It was in 1903 that he captured his first European, the _Times_ correspondent, W. B. Harris, who, speaking Arabic, negotiated his own surrender, and within three weeks left the mountains of the Riff on the release of a number of Raisuli’s men from Moorish prisons. For a year thereafter there prevailed intense fear in the suburbs, outside the walls of Tangier, where the better class of Europeans live. Raisuli had many followers, and the Maghzen was powerless against him, while raids about Tangier and robberies were of almost nightly occurrence. Yet some of the Europeans, those who felt a sentimental interest in the independence of Morocco and wanted to see the good old Moorish ways survive, seemed ready to welcome ‘the really strong man who was coming to the fore.’ It fell to the lot of an American of Greek descent, a Mr. Perdicaris, to receive the next pressing invitation to the interior. Raisuli and a band of followers entered the Perdicaris home one evening, and after breaking up many things, packing off others, and maltreating his wife, they escorted the American himself to their mountain fastnesses. As is the usual way of Western governments in these matters--I do not intend to suggest another method--the State Department at Washington demanded from the Sultan the release of the captive, pressing the demand with the visit of a warship. The Maghzen, seeing no other way, met Raisuli’s terms, again releasing many tribesmen, and paying the brigand £11,000, besides establishing him as governor of Tangier. Of course in this capacity the ‘strong man’ superseded the European Legations in control of the town. The old order of things began to revive. Moors were beaten on the market-place; Moslems again insulted Europeans and jostled them in the streets; and soon, the Legations feared, heads would hang again upon the city gates. So an appeal went up to the Sultan that Raisuli be displaced, and Abdul Aziz, though he had evidently pledged himself to Raisuli, readily agreed to the demands of the European representatives. But the wary governor, getting wind of a plot, escaped to the mountains before the arrival of the Sultan’s emissaries; and though troops followed him, burned and pillaged his home and carried off his women, the fugitive himself escaped to renew armed hostilities against the Maghzen soldiers. Unable to defeat the brigand at arms, after many months Abdul Aziz decided to employ diplomacy, and Kaid Maclean, old and wise in the ways of the Moors and trusted by those who knew him, undertook for the Sultan to convey new pledges to Raisuli and to guarantee them with the word of a Britisher. But the brigand wanted something more substantial, and though he had given his word of honour--his _ïamen_--that he would not molest the Kaid, the old Scotsman was made prisoner when he arrived; for Kaid Maclean went to meet Raisuli with only half-a-dozen men, hoping to inspire him with trust and to win his confidence.