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The National Geographic Magazine 







? TR 1 POLl 



SKETCH MAP OF ALGERIA 



the combination of colonist and native in 

 the tiny town made us realize the im- 

 portance of the problem which, together 

 with the "question Kabyle," now con- 

 fronts the French republic. The little 

 hotel was comfortable and clean, and the 

 pale blue and scarlet coats of the military 

 men, the white burnouses and gold-em- 

 broidered waistcoats of the Arabs, the 

 black cassock of a priest, and the fur- 

 trimmed jacket of a visiting chasseur 

 d'Afrique gave the place almost the ap- 

 pearance of a costume ball. The colonel 

 of the regiment was dining alone, and 

 within joking distance were five spruce 

 young officers, whose grades of rank 

 were almost as evident from their man- 

 ner as from the number of stripes on the 

 bright kepis ranged on the wall beside 

 them. 



An early start next morning was an 

 effort to a lazy woman, but the keen air, 

 the glorious sunrise, and the sights of 

 Setif in morning light were generous re- 

 wards. From glimpses through open 

 doors, and dark circles under the eyes of 

 very evidently up-all-night officers, I have 

 an idea that absinthe and seductive green 

 baize tables may be almost as responsible 

 for the worn and jaded look of the 

 bronzed Algerian soldiers as are African 

 suns and forced marches. 



At Batnah a stop for lunch, and a dis- 

 appointed woman listened hard but 

 failed to hear "the lions' roar come down 

 the Libyan wind," for here we are near 

 the great cedar forests where lions and 



ingly 



panthers yet lair. "Beyond there 

 lives the Said," says the Arabs 

 in the respectful tone in which 

 they always mention the King 

 of the Atlas, and a sample of 

 Arabian philosophy is their 

 proverb concerning his majesty: 

 "He who kills him eats him, and 

 he who does not kill him is eaten 

 by him." 



On again, across rocky dunes 

 and by salt lakes, vegetation ap- 

 pearing only in tiny bunches of 

 sage-brush among the stone and 

 sand, with rare clumps of fennel, 

 rosemary, and candytuft, seem- 

 strayed from a New England 



garden, once in a while an encampment 

 of Kabyles, surrounded by a corral of 

 thorn-brush, and long lines of cactus and 

 aloe standing out against a burning blue 

 sky. 



A herd of antelope pass in the distance, 

 and beyond is a billowy waste of plain 

 in an indescribably yellow, mellow light, 

 with bare hills like sentinels in the back- 

 ground. What is that slow-moving line 

 of dark? What but our first sight of a 

 caravan, twenty or thirty camels with 

 their striped packs, a little herd of goats, 

 Arabs on horseback trot along the line, 

 and plodding, patient figures bring up the 

 rear. 



And as we go on over the billowy 

 sands, seemingly our course is stopped ; 

 for a line of sharp, needle-like, castellated 

 red mountains of fantastic outline ap- 

 pears, like fortified heights with bastions 

 round their sides, to bar our way. But 

 no, there is an opening, a gate — a gate, 

 indeed, El Kantara of the Arabs, Fro- 

 menti's "Porte d'Or de Sahara," and the 

 Calceus Herculis of the Romans ; and 

 here was it that the famous Third Au- 

 gustan Legion was quartered. Vanished 

 are the visions of the oasis of geography 

 days, the oasis veritably bursts upon our 

 gaze, and we have our first sight of what 

 Murray says is one of the three most 

 wonderful views in this wonderful world 

 of ours, while Lamartine's "tu parais, 

 le desert s'anime," comes to our thoughts. 



We are told that there are fifty thou- 



