ongoing. They ended, however, by embarking on a French ship leaving for Livorno. They arrived in this city and stayed there for four months waiting for a new opportunity to leave, and, despairing of finding one, they finally decided to return to Morocco by land, to the Straits of Gibraltar, along the Mediterranean coasts of France and Spain. They thus passed to Marseilles and Barcelona, hoping to see the end of their odyssey soon. In Barcelona they learned that the French besieged Gibraltar, and that it was impossible to cross the strait. They had to wait until the blockade was raised to be able to go to the port and from there to Tetouan. They arrived finally to Fez, having on them only a sum of seven silver mithqal. Immediately in his hometown, Abu al-Qasim az-Zayyani went to visit his old fellow students. His trip had made him different from these latter, whom he found, for the most part, attached to the makhzen of the new Sultan Mohammed ben Abdallah. However, in order not to be seen zd inferior by his former classmates, he immediately applied for a secretarial post, which was granted to him. His father, who had probably suffered disrespect in the previous reign, tried by all means to dissuade him from entering the administrative career. Ez-Zayyani didn't change his decision. His beginnings were rather obscure. The task of imperial secretary in Morocco hasn't changed for a long time. The katib present himself at the palace every day, morning and evening, except Thursday and Friday. He writes there, or more often, copies there, if he has a beautiful handwriting, the letters addressed to the governors of the cities and the tribes, the Sherifian rescripts and circular letters. Moroccan Makhzen was a center of intrigues and slander. They were always on the look-out for the slightest oversight of their colleagues, ready to denounce each other for the slightest breach of the established rule, the sultans' officials have contributed for centuries to anarchy and disorder; sovereigns are rare, who have been able to put a stop to their actions and escape, somehow, from their ever-present guardianship. Ez-Zayyani, who, in this milieu, almost arrived as an intruder, after a long stay abroad, with new acquaintances and an open mind, was skilful enough to keep himself in place and to make his qualities recognised soon. Death According to the author of salwat