CHAPTER XVIII.

Arab Mesmerism.-Divination.-Sheikh Senusi.-Morocco Miracles.-A Treasure-seeker's Tales.-Yusuf's Ingenuity.-Further exemplified.-My Captivity ended.-The Tables turned.

ONE of my first visitors was the Moghrabi from Tangiers, already mentioned, called El Gibely, who has been settled here for many years. He was a perfect specimen of this class of adventurers; pretending to have a familiar spirit, a djin who waits upon him, and tells him the secrets of futurity. He wrote charms to discover treasures, and to cure all manner of diseases, and I almost think had ended by believing in them himself. The day after I was shut up in Yusuf's house he took an opportunity of vaunting to me highly the virtues of his amulets, particularly of one which renders its possessor ball-proof. He fancied, probably, that this was the moment to effect a profitable sale, and I asked questions, and listened to him with a grave attention which must have given him great

hopes. In this he overrated my credulity; but I repaid his communicativeness in kind, by describing to him the wonders of the electric telegraph, which I thought would astonish him; but in this I was in turn disappointed, as he listened to my accounts of instantaneous messages sent over land and sea, without expressing a doubt, or even asking how such wonders were performed. In fact, he already knew all about it "It was the djin."

I one day sent for him to perform the often-talkedof miracle, or trick of the ink-spot in a child's hand. A young negro, about nine years old, was introduced, and the inscription on his forehead was written with all due ceremony, the seal was drawn in his hand, the coriander seed was burned under his nose, until the poor child's eyes ran with tears, and the fear he was in covered his forehead with big drops of sweat. After some time he saw a person in the ink-spot; he was then told to order him to bring another, whom he was not long in fancying he saw; but he then became quite wild, and neither the muttered surah, nor the repeated orders of the Moghrabi had any further effect. The child could see nothing more. I regarded the experiment with the most incredulous caution; and, though it certainly failed, I was not convinced that so-called animal magnetism would not

Chap. XVIII.

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give an explanation of the phenomena, such as trustworthy Arabs have assured me they had themselves seen. Leo Africanus speaks of these conjurors with the utmost contempt; and, I believe, all later Europeans who have written on the subject regard the proceeding as a gross trick; but in these countries it is universally believed, even by men who laugh at the usual apparatus of charms and amulets. One of my friends brought me a manuscript, which he had found among the effects of a moghrabi who died here many years ago, in which the whole process is explained; it was essentially the same as that used by El Gibely, who, probably to enhance the mystery of the proceeding in my eyes, added, besides the two lines which are written on the forehead, a sort of star over the nose, and inscriptions on each eyebrow.*

* HOW TO MAKE THE DJIN DESCEND.

Write in the right palm of a boy or girl, below the age of puberty, the seal which is here given, and fumigate with coriander seed, which among the Djin are counted apples, and conjure them with the Surah "and the Sun" to the end, until they come down. Then ask them what you desire to know, and they will answer you with the permission of God (be he exalted!); and this is what you write on the forehead of the child:

فكشفنا عنك عطاك

فبصرك اليوم صحيح

And then you write the seal, and in the midst of it make a spot of ink; and when you wish to dismiss the kings, conjure them with

Having spoken at such length of the art of making "the Djin descend into a child's hand," I may complete my confession of the black arts which I learned here, by describing the process of divination called “Derb er raml," or "Derb el ful," according to the medium used, whether it is sand or beans; the latter (with the beans) is the simplest, but both are in principle the Seven beans are held in the palm of the left hand, which is struck with a smart blow with the right half-closed fist, so that some of the beans jump into

same.

the verse of the throne, and they will depart by permission of God. This is the seal as you see it here, and there is no power and no strength but in God.

Chap. XVIII.

DIVINATION.

265

the right hand-if an odd number, one is marked; if even, two. The beans are replaced in the left hand, which is again struck with the right, and the result marked below the first. This being repeated four times gives the first figure, and the operation is performed until there are obtained four figures, which are placed side by side in a square; these are then read vertically and perpendicularly, and also from corner to corner, thus giving in all ten figures. As each may contain four odd or four even numbers, they are capable of sixteen permutations, each of which has a separate signification, and a proper house or part of the square in which it should appear. The Derb erraml is only distinguished from this by being more complicated, fresh combinations being obtained by the addition of every pair of figures. There is a large work on this subject by El-Zenaty, and another called Omdat-et-Taleb.

One day the Gibely came to me in all his Friday gaiety of attire, "perfumed like a milliner," his eyes broadly painted with kohl. We had a long discussion on the earth and its form, and the great sea which surrounds it, and jebel kaf which bounds it, and the seven climates, and the seven heavens, for whose existence he quoted the words of Him whose name be exalted! in the Koran. I demurred to some of his theories, and treated jebel kaf and the seven climates

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