Read Ebook: Tafilet by Harris Walter Romberg De Vaucorbeil Maurice Illustrator

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AS CREATED 56 AS MY UNCLE USED TO SAY 126 AT SEA 160 BACKWARD LOOK, A 155 BEST IS GOOD ENOUGH, THE 123 BOYS, THE 104 "BRAVE REFRAIN, A" 113 DREAMER, SAY 61 FEEL IN THE CHRIS'MAS AIR, A 52 FOR YOU 50 GOOD MAN, A 132 HER BEAUTIFUL HANDS 189 HIS ROOM 38 HONEY DRIPPING FROM THE COMB 125 "HOW DID YOU REST, LAST NIGHT?" 94 IN THE EVENING 115 IT'S GOT TO BE 107 JACK-IN-THE-BOX 100 JIM 117 JOHN McKEEN 165 JUST TO BE GOOD 26 KNEELING WITH HERRICK 138 LAUGHTER HOLDING BOTH HIS SIDES 81 MULBERRY TREE, THE 46 MY DANCIN' DAYS IS OVER 184 MY FRIEND 29 NATURAL PERVERSITIES 70 NOT ALWAYS GLAD WHEN WE SMILE 36 OLD DAYS, THE 135 OLD GUITAR, THE 161 OLD TRUNDLE-BED, THE 64 OUR BOYHOOD HAUNTS 182 OUR KIND OF A MAN 92 OUR OWN 63 "OUT OF REACH?" 112 OUT OF THE HITHERWHERE 98 PLAINT HUMAN, THE 43 QUEST, THE 44 RAINY MORNING, THE 141 REACH YOUR HAND TO ME 143 SCRAWL, A 75 SONG OF PARTING 90 SONG OF YESTERDAY, THE 82 SPRING SONG AND A LATER, A 137 "THEM OLD CHEERY WORDS" 172 THINKIN' BACK 31 THROUGH SLEEPY-LAND 170 TO MY OLD FRIEND, WILLIAM LEACHMAN 145 TO THE JUDGE 177 WE MUST BELIEVE 130 WE MUST GET HOME 19 WHERE-AWAY 57 WHO BIDES HIS TIME 68 WRITIN' BACK TO THE HOME-FOLKS 76

RILEY SONGS OF HOME

WE MUST GET HOME

We must get home! How could we stray like this?-- So far from home, we know not where it is,-- Only in some fair, apple-blossomy place Of children's faces--and the mother's face-- We dimly dream it, till the vision clears Even in the eyes of fancy, glad with tears.

We must get home--for we have been away So long, it seems forever and a day! And O so very homesick we have grown, The laughter of the world is like a moan In our tired hearing, and its song as vain,-- We must get home--we must get home again!

We must get home! With heart and soul we yearn To find the long-lost pathway, and return!... The child's shout lifted from the questing band Of old folk, faring weary, hand in hand, But faces brightening, as if clouds at last Were showering sunshine on us as we passed.

We must get home: It hurts so staying here, Where fond hearts must be wept out tear by tear, And where to wear wet lashes means, at best, When most our lack, the least our hope of rest-- When most our need of joy, the more our pain-- We must get home--we must get home again!

We must get home--home to the simple things-- The morning-glories twirling up the strings And bugling color, as they blared in blue- And-white o'er garden-gates we scampered through; The long grape-arbor, with its under-shade Blue as the green and purple overlaid.

We must get home: All is so quiet there: The touch of loving hands on brow and hair-- Dim rooms, wherein the sunshine is made mild-- The lost love of the mother and the child Restored in restful lullabies of rain,-- We must get home--we must get home again!

The rows of sweetcorn and the China beans Beyond the lettuce-beds where, towering, leans The giant sunflower in barbaric pride Guarding the barn-door and the lane outside; The honeysuckles, midst the hollyhocks, That clamber almost to the martin-box.

We must get home, where, as we nod and drowse, Time humors us and tiptoes through the house, And loves us best when sleeping baby-wise, With dreams--not tear-drops--brimming our clenched eyes,-- Pure dreams that know nor taint nor earthly stain-- We must get home--we must get home again!

We must get home! The willow-whistle's call Trills crisp and liquid as the waterfall-- Mocking the trillers in the cherry-trees And making discord of such rhymes as these, That know nor lilt nor cadence but the birds First warbled--then all poets afterwards.

We must get home; and, unremembering there All gain of all ambition otherwhere, Rest--from the feverish victory, and the crown Of conquest whose waste glory weighs us down.-- Fame's fairest gifts we toss back with disdain-- We must get home--we must get home again!

