"Floating in a purple tide."

But the "trade of war" has been carried on ever since, and these
lessons, written in blood, are as useless to mankind as those dashed off
by the harmless pen of the sentimental moralist. El-Kesar is placed in
Latitude, 35° 1 10" N.; Longitude, 5° 49' 30" W.

Mequinez, [25] in Arabic, Miknas (or Miknasa), is a royal residence, and
city of the province of Fez, situate upon a hill in the midst of a
well-watered and most pleasant town, blessed with a pure and serene air.
The city of Miknas is both large and finely built, of considerable
interest and of great antiquity. It was founded by the tribe of Berbers
Meknâsab, a fraction of the Zenatah, in the middle of the tenth century,
and called Miknasat, hence is derived its present name. The modern town
is surrounded with a triple wall thirteen feet high and three thick,
enclosing a spacious area. This wall is mounted with batteries to awe
the Berbers of the neighbouring mountains. The population amounts to
about twenty thousand souls, (some say forty or fifty thousand) in which
are included about nine thousand Negro troops, constituting the greater
portion of the Imperial guard. Two thousand of these black troops are in
charge of the royal treasures, estimated at some fifty millions of
dollars, and always increasing. These treasures consist of jewels, bars
of gold and silver, and money in the two precious metals, the greater
part being Spanish and Mexican dollars.

The inhabitants are represented as being the most polished of the Moors,
kind and hospitable to strangers. The palace of the Emperor is extremely
simple and elegant, all the walls of which are _embroidered_ with the
beautiful stucco-work of Arabesque patterns, as pure and chaste as the
finest lace. The marble for the pillars was furnished from the ruins