A FEW SKETCHES OF ARAB LIFE
1. _Summer in the Sahara_
Having now endeavored to give the reader a general idea of Algeria
from all points of view, I propose to close this book with a few
sketches of my life among the Arabs.
There is nothing particularly striking about these experiences,
but I feel they will lift a further veil on the inner life of these
people whose privacy it is so difficult to penetrate. Only years
of contact have opened the innermost doors of their homes, only the
word of some intimate friend telling of the fellowship between the
lone Englishman and the people of Algeria has removed all suspicious
constraint, only the reputation of simplicity and the instinct of
caste has brought them to me with all their ideas laid bare.
However, before describing these scenes I would like the reader
to catch a glimpse of the country in a clothing different from
that thrown on the screen by the Circuits Transatlantiques. The
average traveler will have fled the shores of North Africa before
the first months of summer, when the big hotels in Algiers have
closed their shutters and the syncopated saxophonists have packed
up their greasy dinner-jackets and crossed to cooler climes. The
hot weather in Algiers itself is singularly unpleasant, not so much
from the point of view of temperature, which never rises very high,
but because of the damp. It is like living in a steam bath all day,
and correspondingly tiring.
Once in the plains of the Mitidja, however, or up in the hills,
the heat is greater but the air is dry, and provided one keeps
quiet in the middle of the day one can quite well bear the summer
months. The temperature of the Sahara is high, but the heat, being
very dry, is not too unpleasant, and though it is not recommended
to pass July and August in an oasis it is no real hardship for the
young and healthy once in a while.
In the first place houses are built to protect one from the sun;
very thick mud walls plastered over, which do not attract the
heat, outside verandahs or inner courts open to the sky, and heavy
shutters, make it possible to keep the house comparatively cool
during the middle hours of the day. Life too is organized to meet
the requirements of the weather. All business is contracted between
six and ten. At eleven everything closes, including the post-office,
and remains shut until three. During these hours lunch is eaten,
followed by the siesta, and it is not until four that those who are
not forced to, appear. By five the main street presents an animated
aspect of Arabs strolling up and down in their white robes, while the
cafés begin to fill up. Those who have gardens in the oasis repair
to them and work until friends arrive to pay calls and discuss the
produce of the rich soil over cups of mint tea, while in a secluded
corner the women squat with the children and gossip in whispers.
Sometimes an Arab of importance will give a dinner in his garden. A
carpet is spread out on the ground, a brass tray is placed in the
middle, while near-by the sheep is being roasted whole on a brushwood
fire. A flutist or a guitarist will play under the orange-trees
by the light of the summer moon. The diners will often remain on
the carpet the whole night and return direct to their business in
the morning.
These gardens are worthy of note. They are not usually anywhere near
the residence of the owner, who lives in the town; they vary in size
from three acres to half an acre, and are planted with fruit-trees
and vegetables, which grow in astonishing abundance. In fact,
with the exception of the dates, the oranges and the apricots, all
the fruit can not be disposed of. It is a wonderful sight to see
gardens full of pears and apricots and figs and strawberries and
pomegranates, while vines heavy with grapes climb up the walls and
the tall date-palms nod in the warm breeze, protecting the garden
from the fiercest rays of the midday sun.
In the terrible months of July and August one wonders why the leaves
of the trees do not shrivel up under the fiery rays of the summer
sun. But on the other hand it must be remembered that all is a
matter of contrast and that during the midwinter months, when the
temperature is that of April in England, it is cold for the Sahara
vegetation, and trees are as leafless as those at home in the same
period. In fact, vegetation on the Riviera in winter is infinitely
more abundant than on the edge of the Sahara at the same season.
The desert too, like the gardens of the oasis, presents a totally
different aspect in summer from that which might be supposed. Whereas
this heat transferred to England would burn up every blade of grass,
here it brings to the surface all kinds of scrub vegetation, and
standing on an eminence looking over the northern tracts of the
Sahara, the view presents a greener impression than to the tourist
in winter. The nights too are comparatively cool, and a blanket is
sometimes required after midnight when the stony land has cooled and
when the house is storing up all the fresh air before the hermetic
closing of all windows at sunrise.
If, therefore, those who stay all the summer will mind the precepts
of all hot countries, a reverential respect for the sun, a light
diet and abstinence from alcohol, they will not suffer too much,
provided the experience is not repeated too often.
The flies are tiresome, but there is little disease, and except
during famine years the typhus does not appear. The sun is a
marvelous disinfectant, and the mortality in these southern cities
is very low.
But when the sirocco starts blowing it is a very different story. It
always comes in series of three, six, nine days, and it usually rises
at dawn. There is no mistaking it. Peacefully asleep, one suddenly
awakes to the rattle of shutters and a sensation that one’s hair
is being scorched on one’s head. Every one is up immediately,
closing every window to keep in a little freshness. The day is
terrible; standing in front of a furnace in a glass factory is the
only comparison possible, intensified by great clouds of whirling
sand which come sweeping across the desert and which drive on for
miles, shrouding the sun in a kind of yellow cloak and creeping
even into one’s innermost chamber as one tries in vain to keep
out of the heat.
