Chapter XL: Tripoli in the West

The appearance of “Trabulus Gharb,” or “Tripoli of the West,” as viewed from the sea is scarcely more imposing than that presented by the principal towns on the Tunisian coast. The city is built on a rocky promontory stretching out into the Mediterranean, and forming a small bay on its eastern side, which is capable of being converted at any time into an important harbour by the filling up with masonry of the openings in a long line of rocks running from the south-west to the north-east, and commonly known to navigators as the Siboun Shinal. The Pashas of Tripoli, however, have not viewed the projects for carrying out any such scheme with much satisfaction; indeed, one of them told an enterprising contractor that the rocks were far too old to bear any additional weight upon them. Large steamers are able to enter the port even now; but the present state of the Siboun Shinal shoal renders it an unsafe place of anchorage during the prevalence of certain winds. The city borders the shore, and has the form of an irregular pentagon, surrounded by a crenellated _enceinte_ wall in a somewhat dilapidated condition. A line of small, half-ruined forts is supposed to protect one side of the harbour, and the Borj or castle of the Pasha the other. The desert almost touches the western side of the city; while on the east is the verdant oasis of Meshiya, where, amid luxuriant groves of palm-trees, are still to be seen the tombs of the Caramanlian sultanas, and the twelve-domed _marabout_ of Sy Hamouda. In the town itself there are seven principal mosques, six of them possessing more or less lofty minarets built after a purely Turkish model. The streets are narrow, dirty, and unpaved. European quarter there is none. What Tunis was twenty years ago, Tripoli is now—a typical Moorish city. Still the capital of an important province, it can boast of an historical past of no small interest. After falling successively into the hands of the Phœnicians, Romans, Vandals, and Greeks, Tripoli was finally conquered by the Arabs twelve centuries ago, and has remained a Moslem State ever since. For many years it formed part of the dominions of the Caliphs of Kairwán. It finally became independent, but in 1510 it was taken by Ferdinand the Catholic, and given by him thirteen years later to the Knights of St. John, who remained there for thirty years, until they were expelled from it in 1553 by the Turkish corsairs Dragut and Sinan. The former became its pasha and ruled Tripoli as the vassal or vali of the Sublime Ottoman Porte, till his death in Malta. Then came the days when the Tripolitan pirates grew to be the terror and scourge of the Mediterranean, and half the States of Europe sent their fleets to bombard the capital in vain. In 1714, while Heussein Ben Ali was founding the present line of the Beys of Tunis, Ahmed Pasha the Caramanli achieved practical independence, and his descendants governed Tripoli until 1835. On the 20th May of that year the Turks took advantage of the breaking out of a civil war to assert once more their authority, and Yusef, the last of the Caramanlis, died a state prisoner at Constantinople. Since 1835 Tripoli has been governed by a succession of pashas or valis sent there periodically by the Sultan.

It is difficult to overrate the commercial importance of the Tripolitan Pashalik. It is at the present time the undoubted centre of the caravan trade of Northern Africa. All efforts to divert the usual route followed by the traders of the desert have been wholly unavailing. The coast of Tripoli is at least 250 miles nearer the great marts of the interior than either Tunis or Algeria, and it is there that the caravans from Ghadames, Murzouk, and Wadai will go. This vast system of inland trade extends even to Bornou and Timbuctoo. Three-fourths of the whole commerce of Tripoli is in the hands of British merchants or dealers in British goods, who send our cloth, cutlery, and cotton fabrics southwards, and export in return the esparto grass, ostrich feathers, and ivory of the Tripolitan market. The carefully prepared trade reports of the British Consul-General, Mr. Hay, may be read with advantage at the present moment.

