The Pirate City, page 199 by Robert Michael Ballantyne
<< Return to Title Details & Download200
A Moor named Geronimo was, about the beginning of the seventeenth century, converted to Christianity by a captive. The reigning Pasha ordered him to recant, and gave him twenty-four hours to make up his mind. On his refusal, the Pasha caused Geronimo to be buried alive in the mud which was being poured into moulds and dried into blocks, for the purpose of building fort Bab-el-Oued. In this block the poor martyr was built into the wall of the fort, which was thereafter named the "Fort of the Twenty-four Hours." The incident was soon nearly forgotten. Two and a half centuries afterwards, (in December 1853), the French, while carrying out their improvements in the town, destroyed the ancient "Fort of the Twenty-four Hours," but were warned, by one who was well read in the history of the place, to be careful on razing a certain part of the walls to examine them well. They did so, and found the body of Geronimo--or, rather, the mould formed by his body, which latter, of course, had crumbled to dust. A plaster cast was taken from this mould, and this cast--which gives an almost perfect representation of the martyr lying on his face, with his hands tied behind his back--is now in the museum of the library of Algiers.
CHAPTER TWENTY
FOUR.
THE DARK CLOUDS BEGIN TO THICKEN--A RESCUE ATTEMPTED--MASTER JIM PLAYS A CONSPICUOUS PART.
In the course of a few days the rumour reached Algiers that England was in right earnest about sending a fleet to bombard the city, and at the same time Colonel Langley learned, through information privately conveyed to him, that the report of Padre Giovanni was to some extent incorrect. The old man had misunderstood the message given to him, and represented the fleet as being in the offing, whereas it had not at that time left England.
The caution, however, was useful, inasmuch as it put the British consul on his guard.
It was at the end of one of the Mohammedan festiva