Moorish Literature | Page 3

wore the veil and wrapped?My head in the folds of the haik."[13]
War, and the struggle of faction against faction, of tribe against tribe, of confederation against confederation, it is which, with love, above all, has inspired the Berber men. With the Khabyles a string of love-songs is called "Alamato," because this word occurs in the first couplet, always with a belligerent inspiration:
"He has seized his banner for the fight?In honor of the Bey whose cause he maintains,?He guides the warriors with their gorgeous cloaks,?With their spurs unto their boots well fastened,?All that was hostile they destroyed with violence;?And brought the insurgents to reason."
This couplet is followed by a second, where allusion is made to the snow which interrupts communication:
"Violently falls the snow,?In the mist that precedes the lightning;?It bends the branches to the earth,?And splits the tallest trees in twain.?Among the shepherds none can pasture his flock;?It closes to traffic all the roads to market.?Lovers then must trust the birds,?With messages to their loves--?Messages to express their passion.
"Gentle tame falcon of mine,?Rise in thy flight, spread out thy wings,?If thou art my friend do me this service;?To-morrow, ere ever the rise of the sun,?Fly toward her house; there alight?On the window of my gracious beauty."[14]
With the Khabyles of the Jurgura the preceding love-songs are the particular specialty of a whole list of poets who bear the Arab name of T'eballa, or "tambourinists." Ordinarily they are accompanied in their tours by a little troop of musicians who play the tambourine and the haut-boy. Though they are held in small estimation, and are relegated to the same level as the butchers and measurers of grain, they are none the less desired, and their presence is considered indispensable at all ceremonies--wedding f��tes, and on the birth of a son, on the occasion of circumcision, or for simple banquets.
Another class, composed of Ameddah, "panegyrists," or?Fecia, "eloquent men," are considered as much higher in rank. They take part in all affairs of the country, and their advice is sought, for they dispense at will praise or blame. It is they who express the national sentiment of each tribe, and in case of war their accents uplift warriors, encourage the brave, and wither the cowardly. They accompany themselves with a Basque drum. Some, however, have with them one or two musicians who, after each couplet, play an air on the flute as a refrain.[15]
In war-songs it is remarkable to see with what rapidity historical memories are lost. The most ancient lay of this kind does not go beyond the conquest of Algiers by the French. The most recent songs treat of contemporary events. Nothing of the heroic traditions of the Berbers has survived in their memory, and it is the Arab annalists who show us the r?le they have played in history. If the songs relating to the conquest of Algeria had not been gathered half a century ago, they would doubtless have been lost, or nearly so, to-day. At that time, however, the remembrance was still alive, and the poets quickly crystallized in song the rapidity of the triumph of France, which represents their civilization:
"From the day when the Consul left Algiers,?The powerful French have gathered their hosts:?Now the Turks have gone, without hope of return,?Algiers the beautiful is wrested from them.
"Unhappy Isle that they built in the desert,?With vaults of limestone and brick;?The celestial guardian who over them watched has withdrawn. Who can resist the power of God?
"The forts that surround Algiers like stars,?Are bereft of their masters;?The baptized ones have entered.?The Christian religion now is triumphant,?O my eyes, weep tears of blood, weep evermore!
"They are beasts of burden without cruppers,?Their backs are loaded,?Under a bushel their unkempt heads are hidden,?They speak a patois unintelligible,?You can understand nothing they say.
"The combat with these gloomy invaders?Is like the first ploughing of a virgin soil,?To which the harrowing implements?Are rude and painful;?Their attack is terrible.
"They drag their cannons with them,?And know how to use them, the impious ones;?When they fire, the smoke forms in thick clouds:?They are charged with shrapnel,?Which falls like the hail of approaching spring.?Unfortunate queen of cities--?City of noble ramparts,?Algiers, column of Islam,?Thou art like the habitation of the dead,?The banner of France envelops thee all."[16]
It is, one may believe, in similar terms that these songs, lost to-day, recount the defeat of Jugurtha, or Talfarinas, by the Romans, or that of the Kahina by the Arabs. But that which shows clearly how rapidly these songs, and the remembrance of what had inspired them, have been lost is the fact that in a poem of the same kind on the same subject, composed some fifty years ago by the Chelha of meridional Morocco, it is not a question of France nor the Hussains, but the Christians in general, against whom the poet endeavors to