We must get home again--we must--we must!-- Creep back from the vain quest through endless strife To find not anywhere in all of life A happier happiness than blest us then ... We must get home--we must get home again!

JUST TO BE GOOD

Just to be good-- This is enough--enough! O we who find sin's billows wild and rough, Do we not feel how more than any gold Would be the blameless life we led of old While yet our lips knew but a mother's kiss? Ah! though we miss All else but this, To be good is enough!

It is enough-- Enough--just to be good! To lift our hearts where they are understood; To let the thirst for worldly power and place Go unappeased; to smile back in God's face With the glad lips our mothers used to kiss. Ah! though we miss All else but this, To be good is enough!

MY FRIEND

"He is my friend," I said,-- "Be patient!" Overhead The skies were drear and dim; And lo! the thought of him Smiled on my heart--and then The sun shone out again!

"He is my friend!" The words Brought summer and the birds; And all my winter-time Thawed into running rhyme And rippled into song, Warm, tender, brave and strong.

And so it sings to-day.-- So may it sing alway! Though waving grasses grow Between, and lilies blow Their trills of perfume clear As laughter to the ear, Let each mute measure end With "Still he is thy friend."

THINKIN' BACK

Thinkin' back, I even hear Them a-callin', high and clear, Up the crick-banks, where they seem Still hid in there--like a dream-- And me still a-pantin' on The green pathway they have gone! Still they hide, by bend er ford-- Still they hide--but, thank the Lord, , I hear laughin' on ahead!

NOT ALWAYS GLAD WHEN WE SMILE

We are not always glad when we smile: Though we wear a fair face and are gay, And the world we deceive May not ever believe We could laugh in a happier way.-- Yet, down in the deeps of the soul, Ofttimes, with our faces aglow, There's an ache and a moan That we know of alone, And as only the hopeless may know.

We are not always glad when we smile,-- For the heart, in a tempest of pain, May live in the guise Of a smile in the eyes As a rainbow may live in the rain; And the stormiest night of our woe May hang out a radiant star Whose light in the sky Of despair is a lie As black as the thunder-clouds are.

We are not always glad when we smile!-- But the conscience is quick to record, All the sorrow and sin We are hiding within Is plain in the sight of the Lord: And ever, O ever, till pride And evasion shall cease to defile The sacred recess Of the soul, we confess We are not always glad when we smile.

HIS ROOM

"I'm home again, my dear old Room, I'm home again, and happy, too, As, peering through the brightening gloom, I find myself alone with you: Though brief my stay, nor far away, I missed you--missed you night and day-- As wildly yearned for you as now.-- Old Room, how are you, anyhow?

"My easy chair, with open arms, Awaits me just within the door; The littered carpet's woven charms Have never seemed so bright before,-- The old rosettes and mignonettes And ivy-leaves and violets, Look up as pure and fresh of hue As though baptized in morning dew.

"Old Room, to me your homely walls Fold round me like the arms of love, And over all my being falls A blessing pure as from above-- Even as a nestling child caressed And lulled upon a loving breast, With folded eyes, too glad to weep And yet too sad for dreams or sleep.

"You've been so kind to me, old Room-- So patient in your tender care, My drooping heart in fullest bloom Has blossomed for you unaware; And who but you had cared to woo A heart so dark, and heavy, too, As in the past you lifted mine From out the shadow to the shine?

"For I was but a wayward boy When first you gladly welcomed me And taught me work was truer joy Than rioting incessantly: And thus the din that stormed within The old guitar and violin Has fallen in a fainter tone And sweeter, for your sake alone.

"For lips and eyes in truth's disguise Confuse the faces of my friends, Till old affection's fondest ties I find unraveling at the ends; But as I turn to you, and learn To meet my griefs with less concern, Your love seems all I have to keep Me smiling lest I needs must weep.

"Yet I am happy, and would fain Forget the world and all its woes; So set me to my tasks again, Old Room, and lull me to repose: And as we glide adown the tide Of dreams, forever side by side, I'll hold your hands as lovers do Their sweethearts' and talk love to you."

THE PLAINT HUMAN

Season of snows, and season of flowers, Seasons of loss and gain!-- Since grief and joy must alike be ours, Why do we still complain?

Ever our failing, from sun to sun, O my intolerant brother-- We want just a little too little of out as it was owing to the Sultan's presence in Tafilet that I was able to undertake my journey at all, and happily bring it to a successful end, I have felt constrained to briefly state the reasons that had taken Mulai el Hassen to the far-away oasis in the desert from which his dynasty originally sprung.