The coast-line of Tripoli, which stretches from Biban, in Tunis, to Bomba, on the frontiers of Egypt, is considerably over 800 miles in length. Besides the ports of Tripoli, Khoms, and Ben Ghazi, it includes the almost unknown natural harbours of Bomba and Tobruk. Father Angelo di Sant’ Agata, the venerable chief of the Franciscan missionaries at Tripoli, has visited the latter. If his information is correct, Bizerta has a rival which needs neither expense nor dredging to bring it into immediate use. Two lines of hills run through the country from east to west—the Ghariyan range near the coast, and the Zuara chain farther inland. The interior of Tripoli may be said with tolerable accuracy to consist of a somewhat unequal alternation of oases and desert. Along the _sahel_ or coast is a border of rich and productive soil. The native population is made up of Arabs, Moors, and Turks, and is thin and scattered. Any attempt at an enumeration is a matter of pure conjecture. The city of Tripoli itself contains about 25,000 inhabitants—viz., 15,000 Moslems, 6000 Jews, 3000 Maltese British subjects, 900 Italians, and 100 other Europeans, including exactly 30 French. The southern boundary of the Pashalik is ill-defined; but Turkish troops now occupy both Ghadames and Ghat, the former sixteen and the latter forty days’ journey from the capital.

The constant change of Turkish pashas has been markedly unfavourable to the progress and even to the prosperity of the country. No one vali ever seems to have effectually transmitted his mantle to his successor, and most of their administrations have left no other trace than plans never executed, and good intentions never acted upon. Every governor who did anything at all seems to have possessed a hobby, but, as no two of them ever worked on the same lines, no practical result ever came of their individual energy and intermittent activity.

