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Aleister Crowley Diary Entry Monday, 22 November 1909
[See Introduction to The Vision and the Voice for background information] [Map of Crowley's travel through Algeria]
Aumale [modern-day Sour El Ghoslane]. The above note was written at Bir-Rabalou, where we had casse-croute,[1] a sleep in a little room where someone had written up:
Voyageur! en-dedans cet heureux enfant gaté, Une fois peut foutu, ey une fois peut—raté[2]
(which depressed to zero my estimate alike of the morale and the physique of the Frenchman in Algeria, and dejeuner.[3]
A Negro came drumming and dancing through the town to the market; rather fun, not being built for the tourist. We left at 1:10, reached Les Trembles 6 km uphill in an hour, thanks to the devil of a steady draught at our backs. Arab coffee in a hotel—Café de la Démocratie, je le crois bien![4]—and off again. 8 km from Aumale, the road being mended, we were kindly picked up by M. Lesur, directeur (inspector) of the Bou-Saada road. Thus we reached Aumale (Hôtel Grossat) about 4:00 P.M. less tired than we should have been. After coffee I took knife and bottle to be repaired. After dinner we went to a wicked place, where, I profoundly regret to be obliged to confess, my comrade displayed unequivocal symptoms of bawdiness. My duty to his poor mother and uncles, as well as my own moral sense, compelled me to repress this terrible lust for carnal copulation with words severe indeed—but not unjust. I stayed, myself, with an Arab wench.
My dream. (The night "out" in the busted barn.) For some reason or other I supposed that I ignored some of my late fathers' affairs, and that one John Quilliam of 10———— could inform me of them. I wrote several times to the address, and got no answer. I went there; it was one of several doors opening a hall thus:
I knocked and rang repeatedly; no answer. The neighbours all came out and a policeman and others arrived. All said that No. 10 was a very funny man, who never went out and threw his letters unread out o' window!
As we were considering whether to break down the door, suddenly John Quilliam appeared in the midst of us. He was a tall upright very beautiful old man (55-60), white moustache and beard, trimmed neatly to a point, exquisite clothes, morning coat; the best-dressed man I ever saw. He singled me out and said: Well, as you have some right to know, read this!
He held out a strip of paper, very badly typed in violet ink in caps for sm[al]l letters here and there—alignment bad, types unequal, etc.—which read.
John Quilliam then flattened himself against the wall tight with the strip of paper—grown large and very hard—sticking his ankles in. I tried to get the point of a stone-from-hoof extractor on my knife under the paper and was with the others vainly endeavouring to extricate my bastard brother when I awoke.
2—French, "Traveller, within this happy spoiled child, one time you can fail, one time you can—miss!"
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