VOICE FROM NORTH AFRICA.

INTRODUCTION.

Reason why the Saracens did not extend their conquests sooner.-Mohammed's andAbubaker's injunctions.-Caliph Othman sends Abdallah to conquer Africa.-Battle and victory at Tripoli.-Constrained to return to Egypt.Expedition renewed under Okba.-His conquests.-Builds Kairwan.-Okba recalled by the Caliph, and Dinar, one of his freedmen, obtains the command.-Okba reinstated. -Imprisons Dinar.-Defeats the Romans.-Etymology of the word Saracen.-Okba goes to Tangiers.-His conquests there.-Dismisses his army with the exception of 5000 men. Is informed by Dinar of the capture of Kairwan. His interview with Dinar.-Both determine to fight to the last. Their defeat.-Expedition renewed under Hassan, viceroy of Egypt, who conquers Carthage.North Africa subdued by the Mohammedans.-Ashath sent by the Caliph as governor of Africa.-Hejra.—The Hargites rebel and are defeated. The government of Omar. Jasid. Ruach.-Harthama.-Abrahim Aglab.-Abo Abas.-Saidat Allah, and his conquests in Sicily.-Okal.-Abo Abas.-Abo Abrahim.-Abdallah. -Ziadat Allah.-Abo Abdallah.-The sect of Ismaelians. -The Mohdi.-Moaz.-Abo Fares, the first king of Tunis. Omar El Muley Mustanka.-The expedition under Louis the Eleventh.-The rise of a new dynasty, and its suppression.-Abo Omar Othman.-Abu Zacariah. -Mohammed.-Muley Ahsen.-Charles the Fifth and

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Barbarossa.-Hamida, with whom the series of kings terminate.-Tunis conquered by the Algerians.-The Spaniards expelled by the Turks.-Change of government.Morad Bey.-Hamuda Basha.-Admiral Blake's attack upon Tunis.-Morad.-Mohammed.-Ramdhan.-Hassan Ben Ali.-Ali Basha.-Mohammed Bey.—Hamuda Basha II.-Mahmood.-Hussein Basha.-Difference with Sardinia. Arabs determined to revenge themselves on the Christians.-Mr Tulin's account of it.-Sir Thomas Reade makes peace with the two nations.-Mustafa.Ahmed Basha the reigning Bey.-A retrospective view.— A contrast between the propagation of Christianity and Mohammedanism.

THE dissensions and troubles in Arabia, after the death of Mohammed, kept his followers sufficiently occupied in their own country; but no sooner was peace and order restored than they began to manifest a spirit of conquest and proselytism. The prophet had repeatedly urged his followers to spread his religion from one end of the world to the other; and his assurance, that, " if twenty of them persevered, two hundred of their enemy should be overcome, and if one hundred were firm, one thousand could not resist them: " and the words of Abubaker, that "fighting for the religion is an act of obedience to God," checked any appalling comparison between the greatness of the task and the littleness of the means. A great part of Asia and Africa had been subdued by them, and the Caliph Othman now turned his attention to Barbary. He sent Abdallah, a brave general, with instruction to conquer and convert the Africans to the religion of Mohammed.*

*Mills' History, p. 48.

This civil and ecclesiastical missionary led from the camp of Memphis an army of upwards of forty thousand valiant Arabs, and arrived at Tripoli, A. D. 647, where he awaited the attack of the Greeks. Gregory the prefect engaged the invaders, but his fate was soon decided by the superiority of the Mussulmen arms. Gregory was slain, his daughter, who fought by his side, was taken captive, and Tripoli fell into Abdallah's hands. This victory, however, was not obtained without considerable loss. This, together with the plague which at that time greatly raged in Tripoli, constrained Abdallah to abandon his conquest, and to return to Egypt.

This expedition was not renewed till about A. D. 660, when Okba, or Ukba, with a large army of infantry, composed chiefly of Barbars, and with ten thousand chosen Syrian cavalry, was sent by the Caliph to reclaim the ground which their arms had gained. Okba did not find much opposition, owing to the unsettled state of the country, their indifference to religion, and to the oppressions and extortion of their rulers. As he advanced, he made himself master of the chief cities along the shore of the Mediterranean, and those that did not willingly submit and embrace his religion, he treated according to the precept of his master, viz., "to kill and to destroy ; but at the same time, faithful to the instructions of Abubaker, Okba saved the lives of women, children, and the aged.

When he arrived in the neighbourhood of Tunis,

he built the city Kairwan,* on the ruins of ancient Cyrene. After having fortified it according to the manner of those times, it served for a place of refuge in accidents of war, being no less than thirty-six miles distant from the Mediterranean sea, and upwards of one hundred from Tunis. A wall of brick surrounded the rising capital, which was afterwards decorated with a governor's palace, a mosque supported by five hundred columns of granite and marble, and several schools of learning. It holds the fourth place, in point of holiness, in the Moslem world; because in the mosque is contained the tomb of the barber and friend of the prophet. Neither Jew nor Christian is permitted to enter the city without express permission from the Bey. The Mohammedans themselves never enter it without first taking their shoes off, thinking they would pollute the holy ground if they did not manifest every outward mark of respect. It has certainly greatly fallen from its former splendour; but I have been informed, from very good authority, that there is yet a great deal of wealth and remains of ancient magnificence to be found in it.

Owing to some misunderstanding between Okba

"The famous city Kiruan, (or Cairwan,) otherwise called Caroen, was founded by Hukba, who was sent as General of the army from Arabia Deserta by Hutmen, the third Mohammedan Calif. From the Mediterranean sea this city is distant thirty-six miles, and from Tunis almost one hundred; neither was it built for any other purpose than that the Arabian armies might securely rest therein, with all such spoils as they won from the Barbarians."-Leo, p. 254.

and the Caliph, the former was ordered to give up his command to Dinar, one of Okba's freedmen. But the Caliph soon saw the necessity of restoring this great man to his dignity; which Okba no sooner obtained, than he threw Dinar, his rival, into prison, for having commenced the building of another city not far from Kairwan, and for having transported all its inhabitants to it. The next step Okba took was to march to Melik, a city in Numidia, where, after having defeated the Romans, and garrisoned the place with Mohammedan troops, he marched to Erbau, the capital of Zaab, the ancient Lambesa. Here an engagement took place with the governor, in which Okba was victorious. The inhabitants were slain, and the country fell into the hands of the Saracens.* Advancing, without any opposition, through Mauritania, he arrived at Tangiers, which place submitted without the least resistance. Leaving Tangiers, he marched towards the remotest parts of the present kingdom of Morocco, where he had been informed there were warlike and savage tribes, living without religion and without laws. These, this zealous conqueror and converter thought, were the very objects of his

*There are various etymologies given of this word. Some derive it from the Arabic word Sarak, which signifies to steal, and hence call them thieves. Others derive it from Sharak, the East, and make the word therefore to signify Eastern. The letters Sin and Shin interchange. Some say that there is an Arabic word Saraini, which signifies a pas→ toral people, and think that Saracini is a corruption from it. See Mills' History of Mohammedanism, p. 28; and Casiri's Bibliot. Arab. Hisp. tom. ii. p. 18.