitched than Sheikh Said and some of his followers entered the camp, and threatened Porcher and the whole party with utter destruction if he did not agree to give him a bakshish. Porcher had not yet heard of our two days’ siege at Cyrene, but gave him the same answer I had done; viz., a point blank refusal. The sheikh thereupon left the camp, and collecting all the men of his tribe, placed them in a large open space at the foot of the Cyrene range, while he himself came up to our tomb to offer me, as he said, a last chance. I told him I had already given him an answer, and that if he wanted to attack us we were quite ready to receive him. On his departure, I again called upon the head sheikhs for assistance, and they again obliged him to move off; so that the waggon party reached Cyrene for the third time without an actual encounter.

The friendly interference of the principal sheikhs of the Haasa had thus been of great service to us hitherto, by preventing a collision which must have led to very serious consequences. Had it come to blows or bloodshed, even the Arabs who were most friendly to us would have been compelled to take side with their brethren against the Christians. With thirteen miles of bad road and close cover between Cyrene and the coast, we must have suffered great loss in fighting our way to the shore against overwhelming numbers. Such a result had fortunately been avoided; but we now began to have doubts of the good faith of the friendly sheikhs, and to suspect that, after all, they might be in secret league with our enemies. We were led to fear that this was the case by the pertinacity and confidence shown by Sheikh Said, and by the fact that Hussein and Hadji Hassan acted in concert with our old foe Sidi Mustapha, who was loud in his denunciation of Sheikh Said’s acts. We naturally thought that if the heads of the Haasa and the chief of the Zauyah were sincere in their professions of friendship, Sheikh Said would not presume to threaten and annoy us.

Affairs being in this state, we thought it advisable to apply to the Mudir of Ghegheb for protection, although we had little hope of his rendering us any really efficient assistance. Our object was rather to put ourselves in the right, by being able to say that we had appealed to the only representative of the Government in the country. I was still too weak to ride as far as Ghegheb, or I should have gone to see the Mudir before now; but Porcher went immediately after his arrival at Cyrene with the waggons. The Mudir himself, he found, was absent, and the Kolaghassi or Major who was acting in his place said that all he could do was to send two Koralié with letters to Sidi Mustapha and the sheikhs Hussein and Hadji Hassan.

Finding that no assistance was to be expected from the Mudir, and that we must rely solely on our own resources for protection, we were anxious to get everything on board as soon as possible, especially as every day’s delay seemed only to add to the difficulties of our position. We therefore determined to make the third trip of the waggons the final one, although, by doing so, we were obliged to leave behind us the large statue of Archippe and some of the inscriptions. Future visitors to the ruins of Cyrene will probably find the statue where we left it, at the western end of our upper range of tombs, and the inscriptions in a subterranean chamber almost immediately beneath the same spot.[6]

The 10th and 11th were spent in loading the waggons, packing up our personal effects, and collecting the necessary number of camels. We made our preparations as quietly and secretly as possible, in the hope of giving the slip to Sheikh Said and his friends, by reaching the shore before he should hear of our departure from Cyrene. Meantime, the road to the coast was clear, and everything promised a peaceful termination to our long sojourn among the Bedouins. On the night of the 11th, however, one of our Arab servants brought us word that Sheikh Said, having heard of our intended movement, was again in position on the road with a larger force than ever, determined to fight us if we did not satisfy his demands.

Early next morning, the marines were paraded under arms, and told off in two parties to act as advanced and rear guards to the main body with the waggons and camels. It was some time, however, before everything was ready for a start. Crowds of Arabs collected round our tomb, clamouring and struggling with each other for the empty bottles and other articles which we were to leave behind. At last the camels were loaded, and we were on the point of beginning our march, when, somewhat to our astonishment, we saw a number of Arabs coming up the Wady, among whom we recognized Sheikh Said and our former friends Sheikhs Hussein and Hadji Hassan. It seemed as if our suspicions of these Haasa sheikhs were, after all, but too well founded, and that they were now openly associated with our enemy, in order to share with him the expected booty.

CENTRAL WADY AND SLOPE OF THE EASTERN HILL OF CYRENE

E. A. Porcher, delt., T. Picken, lith.

London. Published July 1st. 1864 by Day & Son, Lithographers to the Queen &c., Gate Street Lincoln’s Inn Fields.

Day & Son, Lithrs. to the Queen]

Such, however, was not the case. Leaving the other Arabs who were with them, the two sheikhs came up to our tomb and told us that, having accidentally heard that Sheikh Said was again in arms against us, they had hurried off during the night to the position taken up by him in the lower plateau, and, by threatening himself and all his followers with instant death, had compelled him to come to make his submission to us. As no blood had actually been shed, they had given him their word that we should not injure him. On being assured that we would respect the safe-conduct they had given, they brought up their prisoner, who forthwith, in the most abject terms, expressed sorrow for his past offences, and begged to be forgiven. Thus, fortunately, ended an affair which, but for the gratitude of the powerful tribe we had formerly befriended, would, in all probability, have resulted in a great loss of life.

