Identifier: tafiletnarrative00harr (find matches)
Title: Tafilet; the narrative of a journey of exploration in the Atlas mountains and the oases of the north-west Sahara
Year: 1895 (1890s)
Authors: Harris, Walter, 1866-1933
Subjects:
Publisher: London, W. Blackwood and sons
Contributing Library: Mugar Memorial Library, Boston University
Digitizing Sponsor: Boston University

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dsomely dressed in spotless haiks of wool.The men are, as a rule, small of stature and wiry,with keen hungry eyes and fine features, and forma strange contrast in their appearance of cupidity andrascality to the honest ojDcn countenances of theBerbers. The odds being so vastly unequal in openwarfare, the latter race have almost desisted fromattacking the place—though the innate hatred of thetwo peoples finds ample scope in plundering one an-others caravans. Yet, rascals as are the Arabs ofAskura, one cannot help admiring the immense labourwith which they have dug the thousands of canalsthat irrigate the gardens, and the excellent mannerin which these are kept in repair. The love of gar-dening is found all over Morocco; but the tempera-ment of the race for sudden fits of economy, or lazi-ness, puts a stop on all progress in this direction,and on many occasions I have known Moors sink áwells and build irrigating canals, plant fruit-treesand hedges, only to allow the whole to fall into a
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GARDENS. 141 state of ruin as soon as completed; and where one year I have seen flourishing gardens, the next the orange-trees are dried up from want of water and attention, and cattle are feeding on the leaves of the young fruit-trees. But there is also another reason for the constant ruined gardens one is continually passing when travelling in Morocco—namely, the fact that after the death of the owner the property is divided, according to the sherá or native law, amongst his heirs, who each singly wish to reap the entire benefit without sharing in the expenses of keepingthe place in repair. I knew one most beautifulg arden, not twenty miles from Tangier, which was once the pride of the neighbourhood, and which from the above cause is to-day a barren field, with here and there the dried trunks of what were once orange-trees appearing from the soil. At Askura, however, things are different, and the excellent state of the gardens, the walls, and means of water-supply was astonishing, and none the

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