CHAPTER X
A CONNECTICUT YANKEE IN THE COURT OF TUNIS
At Malta, whom should I bump into but commodore Barney! His business in France having been completed, he had taken the notion to see southern Europe before returning to the United States.
He was amazed to see me in the uniform of the United States, yet proud, too, that I had taken matters into my own hands and gone to sea willy-nilly. He told me that the rector had been sent back to his Baltimore charge by his bishop, and that Alexander had begun business in Baltimore as a ship chandler. My story of Murad's treachery brought forth a series of explosions, which, however, were cut short by the arrival of the commodore's friend Captain William Eaton, a military officer from the United States, who had stopped in Malta on his way to take the office of American envoy at the court of Tunis.
The conversation turned towards Captain Eaton's mission to Tunis. "I understand that I have an abominable ruler to deal with," he said, "I shall be doing well if I do nothing more than keep Yankee ships and sailors out of his hands!"
"I wish I were going with you, sir," I said impulsively.
"Can you write? Are you handy at clerical work?" he asked.
"Is he?" burst out the commodore, "why, the boy was brought up to be a minister. When I knew him a quill or a book was never out of his hands!"
"I have authority from Washington to employ a secretary," said the captain. "The lad can accompany me in that office."
Delighted, I turned away to make the necessary arrangements. "If you haven't the knack of fighting as well as of writing, I advise you to decline the position," Captain Eaton called after me, "for I expect to battle with the Bey of Tunis from the hour I arrive!"
"That," I returned, "is the reason I said I'd like to go along! You look like a fighter, sir!"
Captain Eaton was pleased instead of offended at my boldness. The story of his career, as I heard it later from the commodore, proved that the captain was a fighter in deeds as well as in looks. He had a broad forehead, with deep-set eyes and heavy eyebrows. His nose was that of a fighter, and if ever a chin expressed determination, his did.
His career, as I heard it later from the lips of the commodore, was fascinating. His father had been a farmer-teacher who raised crops in the summer and taught school in the winter. William, who was born in Woodstock, Connecticut, developed into a lad with a studious yet adventurous spirit. When sixteen he ran away from home and enlisted in the army where he was employed as a waiter by Major Dennie, of the Connecticut troops.
A DARTMOUTH LAD
After he had risen to the rank of sergeant, he decided that he would like to go to college, and secured an honorable discharge. He was admitted as a freshman to Dartmouth College, at Hanover, New Hampshire, but was given permission to be absent during the coming winter, in order that he might by teaching school obtain enough money to pursue his studies. Due, however, to difficulties at home, he was forced to prolong his school teaching, and it was not until two years later that he was able to return to Dartmouth. With his pack suspended from a staff thrown over his shoulder, he started on foot for Hanover.
In his pack was a change of linen and a few articles which he expected to sell on his journey. When he reached Northfield, his money gave out, and he was in despair. He began, however, to offer his pins, needles and other notions for sale, and with the proceeds he was able to go on to college. Here he was received with great kindness by President Wheelock, and here he pursued his studies, handicapped by sickness and by the necessity of teaching school in town. At last, in August, 1790, he received his degree. In March, 1792, he was appointed a captain in the army of the United States, and was assigned to duty at Pittsburgh and later at Cincinnati.
His prediction as to a troubled career in Tunis came true.
With an embrace and a God-speed from Commodore Barney, I sailed with Captain Eaton for Tunis. Arriving there, Mr. Cathcart led the captain to the Bey's palace. I was allowed to follow. We were ushered into the Bey's Hall of State, and there the captain must approach and bow to a fat-faced individual who frowned on him as if he were a stray cur that had wandered in among his satins and velvets. This fellow, from his safe place among his over-dressed officers, poured out abuse.
"It is now more than a year since your country promised me gifts of arms and ships! Why have they not been sent to me?"
Captain Eaton replied with dignity: "The treaty was received by our government about eight months ago; a malady then raged in our capital, which forced not only the citizens, but all the departments of the government, to fly into the interior villages of the country. About the time the plague ceased to rage, and permitted the return of the government, the winter shut up our harbors with ice. We are also engaged in a war with France; and all our means were used to defend ourselves against that country." He then went on to explain that he was empowered to offer a cash sum instead of the naval stores promised.
