Moorish Literature | Page 4

excite his compatriots.
It is so, too, with the declamatory songs of the latest period of the Middle Ages, the dialects more or less precise, where the oldest heroic historical poems, like the Song of Roland, had disappeared to leave the field free for the imagination of the poet who treats the struggles between Christians and Saracens according to his own fantasy.
Thanks to General Hanoteau, the songs relating to the principal events of Khabyle since the French conquest have been saved from oblivion, viz., the expedition of Mar��chal Bugeaud in 1867; that of General Pelissier in 1891; the insurrection of Bon Bar'la; those of Ameravun in 1896, and the divers episodes of the campaign of 1897 against the Aith Traten, when the mountains were the last citadel of the Khabyle independence:
"The tribe was full of refugees,?From all sides they sought refuge?With the Aith Traten, the powerful confederation.?'Let us go,' said they, 'to a sure refuge,'?For the enemy has fallen on our heads,'?But in Arba they established their home."[17]
The unhappy war of 1870, thanks to the stupidity of the military authorities, revived the hope of a victorious insurrection. Mograne, Bon Mazrag, and the Sheikh Haddad aroused the Khabyles, but the desert tribes did not respond to their appeal. Barbary was again conquered, and the popular songs composed on that occasion reproached them for the folly of their attempt.
Bon Mezrah proclaimed in the mountains and on the plain:
"Come on, a Holy War against the Christians,?He followed his brother until his disaster,?His noble wife was lost to him.?As to his flocks and his children,?He left them to wander in Sahara.?Bon Mezrag is not a man,?But the lowest of all beings;?He deceived both Arabs and Khabyles,?Saying, 'I have news of the Christians.'
"I believed Haddad a saint indeed,?With miracles and supernatural gifts;?He has then no scent for game,?And singular to make himself he tries.
"I tell it to you; to all of you here?(How many have fallen in the battles),?That the Sheikh has submitted.?From the mountain he has returned,?Whoever followed him was blind.?He took flight like one bereft of sense.?How many wise men have fallen?On his traces, the traces of an impostor,?From Babors unto Guerrouma!?This joker has ruined the country--?He ravaged the world while he laughed;?By his fault he has made of this land a desert."[18]
The conclusion of poems of this kind is an appeal to the generosity of France:
"Since we have so low fallen,[19]?You beat on us as on a drum;?You have silenced our voices.?We ask of you a pardon sincere,?O France, nation of valorous men,?And eternal shall be our repentance.?From beginning to the end of the year?We are waiting and hoping always:?My God! Soften the hearts of the authorities."
With the Touaregs, the civil, or war against the Arabs, replaces the war against the Christians, and has not been less actively celebrated:
"We have saddled the shoulders of the docile camel,?I excite him with my sabre, touching his neck,?I fall on the crowd, give them sabre and lance;?And then there remains but a mound,?And the wild beasts find a brave meal."[20]
One finds in this last verse the same inspiration that is found in the celebrated passage of the Iliad, verses 2 and 5: "Anger which caused ten thousand Achaeans to send to Hades numerous souls of heroes, and to make food of them for the dogs and birds of prey." It is thus that the Arab poet expresses his ante-Islamic "Antarah":
"My pitiless steel pierced all the vestments,?The general has no safety from my blade,?I have left him as food for savage beasts?Which tear him, crunching his bones,?His handsome hands and brave arms."[21]
The Scandinavian Skalds have had the same savage accents, and one can remember a strophe from the song of the death of Raynor Lodbrog:
"I was yet young when in the Orient we gave the wolves a bloody repast and a pasture to the birds. When our rude swords rang on the helmet, then they saw the sea rise and the vultures wade in blood."[22]
Robbery and pillage under armed bands, the ambuscade even, are celebrated among the Touaregs with as great pleasure as a brilliant engagement:
"Matella! May thy father die!?Thou art possessed by a demon,?To believe that the Touaregs are not men.?They know how to ride the camel; they?Ride in the morning and they ride at night;?They can travel; they can gallop:?They know how to offer drink to those?Who remain upon their beasts.?They know how to surprise a?Courageous man in the night.?Happy he sleeps, fearless with kneeling camels;?They pierce him with a lance,?Sharp and slender as a thorn,?And leave him to groan until?His soul leaves his body:?The eagle waits to devour his entrails."[23]
They also show great scorn for those who lead a life relatively less barbarous, and who adorn themselves as much as the Touaregs can by means of science and commerce:
"The Tsaggmaren are not men,?Not lance