What was this Moorish boat in which I went on shore?  A mere long shell of bad planks, and scarcely more ship-shape than the trunk of a tree hollowed into a canoe, leakily put together.  It was filled with dirty, ragged, half-naked sailors, whose seamanship did not extend beyond coming and going from vessels lying in this little port.  Each of these Mogadorian port sailors had a bit of straight pole for an oar; the way in which they rowed was equally characteristic.  Struggling against wind and current with their Moorish rais at the helm, encouraging their labours by crying out first one thing, then another, as his fancy dictated, the crew repeated in chorus all he said:—­“Khobsah!” (a loaf) cried the rais.

All the men echoed “Khobsah.”

“A loaf you shall have when you return!” cried the rais.

“A loaf we shall have when we return!” cried the men.

“Pull, pull; God hears and sees you!” cried the rais.

“We pull, we pull; God hears and sees us!” cried the men.

“Sweetmeats, sweetmeats, by G—­; sweetmeats by G—­you shall have, only pull away!” swore the rais.

“Sweetmeats we shall have, thank God! sweetmeats we shall have, thank God!” roared the men, all screaming and bawling.  In this unique style, after struggling three hours to get three miles over the port, we landed, all of us completely exhausted and drowned in spray.

It is usual for Moors, particularly negroes, to sing certain choruses, and thus encourage one another in their work.  What, however, is remarkable, these choruses are mostly on sacred subjects, being frequently the formula of their confession, “There is no God, but one God, and Mahomet is his Prophet,” &c.  These clownish tars were deeply coloured, and some quite black.  I found, in fact, the greatest part of the Moorish population of Mogador coloured persons.  We may here easily trace the origin of the epithet “Black-a-Moor,” and we are not so surprised that Shakspeare made his Moor black; indeed, the present Emperor, Muley Abd Errahman, is of very dark complexion, though his features are not at all of the negro cast.  But he has sons quite black, and with negro features, who, of course, are the children of negresses.  One of these, is Governor of Rabat.  In no country is the colour of the human skin so little thought of.  This is a very important matter in the question of abolition.  There is no objection to the skin and features of the negro; it is only the luxury of having slaves, or their usefulness for heavy work, which weighs in the scale against abolition.

As soon as we landed, we visited the lieutenant-governor, who congratulated us on not being carried down to the Canary Islands.  Then his Excellency asked, in due studied form: 

“Where do you come from?”

Traveller.—­“Gibraltar.”

His Excellency.—­“Where are you going?”

Traveller.—­“To see the Sultan, Muley Abd Errahman.”