"I am not a beggar," said the Bey, "I have cash to spare. The stores are more than ever needed because of my war with France. You have found no trouble in fulfilling your promises to Algiers and Tripoli; and to Algiers have made presents of frigates and other armed vessels."
The captain explained that the Dey of Algiers had agreed to pay for certain armed vessels built for him by the United States, and that, moreover, several years' time had been allowed for their delivery.
"You may inform me," said the Bey, "that the Dey of Algiers paid you cash for your vessels. I do not believe it."
Arguments such as this one went on forever.
Our first pilgrimage, after becoming settled in Tunis, was to visit the hill which was once the site of Carthage. We passed through fertile pastures where donkeys, sheep, cattle, and camels were feeding, and among fields of wheat, barley, and oats where awkward camels were used for plowing. Captain Eaton's military soul became aroused as we stood at the place where the great Hannibal was born.
My chief was well acquainted with Carthaginian history and thrilled me with his description of how Hannibal, commanding an army of paid mercenaries--Africans, Spaniards, Gauls, and Italians--managed them for thirteen years through wars and hardships in a foreign country without experiencing a single mutiny. Captain Eaton little dreamed that, on a small scale to be sure, fate had designed him to play the part of a Hannibal for his own country--but this will be told in due time.
When I was not on duty I spent my time taking donkey tours of the city, with an Arab boy running behind me to make my stubborn steed go. In this fashion I visited the Maltese, Jewish and Arab quarters, and explored the bazaars. When I grew hungry, why, here was the stand of an Arab who sold sweetmeats, and there was the booth of a man who fried meat and sold it hot from the fire, while always in the streets were fruit merchants selling fresh dates, oranges, and figs. When I stopped to buy curios, the swarthy, turbaned dealers usually invited me into their little shops to sit cross-legged on the floor and sip strong black coffee while we haggled over prices.
THE HORSE-WHIPPING
Before we arrived in Tunis, the agent there for the United States was a French merchant, named Joseph Etienne Famin. Upon our arrival the English consul at Tunis, Major Magre, warned Captain Eaton not to place confidence in Famin, stating that he was a dangerous man who would set snares for his successor. Captain Eaton soon learned that the Frenchman had protested to the Bey against the United States establishing a consul there "to keep the bread out of his mouth."
The captain, lonely among enemies, rewarded my faithfulness by taking me into his confidence. He told me that he had found that Famin had yielded to every outrageous demand made by the Bey against the United States, which Famin represented. Captain Eaton also told me that he suspected the Frenchman of reaping a profit from the presents sent by the United States to the ruler. Famin, we learned, had declared to the Bey that Eaton was nothing but a vice-consul, subject to Consul-General O'Brien at Algiers, and only placed at Tunis to spy upon the court.
At last, when the Frenchman told the court that "the Americans were a feeble sect of Christians" and that their independence from England "was the gift of France," Captain Eaton, giving him his jacket to hold, horse-whipped Famin at the marine gate of Tunis, before a crowd of amazed Moslems.
Famin went whining to the Bey and demanded that Eaton be punished.
"How dare you lift your hand against a subject of mine in my kingdom?" the Bey demanded of Captain Eaton, who took me with him to the palace.
The captain replied that Famin had tried to betray him, and had tried also to betray the Bey. He brought forth a paper, and prepared to read its contents.
"Hear him call your prime minister and your agents a set of thieves and robbers!" exclaimed Captain Eaton.
"Mercy! Forbearance!" cried Famin.
"Yes, _thieves_ and _robbers_! This is the man of your confidence!" the consul went on. Then I heard him tell the Bey that Famin had blabbed all his secrets to a woman, who had repeated them to others, so that all the town knew that he was playing a double game with the Americans, and increasing the misunderstandings that had arisen between the American envoy and the court.
Famin trembled as if in a fit, and began an address in Arabic.
"Speak French!" said the Bey, frowning.