As to the motives of the Sultan, it is difficult to state anything with certainty. No doubt religious zeal to pray at the reverenced tomb of his ancestor, Mulai Ali Shereef, had much to do with the desire to undertake so long and trying a journey, for it could have been from no hope that by so doing any considerable sums of money could be collected or extorted, as was generally believed to be the case, for none could have been better aware than he of the poverty of the country and its inhabitants. Probably it was solely the religious point, touched with some anxious curiosity to see the home of his ancestors, that led him to empty the treasury upon an expedition from which no real, and but little moral, benefit could accrue.

I had meanwhile been carefully watching such glimpses of information as from time to time reached England as to the whereabouts of the Sultan and his army, and scanty and contradictory as they were, I was able by the beginning of September 1893 to gather that his Majesty's journey, in spite of a general belief to the contrary, would be successful, and that Tafilet would be reached.

I therefore left England in the middle of September, and collecting the few necessaries for my journey at Tangier, reached Saffi, some 400 miles down the Atlantic coast of Morocco, in the second week of October.

The journey from Tangier to Saffi was one that presented but little of interest. The coast-steamer in which I travelled visited the various ports,--Laraiche, Rabat, Casablanca , and Mazagan, all of which I knew well. The weather was rough, and we had some difficulty in communicating at more than one of the ports, lying for some twenty hours off Rabat before the lighters were able to issue from the mouth of the river--the Bu Regreg--that separates that town from Sallee, the home of the old rovers, whose depredations upon English sailing-ships were at one time so well known and so much dreaded.

However, on the fifth day after leaving, Saffi was reached, and fortunately the sea was calm enough to allow of our landing in one of the strangely built and decorated surf-boats in use at that port.

What a shouting and yelling there was of the boatmen, as my Riffi servant Mohammed, of whom more anon, and I, perched on the top of our little pile of baggage, were tossed to and fro by the curling seas that one after another broke along the beach! In silence the steersman watched his opportunity, and with a smooth gliding motion we were borne between rugged rocks, and our boat lay high and dry upon the beach.

Saffi has been too often described to need more than the merest mention here. It is a strange, flat-roofed, white town, reaching from the sea-beach high up the semicircle of hills by which it is enclosed, the summit capped by the windowless walls and peaked towers of the great castle, once a palace of the Sultans, now little more than a deserted ruin.

Within the town the streets are narrow and dirty. In rainy seasons the mud is almost knee-deep, and a torrent flows through the main street. The native inhabitants are poor, and accordingly but little signs of luxury or trade are to be found, with the exceptions of the large stores of the few European merchants who reside there. The town is walled, in parts of Moorish workmanship, in others the remains of the old Portuguese occupation; for Saffi, like most of the other towns of the Atlantic coast of Morocco, once formed a small colony of the "King of the Algarves."

The few days I spent at Saffi passed pleasantly enough, for I was entertained by Mr Hunot, her Majesty's Vice-Consul, whose knowledge of Arabic and Morocco, gained from a residence of some forty years in the country, is exceptional; and though I chafed at the delays that always meet one in dealing with Moors, he did much to render my time as agreeable as could be to a man who was intent upon nothing but in making a start.

Small as my preparations were, they caused me several days' more delay than I liked; but before the week was out I found myself on the eve of departure, with a couple of mules, an old man who was to be my guide, philosopher, and friend, his son and his nephew, a black slave-girl belonging to his establishment, a stray Sahara pilgrim, and my Riffi servant.

Adopting the dress of the country on my departure, and mounting a pack-mule on the top of the luggage, we set out one morning, not at sunrise as I had hoped, for the old man forgot everything that he could forget, and remembered an enormous quantity of things he should have left behind, and it was near mid-day before we passed out under the old gateway of the town and climbed the steep hill, in the valley below which the only gardens that Saffi can boast are situated.

There is one scene, however, that presents itself as one nears the city that cannot be passed over without mention, though I myself, amongst others, have described it before. Yet so strikingly grand is it, and so unique, that it demands reference in any work that deals with this portion of Morocco. I refer to the first view of the wide valley of the Tensift, with its wonderful background of the range of the Atlas Mountains.

We had been climbing the steep slopes of Jibeelet, the name given to the range of hills that form the north boundary of the wide valley of the Tensift, for some little time before the plain beneath came into view. The ascent had been a hot and tiring one,

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