[Illustration:  STREET IN MARRAKESH]

The home and its appointments duly exhibited, Sidi Boubikir led the way to a diwan in a well-cushioned room that opened on to the garden.  He clapped his hands and a small regiment of women-servants, black and for the most part uncomely, arrived to prepare dinner.  One brought a ewer, another a basin, a third a towel, and water was poured out over our hands.  Then a large earthenware bowl encased in strong basketwork was brought by a fourth servant, and a tray of flat loaves of fine wheat by a fifth, and we broke bread and said the “Bismillah,"[41] which stands for grace.  The bowl was uncovered and revealed a savoury stew of chicken with sweet lemon and olives, a very pleasing sight to all who appreciate Eastern cooking.  The use of knives being a crime against the Faith, and the use of forks and spoons unknown, we plunged the fingers of the right hand into the bowl and sought what pleased us best, using the bread from time to time to deal with the sauce of the stew.  It was really a delicious dish, and when later in the afternoon I asked my host for the recipe he said he would give it to me if I would fill the bowl with Bank of England notes.  I had to explain that, in my ignorance of the full resources of Moorish cooking, I had not come out with sufficient money.

So soon as the charm of the first bowl palled, it was taken away and others followed in quick succession, various meats and eggs being served with olives and spices and the delicate vegetables that come to Southern Morocco in early spring.  It was a relief to come to the end of our duties and, our hands washed once more, to digest the meal with the aid of green tea flavoured with mint.  Strong drink being forbidden to the True Believer, water only was served with the dinner, and as it was brought direct from the Tensift River, and was of rich red colour, there was no temptation to touch it.  Sidi Boubikir was in excellent spirits, and told many stories of his earlier days, of his dealings with Bashadors, his quarrel with the great kaid Ben Daoud, the siege of the city by certain Illegitimate men—­enemies of Allah and the Sultan—­his journey to Gibraltar, and how he met one of the Rothschilds there and tried to do business with him.  He spoke of his investments in consols and the poor return they brought him, and many other matters of equal moment.

It was not easy to realise that the man who spoke so brightly and lightly about trivial affairs had one of the keenest intellects in the country, that he had the secret history of its political intrigues at his fingers’ ends, that he was the trusted agent of the British Government, and lived and throve surrounded by enemies.  As far as was consistent with courtesy I tried to direct his reminiscences towards politics, but he kept to purely personal matters, and included in them a story of his attempt to bribe a British Minister,[42] to whom, upon the occasion of the arrival of a British Mission in Marrakesh,