If possible, Tripoli, until very lately, presented even more strongly than Tunis the spectacle of a house divided against itself. Not only were the Arab tribes perpetually at war with each other under the combined influence of hereditary feuds and the institution of the _Soff_, but as a body they hated their Turkish rulers and co- religionists, just as much as the Turkish adherents of the Caramanlis disliked the intruders from Stamboul. The events of the past year have, however, materially and perceptibly affected this state of things, and the French invasion of Tunis has undoubtedly caused all local strife to be temporarily or permanently merged in a league, the common object of which seems to be the defence of Islam in general and of Tripoli in particular. The Arabs, who a short time ago were wont to complain bitterly of their Turkish masters, greeted the arrival of Nasif Pasha last May with intense enthusiasm, the Turkish troops were received with shouts of triumph, and as soon as the great siege guns were landed they received a baptism of blood from the sacrifice upon them of numerous sheep and oxen brought down to the shore by the Tripolitan townsfolk. No longer do the Bedouins of the interior murmur at their camels being taken for transport service; all they say is, “_Allah yunser es Sultan_”—“May God grant victory to the Sultan.” Sixteen days before Nasif Pasha’s arrival, M. Roustan had made the Bey of Tunis a French vassal by the Treaty of Kasr-es-Said. The feeling of Moslem antagonism, which was first roused by the French conquest of Algeria fifty years ago, was now re-awakened with renewed intensity, and the presence of Turkish troops in force was quite as necessary to prevent the extension of the movement among the Tunisian Arabs to their _confrères_ of Tripoli, as to assure the Tripolitans that Turkey would oppose by force any attack by France on the Pashalik itself. To have ignored or even neglected the state of public feeling in North Africa might have cost Abdul Hamid the Caliphate. But this is not all. Within the confines of Tripoli itself an _imperium in imperio_ has of late years been growing up, which will sooner or later attract the attention of Europe. In 1830, one Sidi Muhamed es Senoussi was living at Mustaghanem, in Algeria. He even then enjoyed a widespread reputation as a saint or _marabout_, and on the French invasion taking place he retired to Fez, in Morocco, where he was initiated into the confraternity of Moula-et-Taib. From Fez, Es Senoussi passed along the Algerian Sahara to Tunis and Tripoli, and finally reached Mecca by way of Alexandria. After a stay of two years in the holy places, he returned to Alexandria, where he founded a _zaouia_, and commenced a crusade against the contamination of Islam by Christian contact, advocating at the same time an immediate return to the austerest principles of the faith, and vehemently assailing the Turkish Government for adopting European costume and copying European institutions. The doctrines of Es Senoussi were a refinement of Wahabiism. Excommunicated by the Sheikh-el-Islam at Cairo, an attempt was even made to poison him, but one of his followers, Muhamed Ben Abdallah, managed to convey him on a camel into the Libyan desert. Senoussi finally took up his abode at Djebel-el-Akhdar, or the Green Mountain, in the neighbourhood of Ben Ghazi, in Tripoli, where he married. Finding the locality too close to the Mediterranean for the execution of his projects, he removed to Djaghbub, or Djarbub, twenty- two days’ journey from the coast. Here he erected a magnificent _zaouia_, surrounded by palm groves and inhabited by nearly 1000 of his followers. His doctrines were soon received with enthusiasm in the Moslem kingdoms of Northern and Central Africa. He established no less than 300 subordinate convent-sanctuaries in every considerable place between Morocco and Mecca, and appointed _mukaddemin_, or vicars, in every part of Islam. In 1850 his agent, Muhamed Ben Abdallah, the Senoussian _mukaddem_ for Algeria, excited the revolts of Laghwat and Ouergla. He finally succeeded in escaping from Algeria, and returning to Djaghbub. In 1860 Muhamed es Senoussi died, leaving two sons, the eldest of whom bore the name of El Mehdi. Before his death, Senoussi the elder sent emissaries to all his _zaouias_ to convey guarded hints to his followers that a glorious future was in store for his son. The prosperity of the _zaouia_ at Djaghbub increased. The pilgrims to Mecca from North Africa, as well as those coming from Bornou and the Saharian provinces, were persuaded that the benediction of El Mehdi was necessary to complete the efficacy of their journey. They flocked in thousands with their offerings to Djaghbub, while the Sultans of the interior sent caravans laden with ivory and ostrich feathers and other costly presents to the great saint, while cargoes of arms and ammunition often arrived at the almost unknown harbours of the coast. El Mehdi now began to multiply the number of his subordinate _zaouias_, and the travellers Rohlfs, Nachtigal, and Duveyrier found their passage barred by Senoussian agents. Meanwhile, their tenets gained ground in countries far beyond the Libyan desert. “The Moslem’s object,” they said, “must be to combat Christian ideas and Christian innovations; the Moslems must employ all possible means to check further Christian advances into the Dar-el-Islam.” Four years ago El Mehdi withdrew himself from his followers, and, becoming a hermit, sought to involve his very existence in mystery. This proceeding at once increased his fame. From _zaouia_ to _zaouia_ of the Senoussia, and consequently from Mecca to Morocco, the attention of the faithful was assiduously called to the following prophecy:—

“On the first of the month of Moharram in the year 1300 (12th November 1882) will appear the El Mehdi, or Messiah. He will be exactly forty years of age and of noble bearing. One arm will be longer than the other; his father’s name will be Muhammed, his mother’s Fatima, and he will be hidden for a time prior to his manifestation.”

