other cities suffices to show how small is the commerce of
Mequinez. No regular couriers ran to any other town, till
the Moors started one to Fez a few years ago, and a
second was established by private venture. No foreign
Governments are represented here, nor were there any
resident Europeans till the American Gospel Union made
it a mission station in 1895. There is one prison, which
the Government succeeds in keeping well-occupied, using
it both for criminals and State victims.
The population has been varyingly estimated at twenty,
forty and fifty thousand, the truth probably lying between
thirty and forty, but there is no possibility of
Inhabitants. . . . , . . ,,
verifying, these figures. A goodly proportion
o f mulattos represent the Bokhara, Udai'a and other
troops imported from Timbuctoo by Mulai Isma’il, and
the many white slaves brought in at the same time
cannot fail to have left a considerable trace among the
inhabitants of the town. The men have a good name
for bravery, and the women are famed throughout Morocco
for their beauty, which is not, however, of a type
to captivate Europeans.
The occasional presence of the Court alone rescues
Mequinez for a time from its “ dead-alive ” condition.
Its manufactures are by no means important,
Manufactures. , . . , , , , , , ,
yet they include gun-locks, ploughs, swords,
knives, pack-saddles, pattens and turned-wood articles,
such as rosaries. In the sixteenth century this town was
famous for its selhams, and much silk was cultivated in
the neighbourhood,1 but these are things of the past,
although the Miknasis are no whit behind the Fasis and
Marrakshis in dyeing and weaving. The little stream
outside the gate which waters the gardens and turns the
corn-mills is called Bu-Fakran— “ Father of Tortoises”—
a name as applicable to the town, by reason of the
character of its inhabitants. The streets have by no
means a busy look, and though of the regulation width
— or rather narrowness—they are seldom crowded like
those of Fez, or even of Marrakesh or the ports. In
short, its glories, such as they .were, have departed, and
nothing remains save decay and ruin.