But apart from the ordeal of sirocco days a man sensibly dressed
and living a reasonable life in an oasis of the Sahara, with an
average shade temperature of one hundred degrees is better off
than the tall-hatted Londoner devouring his copious British lunch
and not resting in the middle of the day, and the tourist who will
venture south in June will return home with a marvelous impression
of real summer.
2. _Staying in a Country House in the Tell_
Staying in an Arab country house is as different from staying
in a country house in Europe as it is possible to imagine. (I am
speaking, of course, from the point of view of intimate friends
who are treated as the Arabs.)
In the first place there is no specific invitation; one is
asked to come and stay, say in the summer, and when one feels
inclined, one arrives. If one is polite one wires beforehand, but
it is not expected. Secondly, one goes always with some specific
object—to shoot, to visit flocks, to contract some business in
the neighborhood, but rarely just to stay.
When one arrives the host may or may not be there; if he is not he
will have delegated some near relation to do the honors in his place,
and he may appear during the course of the visit. In the same way
he may suddenly go away when one has only been there a few days,
but it does not in the least suggest a hint for the guest to leave;
a deputy host will take his place and things will go on in exactly
the same way.
Another thing in an Arab home, which is quite peculiar to the
country, is the fact that the guests not of the actual family neither
eat nor sleep in the house in which the people live, that is to say
that there is a kind of guest annex which is only opened on these
occasions. This custom is chiefly due to the presence of the women,
who might be difficult to conceal from strangers if they had access
to the main building.
The particular country house I am going to describe belongs to
a _bash agha_ and is situated in the Tellian Atlas near to the
village of Bourbaki. The country is mountainous and produces cereals.
I arrived two days late for my visit, but not at all through
my fault, as I had arranged to go by train to Boghari, where my
host would send me a car. I arrived at the specified time, but the
conveyance did not come for forty-eight hours. I naturally expressed
astonishment and some annoyance, but it seemed to surprise the
driver, to whom a day or so before or after meant so little.
When I arrived, dinner awaited me, and I was pleased to see that I
was being treated really as one of the family, and that there were
no tables or chairs, no knives and forks. The party was assembled in
a pillared courtyard open to the sky, with jasmine and rose bushes
growing around. Two lemon-trees stood at either end, and above us
a July moon shed a gentle radiance.
We sat down in three circles. In the first group was the _bash agha_,
myself, my _caïd_ partner of the sheep farm, an old schoolmaster
and a very aged _imam_. In the second group were the _bash agha’s_
sons, his nephews, and his chief clerk. In the third group were my
head shepherd, the chauffeur, and the rest of the retainers.
The food was first of all placed in the center of our circle, and
we all dipped into the common bowl: when we had had enough it was
passed to the second circle, who did likewise, until it was finished
by the third party. While the third group was eating we began our
next course, and the servant was able to join the last group.
“Servant” is not exactly the right word, as _“khedime,”_
which is literally translated by “servant,” is almost a term
of insult. The people who wait and look after the house of an Arab
chief are not considered in the same way as those who minister to
us. In the first place they are not paid, but are merely clothed
and lodged—they and their families, and when they get too old they
are kept on and their sons take their places for the actual work.
When dinner was over and we had washed our faces and hands and
tea and coffee had been brought, we stretched out our legs on the
carpet. While we in our little circle began to smoke, the other
groups broke up and moved silently out of the court, for in the
presence of their elders they could not light a cigarette; in fact,
during the whole of the meal they had conducted their conversation
in respectful whispers.
For an hour or so we sat and conversed on all kinds of subjects,
then one by one the Arabs dropped off into a doze, no constraint,
no endeavoring to keep awake when sleep dominated. For a while they
slumbered, then, coming to again, said good night and went off to
the other part of the house to rest, while I settled myself in the
vast guest-chamber in a large brass bed.
In the middle of the night there was an earthquake. It did not last
very long, but for a moment the house shook violently. The household
rose in commotion, and the _bash agha_ came rushing into my room
fully dressed, which proved to me again that these men sleep in
their clothes. He looked at me in surprise.
“How is this,” he cried, “an earthquake and you remain in
bed without moving?”
I laughed.
“It is I who should be surprised,” I replied, “for with your
belief in the _mektoub_ you shouldn’t worry about such trifles
as earthquakes.”
His eyes twinkled in spite of his emotion.
“You are right,” he said, “what is written is written, and
none but Allah can interfere. Good rest!”
He left me and I heard him outside admonishing the others for making
such a noise.
The next day we motored up to see some of the _bash agha’s_
cattle in the cedar forest near Teniet el Haad. This is one of
the finest excursions in Algeria, but it is unfortunately off the
tourist track, and practically no one goes there.
