A century after the Dutch and English had founded their factories the French followed their example, while in 1803 the Americans commenced to trade direct with the Red Sea ports. On the British occupation of Aden in 1839, the immense superiority of that place as a port, and the security and advantages assured by British rule, drew the commerce from Mokha thence, the former celebrated city fast falling to decay and ruin.[3] Before this period, however, serious outrages had been offered to British subjects, and during the first twenty years of this century there had been constant trouble brewing between the fanatical natives and the Christians, augmented no doubt by the jealousy felt by the former for the manner in which the Europeans had annexed their trade. More extraordinary still than these outrages was the manner in which their perpetration was looked upon by the British Government, and it was not until things became unbearable that forcible means were taken to punish the offenders, and in 1820 a force under Captain Bruce, who had been sent thither to enforce a treaty with the Imam’s Amir, and Captain Lumley of H.M.S. Topaz, bombarded Mokha, and succeeded in forcing an entry into the town. The result of this long-delayed act of reparation on the part of the Indian Government was the placing upon an honourable footing of the British “factory,” and the carrying through of a treaty of commerce with the Government of the Yemen.[4] Although the author did not land in Mokha, the captain of the steamer on which he proceeded from Hodaidah to Aden very kindly approached as near the shore as was compatible with the ship’s course, and with the aid of glasses a very good view of the place was obtained. From a distance it still has the appearance of being a flourishing town, but on nearer approach one can see that, although the walls of the houses are still standing, the roofs and floors have for the most part fallen in, and Mokha is to-day little more than a vast ruin, from which a few tall minarets still rise to tell of its former beauties. A handful of Turkish soldiers and a few Bedouins are all that remain of its once heterogeneous population; and where once the streets were filled with richly robed merchants, goats feed to-day on the coarse weeds.