Our readers will see, when they come to the Tour, that this description of the palm-groves agrees entirely with that of Mr. Reade and Captain Balfour.  I have already mentioned that the palm is male and female, or, as botanists say, dioecious; the Moors, however, pretend that the palm in this respect is just like the human being.  The female palm alone produces fruit and is cultivated, but the presence or vicinity of the male is required, and in many oriental countries there is a law that those who own a palm-wood must have a certain number of male plants in proportion.  In Barbary they seem to trust to chance, relying on the male plants which grow wild in the Desert.  They hang and shake them over the female plants, usually in February or March.  Koempfe says, that the male flowers, if plucked when ripe, and cautiously dried, will even, in this state, perform their office, though kept to the following year.

The Jereed is a very important portion of the Tunisian territory, Government deriving a large revenue from its inhabitants.  It is visited every year by the “Bey of the Camp,” who administers affairs in this country as a sovereign; and who, indeed, is heir-apparent to the Tunisian throne.  Immediately on the decease of the reigning Bey, the “Bey of the Camp” occupies the hereditary beylick, and nominates his successor to the camp and the throne, usually the eldest of the other members of the royal family, the beylick not being transmitted from father to son, only on the principle of age.  At least, this has been the general rule of succession for many years.

The duties of the “Bey of the Camp” is to visit with a “flying-camp,” for the purpose of collecting tribute, the two circuits or divisions of the Regency.

I now introduce to the reader the narrative of a Tour to the Jereed, extracted from the notebooks of the tourists, together with various observations of my own interspersed, and some additional account of Toser, Nefta, and Ghafsa.

CHAPTER IX.

Tour in the Jereed of Captain Balfour and Mr. Reade.—­Sidi Mohammed.—­ Plain of Manouba.—­Tunis.—­Tfeefleeah.—­The Bastinado.—­Turkish Infantry.—­Kairwan.—­Sidi Amour Abeda.—­Saints.—­A French Spy—­ Administration of Justice.—­The Bey’s presents.—­The Hobara.—­Ghafsa.  Hot streams containing Fish.—­Snakes.—­Incantation.—­Moorish Village.

The tourists were Captain Balfour, of the 88th Regiment, and Mr. Richard Reade, eldest son of Sir Thomas Reade.

The morning before starting from Tunis they went to the Bardo to pay their respects to Sidi Mohammed, “Bey of the Camp,” and to thank him for his condescending kindness in taking them with him to the Jereed.  The Bey told him to send their baggage to Giovanni, “Guarda-pipa,” which they did in the evening.

At nine A. M. Sidi Mohammed left the Bardo under a salute from the guns, one of the wads of which nearly hit Captain Balfour on the head.  The Bey proceeded across the plain of Manouba, mounted on a beautiful bay charger, in front of the colours, towards Beereen, the greater part of the troops of the expedition following, whilst the entire plain was covered with baggage-camels, horses, mules, and detached parties of attendants, in glorious confusion.