The conclusion to be drawn from this is easy enough—El Mehdi of Djaghbub is none other than the Messiah of Islam. Persons who have seen Senoussi the younger now remember that his right hand reached as far as his knee. The Sultan sent emissaries to Ben Ghazi. The vali of that place (himself an affiliated Senoussia) managed to secure their return to Constantinople without effecting the object of their mission. Meanwhile, the power of this great confraternity continues to increase; the neighbouring tribes take the name of _maraboutin_, and pay no tribute; the great _zaouia_ in the Libyan desert is enlarged and adorned, and the Senoussia look anxiously for the day when El Mehdi shall fulfil a second prophecy of “reigning from a T to a T,” which they interpret as meaning from Tangier to Tripoli in Syria, the much-longed-for Arab Empire of the future. The French expedition to Tunis has raised the bitterest feelings of the Senoussia, who view with alarm this fresh attack on Islam, made on the very eve, as it were, of the fulfilment of their dream of power. Even these austere sectaries are now leaving the condemnation of Egypt and Turkey out of their catechism, and seek to conceal the severity of their ultra-Moslem puritanism under the cloak of a great Pan-Islamite union. After all that has taken place in Tunis one can hardly be surprised at the movement having many sympathisers throughout the Moslem world. The action of France has converted a passive dislike into an active and militant antagonism, and hastened and intensified a movement which would have been dangerous at any time and under any circumstances. Although the Turks are quite prepared to contest inch by inch the advance of any invader on Tripolitan soil, I have good reason to believe that the active encouragement which seems to have been given to the Tunisian Arabs proceeded rather from the _khouan_, or religious confraternities, than from the Ottoman authorities. The Turks in Tripoli cannot, it appears to me, be accused, with any show of justice, of fomenting the discords in Tunis, nor can the steps they have taken to defend the province which is on all hands admitted to be theirs, be reasonably called in question.

The day after my arrival in Tripoli (December 2) happened to be the Moslem feast of the Asura, the anniversary of the death of the Prophet. Early in the morning I was present at a review of about 4000 Turkish troops by the Pasha and General of Division, which took place on the sands outside the Meshiyah Gate. Nearly all the troops now in Tripoli have arrived during the present year. With the exception of a single battalion, they have all seen service in the Russo-Turkish war. The men are of uniformly good calibre, well accoutred, and nearly all armed with the Martini-Henry rifle. One battalion of infantry still retains the Snider gun, and the cavalry carry the Winchester rifle, but they are all to be shortly provided with Martini-Henry rifles instead. Various movements were very fairly gone through, notwithstanding a visible want of dressing, but the most notable feature of the review was the passage of three batteries of field artillery at full gallop before the saluting point. I observed that a black dervish, carrying a green flag and a sort of drum, marched at the head of the troops, and two large, red embroidered banners (after being solemnly saluted) were carried in charge of two military chaplains. The number of the Turkish troops now in Tripoli is about 9500. They all belong to the Turkish First Army Corps. So much misapprehension exists in Europe on this subject that the details of the composition of this force may be interesting. The Imperial Ottoman Division in Tripoli consists at the present moment of one battalion of the 1st Regiment of Rifles, of four battalions each of the 155th, 156th, 157th, and 158th Regiments of Infantry, the 8th Regiment of Field, and the 2d Regiment of Mountain Artillery, forming a total of 9521 combatants. The Ferik, or General of Division, is Hussein Wasfi. He has done a great deal of really good work in Tripoli, but has managed to acquire the reputation of having a leaning towards the French. From a long interview I had with him I formed a favourable opinion as to his energy and ability. He is a rigid disciplinarian, has put the city police in excellent order, and rendered the occurrence of any disturbances at this critical juncture almost impossible. Under these circumstances the existence of a doubt as to his honesty of purpose is much to be regretted. He is a frank, outspoken soldier, was severely wounded at Plevna, and heartily despises the Bey of Tunis for forsaking the Sultan. Hussein Wasfi has trained a fine military band, but he offended deeply his co-religionists a week ago when the _Marseillaise_ was played before the Pasha’s firman was publicly read, and the playing of “God save the Queen” afterwards hardly mended matters. Some time ago Ali Sharif Bimbashi, who defended Sfax against the French in July, reached Tripoli overland with four or five Tunisian soldiers from the camp of Ali Ben Hlifa. General Wasfi received him with great cordiality and enrolled him as a major in the Ottoman service forthwith. I noticed that Major Ali Sharif was treated with marked respect during the review, although his Tunisian uniform was sadly tattered and weather-beaten. The General said that if Tripolitan territory was crossed, he should fight as a matter of course. He was not equally clear as to how the Tunisian Arabs were to be treated if they took refuge on the Turkish side of the boundary line. I inferred, however, from his remarks that they would be treated as belligerents on neutral ground and interned. Public opinion here would never allow the Turkish troops to drive the Tunisians back to their destruction across the frontier. General Wasfi was courteous enough to send his carriage to convey Signor D’Ancona, the Spanish Consul at Tripoli, and myself to the military hospital and barracks outside the town. The arrangements of both buildings were equally good. The hospital stands in the middle of the picturesque oasis of Meshiyah, and is surrounded by large gardens. The sick wards are spacious and well ventilated, the patients are well cared for, and only number about one per cent. of the total force. Only thirty deaths have occurred during three months, and there has been no case of either dysentery or typhoid fever. The whole establishment contrasted most favourably with the unfortunate ambulance arrangements of the French in Tunis, of which Europe has heard so much, and the whole truth about which will shortly be told in the official report of my fellow-traveller Dr. Pozzi. I also observed that a very large room was set apart for the use of the sick Arabs of the neighbourhood. The cavalry and artillery barracks were in excellent order, and the Turkish soldiers seemed to feed far better than in the Tripolitan hotels. A large reinforcement of cavalry at the time I was amongst them was daily expected.

