168 SMOKING IN ALGIERS. 



is cut down and perforated by the workmen, and fitted with 

 a terra-cotta bow and an amber mouth-piece." 



Blackburn, in his work entitled "Artists and Arabs," gives 

 the following picture of life and manners in Algiers : 



" There is one difficulty here, however, for the artist that 

 of finding satisfactory models. You can get one at last, and 

 here is her portrait. Her costume, when she throws oft' her 

 haik (and with it a tradition of the Mohammedan faith, that 

 forbids her to show her face to an unbeliever), is a rich, 

 loose, crimson jacket embroidered with gold, a thin white 

 bodice, loose silk trousers reaching to the knee and fastened 

 round the waist by a magnificent sash of various colors, red 

 morocco slippers, a profusion of rings on her little fingers, 

 and bracelets and anklets of gold filagree work. Through 



FEMALE SMOKING IN ALGIERS. 



her waving black hair are twined strings of coins and the 

 folds of a silk handkerchief, the hair falling at the back in 

 plaits below the waist. She is not beautiful, she is scarcely 

 interesting in expression, and she is decidedly unsteady. She 

 seems to have no more power of keeping herself in one posi- 

 tion or of remaining in one part of the room, or even of being 

 quiet, than a humming-top. The whole thing is an unutter- 

 able bore to her, for she does not even reap the reward her 

 father, or husband, or other male attendant always taking 

 the money. She is petite, constitutionally phlegmatic, and 

 as fat as her parents can manage to make her ; she has small 