To insure us from further molestation, Sheikhs Hussein and Hadji Hassan accompanied us to the beach, where we induced them with some difficulty to intrust themselves to leave _terra firma_, and pay a visit to the ship. When they came on board, Captain Ewart made them a liberal and most welcome present of powder, and at their own earnest request I gave each of them a certificate of good conduct addressed to the English vice-consuls at Benghazi and Derna.

The waggon party reached the head of the Augubah the same night, and on the following morning descended to the plain, where they were met by the ship’s band, who escorted them to the beach. Before evening everything was safely embarked.

The narrative of the excavations would be incomplete without mentioning a small dressed statue of a girl found near the central theatre of Cyrene, by some of the sailors, who spent the two days before our departure in digging for “images” on their own account. For want of a more appropriate name, her discoverers gave her that of the ship: “Melpomene.”

While getting the last of the cases on board, on the afternoon of the 13th, we observed a steamer coming along the shore from the westward, which was soon made out to be H.M.S. _Medina_, commanded by Captain Spratt, C.B., who was then engaged in testing and correcting the charts of the coast between Tripoli and Alexandria. He had previously written to inform us of his intended visit to Cyrene; but his letter did not reach us until after the arrival of the _Medina_ herself. Unfortunately it was now too late to think of going, as Sheikh Said and his followers were doubtless eager to have revenge for their late humiliation. Immediately before coming to Marsa Sousah, the _Medina_ had anchored for a few hours at Sousah Hamema, for the purpose of taking some observations on shore with the artificial horizon. The party that landed for this purpose, having crossed by chance the limits of the Zauyah, were indignantly ordered off by the saintly Achwani, who would not have hesitated to enforce obedience by firing on the intruders.

The last duty we had to perform before our departure was the distribution of bakshish among our friends and attendants. Of these, Amor Bon Abdi Seyat, who had stood by us well during the whole of our residence in the country, had the greatest claim on our gratitude. Honesty, in our sense of the word, was a quality of which, in common with his countrymen, he could form no conception, and to which he, consequently, had no pretension. But he refrained from actual theft, and had discernment enough to see that in honesty, that is, in _limited_ peculation, lay his best policy; inasmuch as the periodical bakshish which he received varied inversely as the amount he gained by illicit means. In every respect he was probably the best man we could have got in the country. Naturally quick-witted, active, and courageous, he had acquired considerable influence over the men of his tribe, which, on more than one occasion, he exerted with success in our behalf. As a farewell gift, we gave him our two horses and a large supply of powder.

It was not without regret that we finally left our temporary home at Cyrene. The beauty of the scenery and the interesting nature of our occupations had combined to render our residence in the country a most agreeable one. We had occasionally suffered considerable annoyance and anxiety; but, on the whole, our relations with the Arabs had been much more satisfactory than might have been anticipated. Several considerations, however, now induced us to return to Malta in the _Melpomene_. As a ship could not approach the coast with safety during winter, we should have had to remain at Cyrene at least six or seven months, before another vessel could be sent to visit us; and this period we were afraid we should not be able to employ to much advantage in the way of excavation. Immediately after the first rains, the Arabs begin to sow their crops, which, at Cyrene, cover nearly the whole site of the ancient city. During the previous winter, we had examined nearly every promising spot that was left unoccupied. Very little digging, therefore, could be done until the ground was again clear after the harvest in May, as the Arabs would on no account allow their crops to be interfered with. We should, consequently, have been obliged to remain in the country a whole year, for the chance of finding more sculptures during the five or six months of the following summer. There was no doubt that many statues were still to be found; but as we had already excavated all the prominent sites in the city, in many of which we discovered nothing, further operations must have been carried on almost at random. For these and other reasons, we made up our minds to leave Cyrene, and return to Malta in the _Melpomene_.

At daylight on the morning of the 14th we weighed anchor, and sailed for Malta. It was well that we had got all the cases of sculpture on board the day before; for we had hardly left the coast when a breeze sprang up and rapidly freshened to a gale, which would have made it quite impossible to communicate with the shore, and would have obliged the ship herself to put to sea for safety. After a stormy passage of three days, we reached Malta on the 17th, just in time to correct a report sent from Benghazi by the new submarine telegraph, to the effect that, in an attack made upon us by the Arabs of Cyrene, one of us had been killed and the other wounded.

At Malta the sculptures were transferred to H.M.S. _Supply_, Master Commander Balliston, in which vessel they were soon afterwards safely conveyed to England.