At the office of the staff I saw Colonel Danisch Bey, who, as Military Attaché to Musurus Pasha, was only a few months ago favourably known in London, and is now charged with the important task of fortifying Tripoli. He has just completed an excellent map of the whole Pashalik as well as a scheme for rendering the city almost impregnable. The old bastions are, as he says, entirely useless, and only about thirty of the 300 cannon already in Tripoli before the arrival of Nasif Pasha last May are still serviceable. No less than sixteen large steel breech-loading guns and four mortars have arrived here from the manufactories of Krupp and Armstrong since the 12th of July, and a total of fifty guns are available for the manning of the new fortifications, which, according to Danisch Bey’s plans, are to consist of three forts commanding the harbour, and a series of earthworks and batteries arranged in a semicircle ten miles from the town, rendering any approach to Tripoli from the land side very difficult. A range of small sandhills will materially facilitate the carrying out of the projected works, which will save the town in a measure from the perils of a bombardment. The forts on the shore are being quickly constructed, and as soon as the plans are fully approved at Constantinople, from 35,000 to 40,000 workmen are to be employed in completing them.

On the third day of my stay in the solitary guest-chamber of the Hotel Minerva at Tripoli, I went to the Borj to pay my respects to the Pasha. Ahmed Rassim Pasha is a quiet, but apparently resolute old man of sixty, and did not attempt to conceal his contempt for Muhamed es Sadek and for the Tunisian general, not excepting even such an exalted personage as Kheir-ed-Din Pasha himself. He said nothing could ever justify the signing of the Kasr-es-Said Treaty by the Bey; and he spoke of the widespread effect of the French invasion of Tunis on the Arabs. Ahmed Passim confessed that his chief difficulty had been the internal dissensions of the tribes, especially on the frontiers, “where,” he observed smilingly, “a Khamír raid could be forthcoming at a moment’s notice,” but he said that he had now received a report that at a great meeting of the clans the chiefs had sworn on the Koran that in the face of the common danger, they would forsake all squabbles amongst themselves and cease from conflicts with their Tunisian neighbours. The castle of Tripoli resembles an enormous pigeon-house in shape and arrangement, and seems fast going to ruin and decay.

The presence of a very unusual number of Moslem _marabouts_ in Tripoli while I was there is an undoubted fact. A great deal has been said by the French about the arrival, with Nasif Pasha, of Sheikh Hamza, one of the leaders of the Madania, a Moslem confraternity having its principal seat at Masrata, in Tripoli, especially as Sidi Zafr, the brother of Sheikh Hamza, is the spiritual adviser of the Sultan. M. Duveyrier, in his latest work, says that, although a branch of the Wahabis, the Madania preach universal tolerance, and that France has nothing whatever to fear from the spread of the sect. When, however, the nephew of Sheikh Hamza visited the interior, he was accused of fomenting the excitement of the Arabs. So far as I can learn, the political influence of the lesser _khouan_ is entirely eclipsed by the all-powerful Senoussia, who are apparently waiting their opportunity.

