Travels in the Great Desert of Sahara, in the Years of 1845 and 1846Richardson, James
History
Travels in the Great Desert of Sahara, in the Years of 1845 and 1846
Richardson, James
Sahara -- Description and travel
"_Who's_ that?" for he couldn't see much, being nearly blind. They told
him it was the Christian going. He cried out, "Stop!" and then added,
"You have books with you, but you English are not Christians. You deceive
us. Nor are the Danish, or the Swedes, or the Russians Christians. _They
have no books._" He meant _religious_ books. The same opinion, I found
afterwards, was entertained by Haj Ibrahim, a very respectable and
intelligent Moorish merchant of Tripoli. Haj Ibrahim said to me, "How is
it that you have books on religion, when the English have none?"
Formerly Ettanee resided at Tripoli; and I have not the least doubt both
these Moors derived this false information from the intolerant and
Protestant-hating Romanist priests resident in Tripoli, backed as the
falsehoods were by the absence of any English church or worship, although
the English Consul very regularly celebrated worship in his family every
Sunday,--a circumstance which ought to have been known amongst the town
population of all religions. I am sorry the intentions of the British
Government have been so feebly carried out by the Bishop of Gibraltar.
Her Majesty's Government was anxious that Dr. Tomlinson should visit all
the coasts of the Mediterranean, both to strengthen the few Protestants
scattered on these inhospitable shores, and to show the various
authorities and people of this famed inland sea, that the English had a
religion, and cared for its prosperity. Up to the time I left the Barbary
coast, Dr. Tomlinson had neither visited Tunis nor Tripoli, though he had
been resident at Malta some three years. This is too bad; and it is quite
clear the Bishop does not understand the object of his mission in the
Mediterranean. He ought to have shown himself at once in all Barbary; he
then might have annihilated this monstrous error, propagated by Romish
priests, that the English had no religious books, and were not
Christians. It is but justice to add, the Bishop went to Tangiers. Mr.
Hay expected a very unctuous episcopal visit, and was shocked to hear the
good Bishop talk so much about fortifications and "horrid war." There is
consistency in everything; and common sense dictated that the Bishop
should have, on such a visit, assumed his character of "Overseer of the
scattered Protestant flock." Unfortunately, when he went first to Malta,
Dr. Tomlinson acted more like an episcopalian tight-rope dancer, always
balancing himself between Puseyism and Evangelicalism, and so distracted
the few Protestants at Malta. He is eminently a man of no decision of
character; and whenever he does manage to get up his reluctant will to a
decision, it is invariably on the wrong side of the question. Here in The
Desert I found myself pestered with both political and religious
questions; and to have shirked either, would have been to offend the
people. There was no alternative but to preach to them that all the
English and all Protestants had the same Bible as the Romanists, and were
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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