430 THE HOME OF THE TROGLODYTES. 
exist between the solid buildings of the ancient inhabitants of the soil 
and the temporary movable abodes of the shepherds, whose migration 
to Magreb is comparatively recent. The true mapalia are keel-shaped 
constructions, long, narrow, and low, of which the ksours of Mettamer 
and of Medennie in Araad represent the most perfect type, and which 
our Troglodytes of Matmata, d’Hadeje, etc., have adapted to their spe- 
cial needs. 
II. 
Sallust, in ending his chaper on ethnology, describes the strangers 
whom legend brings to the shores of Africa as mingling with the native 
Getules, and increasing rapidly, from which alliances have sprung the 
great nation of the Numidians, soon spreading over all the territory 
about Carthage. 
The uncertainty as to origin, thus attributed by tradition to the 
Numidians, manifests itself even in our day in regard to the Berbers 
of Tunis in general, and particularly among those of the mountains of 
the south. <A special ethnical type, of which the large island of Djerba 
is the principal center of habitation, here comes in contact with another 
type, no less characteristic, which predominates in the Djerid. The 
type of the Djerabi, which corresponds to the foreign population which 
Sallust represented as landing on the shore in the vicinity of Syria, is 
distinguished, at the first glance, by a very clear complexion of a dead 
white, or else slightly bronzed, relative shortness of the head, and 
roundness of the face; the nose is straight, the lips thin, the chin 
rounded. The type of the Djeridi, descendants of the ancient Getules, 
is characterized on the contrary by dark coloring, almost that of a mu- 
latto, a long and narrow skull, a high forehead, retroussé nose, thick 
lips, and receding chin. I have found these two ethnical types well 
distinguished by Dr. Collihnon in the two Caliphates of Matmata. The 
first seemed to me to predominate at Hadeje; the second prevailing at 
Matmata Bled Kebira. 
Besides these there were seen here and there in the mountains, per- 
sons without doubt of Zanatian origin, who recall our Kabyles; a few 
half-breed Arabs, and also a small number of negroes, more or less Ber- 
ber in type, exercising in general the important profession of water-car- 
riers, but transforming themselves in an obliging manner into musicians 
for local fetes. 
The Matmatians are at the same time shepherds and husbandmen. 
They raise herds, of which goats and sheep predominate. The wool of 
these animals they take to the coast to sell, sometimes raw and some- 
times woven. They cultivate barley and wheat, the date, olive, and 
fig, the products of which transported to Gabes enable them to acquire, 
by exchange, a quantity of foreign objects which more and more take 
the place of the articles which they formerly fabricated for themselves. 
I found in the house of Ali porcelains of Limoges, ordinary glassware, 