M. Féraud, the French Consul-General, has the reputation of being a _consul de combat_, but he says he has never aimed at emulating the now faded laurels of M. Roustan. At one time, however, both he and his Government seem to have been bent on what was called in this case “a revival of influence.” M. Féraud now professes the most pacific intentions, and complains of having been much misrepresented in Europe. He even demurs to the accusation of affixing a circular in the bazaars inviting the registration of Tunisian subjects, and, on examination, it really appears that the document was only exhibited in the French and Tunisian Consulates, but then the Tunisian consulate was something between a shop and a café. As a matter of fact, the circular has become virtually a dead letter.

The most uncomfortable feature in French diplomacy in Tripoli is the undeniable fact that the shadow of zealous Archbishop Lavigérie has already fallen upon the country. His recent attempt to invest M. Roustan’s proceedings with the halo of ecclesiastical respectability gives a colour to the suspicion that he is willing and anxious to aid French views here as he has done elsewhere. Christianity in Tunis has been represented for three centuries by a Franciscan mission, now placed under French protection. In the past they have done an excellent work, and they maintain an hospital in which they dispense medical assistance gratis to sufferers of every creed. Archbishop Lavigérie is at this moment seeking to include Tripoli in his extensive diocese; he has sent a body of Marianists to establish a college in the old slave _bagnio_ of St. Michael; a party of Jesuit Fathers have simultaneously taken up their quarters at Meshiyah, on the southern limits of the oasis, while missionaries have left for Ghat and Ghadames, and it is hinted that it is possible that Ghadames is soon to be claimed as a part of Tunis. Since I left Tripoli two of these emissaries have been killed between Ghat and Ghadames; and although they were warned not to go there, M. Féraud seems anxious to turn the matter into another edition of the Khamír raids. It is unlikely he will be successful, as “burned cats dread the fire,” but be this as it may, after the experience of recent French tactics in the interior of Africa, the fate of these two great centres of Saharian trade must be carefully watched.

The archæological interest of Tripoli is also very great. Ahmed Rassim Pasha himself sent a guide to show me over all the mosques in the city, seven in number. The oldest is that of Dragut Pasha, the inscription over its door bearing the date of A.H. 1013. The body of the great corsair lies under an adjoining _kouba_, almost devoid of ornament. The Turkish Pashas of Tripoli have apparently monopolised for themselves and their families the privilege of being buried within its walls. With the exception of a good deal of exquisite carving on the doors of the older mosques, their decoration is very inferior to that found in Kairwán. From the _minár_ of the modern Djama El Gourgi a striking bird’s-eye view of the city may be obtained. Near the Marine Gate is a four-sided Roman triumphal arch, erected by one Orfilus, in honour of the Emperors Aurelius Antoninus and Aurelius Verus. Its interior is now filled up by a tobacco depot and a Maltese tavern.

At the present time England enjoys what the French are pleased to call _prépondérance_ at Tripoli, but her influence is not exclusive, and is purely the consequence of successful commercial competition. To this satisfactory result her present Consul-General, Mr. Hay, has very materially contributed during the past sixteen years. The loss of the independence of the Pashalik might very seriously affect British trade, and we have certainly more than one reason to support its _status quo_. An invading army has reached Tripoli and Tunis from Egypt three times since the feat was first accomplished by Cato the younger, and the movement might at any time be reversed.

The “Valette” having gone from Malta to Sicily, I returned to Tunis three days later by the “Dragut,” another steamer belonging to the Compagnie Transatlantique. At Jerba we took on board a number of invalided soldiers, whose heart-rending accounts of what they had undergone it will be difficult to forget. Four days later the “Dragut” brought me safely back to Goletta.