[2] On account, of their once possessing the throne, the Shereefs have a peculiar jealousy of Marabouts, and which latter have not forgotten their once being sovereigns of Morocco. The _Moravedi_ were "really a dynasty of priests," as the celebrated Magi, who usurped the throne of Cyrus. The Shereefs, though descended from the Prophet, are not strictly priests, or, to make the distinction perfectly clear the Shereefs are to be considered a dynasty corresponding to the type of Melchizdek, uniting in themselves the regal and sacerdotal authority, whilst the _Marabouteen_ were a family of priests like the sons of Aaron. Abd-el-Kader unites in himself the princely and sacerdotal authority like the Shereefs, though not of the family of the Prophet. Mankind have always been jealous of mere theocratic government, and dynasties of priests have always been failures in the arts of governing, and the Egyptian priests, though they struggled hard, and were the most accomplished of this class of men, could not make themselves the sovereigns of Egypt. [3] According to others the Sâdia reigned before the Shereefs. [4] I was greatly astonished to read in Mr. Hay's "Western Barbary," (p. 123), these words--"During one of the late rebellions, a beautiful young girl was offered up as a propitiatory sacrifice, her throat being cut before the tent of the Sultan, and in his presence!" This is an unmitigated libel on the Shereefian prince ruling Morocco. First of all, the sacrifice of human beings is repudiated by every class of inhabitants in Barbary. Such rites, indeed, are unheard of, nay, unthought of. If the Mahometan religion has been powerful in any one thing, it is in that of rooting out from the mind of man every notion of human sacrifice. It is this which makes the sacrifice of the Saviour such an obnoxious doctrine to Mussulmen. It is true enough, at times, oxen are immolated to God, but not to Moorish princes, "to appease an offended potentate." One spring, when there was a great drought, the people led up to the hill of Ghamart, near Carthage, a red heifer to be slaughtered, in order to appease the displeasure of Deity; and when the Bey's frigate, which, a short time ago, carried a present to her Britannic Majesty, from Tunis to Malta, put back by stress of weather, two sheep were sacrificed to some tutelar saints, and two guns were fired in their honour. The companions of Abd-el-Kader in a storm, during his passage from Oran to Toulon, threw handsful of salt to the raging deep to appease its wild fury. But as to sacrificing human victims, either to an incensed Deity, or to man, impiously putting himself in the place of God, the Moors of Barbary have not the least conception of such an enormity.