The surrounding country is flat meadowland, but flooded after the rains, and producing fatal fevers, though dry and hot enough in summer.  The suburban fields are covered with gardens and orchards.  It was at El-Kesar, where, in A.D. 1578, the great battle of The Three Kings came off, because, besides the Portuguese King, Don Sebastian, two Moorish princes perished on this fatal day.  But one of them, Muley Moluc, died very ill in a litter, and was not killed in the fight; his death, however, was kept a secret till the close of the battle, in order that the Moors might not be discouraged.  With their prince, Don Sebastian, perished the flower of the Portuguese nobility and chivalry of that time.  War, indeed, was found “a dangerous game” on that woeful day:  both for princes and nobles, and many a poor soul was swept away

  “Floating in a purple tide.”

But the “trade of war” has been carried on ever since, and these lessons, written in blood, are as useless to mankind as those dashed off by the harmless pen of the sentimental moralist.  El-Kesar is placed in Latitude, 35 deg. 1 10” N.; Longitude, 5 deg. 49’ 30” W.

Mequinez, [25] in Arabic, Miknas (or Miknasa), is a royal residence, and city of the province of Fez, situate upon a hill in the midst of a well-watered and most pleasant town, blessed with a pure and serene air.  The city of Miknas is both large and finely built, of considerable interest and of great antiquity.  It was founded by the tribe of Berbers Meknasab, a fraction of the Zenatah, in the middle of the tenth century, and called Miknasat, hence is derived its present name.  The modern town is surrounded with a triple wall thirteen feet high and three thick, enclosing a spacious area.  This wall is mounted with batteries to awe the Berbers of the neighbouring mountains.  The population amounts to about twenty thousand souls, (some say forty or fifty thousand) in which are included about nine thousand Negro troops, constituting the greater portion of the Imperial guard.  Two thousand of these black troops are in charge of the royal treasures, estimated at some fifty millions of dollars, and always increasing.  These treasures consist of jewels, bars of gold and silver, and money in the two precious metals, the greater part being Spanish and Mexican dollars.

The inhabitants are represented as being the most polished of the Moors, kind and hospitable to strangers.  The palace of the Emperor is extremely simple and elegant, all the walls of which are embroidered with the beautiful stucco-work of Arabesque patterns, as pure and chaste as the finest lace.  The marble for the pillars was furnished from the ruins adjacent, called Kesar Faraoun, “Castle of Pharoah” (a name given to most of the old ruins of Morocco, of whose origin there is any doubt).