The ruler was at last convinced of the Frenchman's guilt. As we quitted the place we heard the Bey say to his court:
"The American consul has been heated, but truly he has had reason. I have found him a very plain, candid man; and his concern for his fellow-citizens is not a crime."
On one occasion, while Captain Eaton was in the palace, I paid a visit to the executioner, who occupied a lodge at the entrance to the palace. I went with an interpreter, a friend of the executioner, but even under the circumstances I felt timid when the official took down from its place on the wall a long curved scimitar and began to feel its edge as a reaper feels the blade of his scythe.
"It is a good blade--it has never failed me," he said, "even though I have had to slice off as many as twenty heads in a day."
If one is disposed to think that the ancient cruelty of these Turkish rulers has been decreased, let him think of these cruelties which we saw enacted in spite of our attempts to stop them.
Five corsairs from Tunis, manned by nine hundred and ninety men, sailed forth and landed upon the island of St. Peters, belonging to Sardinia. They captured and brought back with them as prisoners to Tunis two hundred and twenty men and seven hundred women and children. In the raid upon the island, old men and women, and mothers with infants were pulled from their beds, driven down stairs or hurled from windows, driven almost naked through the streets, crowded into the filthy holds of the cruisers, and then, when landed at Tunis, bound with thongs and driven through the streets to the auction square, where they were sold into slavery. The old, the infirm and the infants, being unfit to work, were left to shift for themselves. If it had not been for contributions made by Captain Eaton and European ambassadors, they would have died of starvation.
The sum of $640,000 was demanded by the Bey for the ransom of the slaves, but at last he agreed to accept $270,000 from the king of Sardinia for their redemption.
WAR BREAKS OUT WITH TRIPOLI
A fire broke out in the palace and destroyed fifty thousand stands of arms. The Bey called upon Captain Eaton to request the United States to forward him ten thousand stands of arms. "I have divided my loss," he said, "among my friends; this quota falls to you to furnish; tell your government to send them without delay."
Captain Eaton refused to forward the demand. "You will never receive a single musket from the United States!" he declared.
Meanwhile, Captain Eaton's neighbor consul, Mr. Cathcart, was having similar troubles at the court of Tripoli. We learned from correspondence that in April, 1800, Tripoli's greedy Bashaw had bidden Cathcart, the American consul, to tell the President of the United States that while "he was pleased with his proffers of friendship, had they been accompanied by a present of a frigate or brig-of-war, he would be still more inclined to believe them genuine."
In May the Bashaw asked: "Why do not the United States send me a present? I am an independent prince as well as the Bey of Tunis, and I can hurt the commerce of any nation as much as the ruler of Tunis."
The President paid no heed to these threats. Thereupon, on May 18, 1801, the Bashaw cut down the flagstaff of the American consulate at Tripoli. Consul Cathcart quitted the city, and a state of war was declared.
Matters came to a head with us in Tunis in March, 1803. Commodore Morris had been detained in port by the Bey because the American squadron had seized a Tunisian vessel bound for Tripoli, with which country the United States was at war. Consul Eaton had protested with more than usual vigor against this outrage. The Bey ordered him to quit the court at once.
"It is well," replied Captain Eaton, "I am glad to quit a court where I have known such violence and indignity!"
On the 10th of March, we left Tunis on board of one of the ships of the American squadron. Doctor George Davis, of New York, was left in charge of American affairs. On the 30th of the same month, Captain Eaton sailed from Gibraltar in the merchant ship _Perseverance_, bound for Boston, at which port he arrived May 5th. He then went to Washington to urge that a land campaign be waged against the ruling Bashaw of Tripoli, of which project more will appear in this story. He was appointed navy agent for the United States and instructed to aid in the campaign of our squadron against the Bashaw of Tripoli.
I hoped while in Tunis to obtain a leave of absence that I might join a caravan that would pass by Tokra, the treasure city of my dreams. But no opportunity came. I remained with the fleet while Captain Eaton was at home and rejoined him when he returned. He brought with him a plan of campaign that, in operation, was to bring me well within reach of the treasure spot.