It is, however, quite a simple journey, and if the traveler wishes to
see real forest he has but to motor from Algiers, either via Tipaza
and Miliana, which is in itself a gorgeous drive, and continue to
the south by Boghari, or else he can return to Algiers by Goghari and
Medea. If he does not have a car he can take the train to Affreville,
where an excellent motor-bus will land him at Teniet el Haad. Here
there is quite a good hotel of the unluxurious type.
The cedar forest is in the mountains some fourteen kilometers
along a quite passable mountain road. It winds steeply up through
pine-trees, then little by little the cedars begin to appear standing
erect, their long arms stretched out forming roofs of that delicate
blue-green. As one progresses the cedar alone remains, increasing
in size until one comes upon giant trees a hundred feet high and
with a circumference of seven or eight yards. The view over the
valleys below is superb.
We stopped at a clearing where the _bash agha_ kept a small house,
and we went in search of the cows. It took some time to find them,
but during our walk we passed some really magnificent trees—giants,
centuries old. On our return to the house I was surprised to find,
instead of the cold chicken and beef associated with picnics in
the mountains, a five-course hot lunch with the best wine of Algeria.
The _bash agha_ explained that he always kept all material ready
in his chalet, and that it only needed the bringing of the food to
have it prepared. As a matter of fact I have always noticed with
Arabs that in the question of meals there are no half-measures. One
either spends the whole day out with nothing except perhaps a
piece of bread, or else one sits down to a feast in the most
out-of-the-way place.
The meal was excellent, too excellent, with the result that we
all went to sleep after. When we woke up it was late afternoon
and the sun was glinting through the blue branches of the cedars
and lighting up the forest in a fairy fashion. One expected to see
gnomes and elves appear from out of the vast trunks. We drove back
in the sunset, the softest light imaginable, but quite unlike the
golden radiance of the Sahara.
The following day was market-day at Burdeau, some thirty kilometers
away, so that every one was astir at dawn, and before sunrise every
male member of the household had piled into the cars and we were
speeding across the cereal plain which overlooks the Sersou. All
the _aghas_ and _caïds_ of the district as well as those from the
south were there, and there was much kissing and shaking of hands.
I saw here another curious example of the respect of the younger
generation for the older. I wanted my breakfast, so I went into
a café with the _caïd_; my partner and I ordered our coffee. It
was just being brought when up jumped the _caïd_ and went off into
the street. I followed anxiously, and to my surprise he went into
the café opposite, where he ordered the same collation. This time
it was actually brought and set on the table, when like a flash my
companion was up again and outside before I could speak.
I caught him up and saw that he was making for the original café.
“Hi!” I cried, “what’s all this about? Is it a game? Why
can’t we eat in peace? I’m hungry.”
“Didn’t you notice?” he asked calmly.
“Notice what?” I asked.
“My uncle, the _bash agha_ of the Larbas.”
“No, I can’t say I did,” I replied, “but what of it?”
“He came into the first café when I was sitting there, and I
couldn’t remain; and then just as I had settled in the next,
he came in there too.”
“And I suppose we shall go on chasing round Burdeau till the
old gentleman settles or until we die of hunger,” I laughed
back. “No, _mon vieux_, I’m hungry, and I won’t starve for
any one.”
So saying I took my coffee and roll and carried it across to the
_bash agha’s_ table, where I sat down and explained my action. He
smiled, but I realized that he was smiling to please me, and that
he saw nothing in the inconvenience caused to his nephew, who might
wait all day for his coffee if necessary.
On the way back we called on various _caïds_ and rich farmers, who
gave us quantities of sweet mint tea. At one house the old _bash
agha_, who had accompanied us, found an aged _kadi_ who played
chess, so he insisted on having a game while we all had to wait,
regardless of the fact that it was getting near dinner-time.
How different from the customs of Europe, where age is, if anything,
jeered at. Fancy giving a lift to some one’s grandfather after a
day in the country and having to wait while he played a silly game
with a local judge whom he met in some one else’s house!
And so the pleasant visit wore on. Each day we did something
different, each day we had enormous meals until finally I was
obliged to leave. Looking back on the visit the thing which strikes
me the most is the complete lack of fuss during the whole of my
stay. Everything was done quite haphazardly and yet without a
hitch. I suppose it is the effect of centuries of such existence
which remains as a background and which is carried on generation
after generation. A few modern inventions have appeared which
facilitate things a bit, but otherwise the same life is led with
exactly the same ideas as it was twelve hundred years ago, and it
seems difficult to see any radical change ever taking place. In
this mode life runs smoothly for the Arabs; complications do not
trouble them, so why change?
3. _A Week-end with a Marabout_
The Marabout of Kourdane asked me to spend a week-end with him
to discuss the possibilities of organizing a moufflon shoot in the
Djbel Amour. I was interested in the prospects of getting a moufflon,
but still more interested to see Kourdane.
Situated in the Sahara some fifty kilometers from Laghouat, at the
foot of the Djebel Amour Range, this country home of _marabouts_ was
created by a Frenchwoman known as Madame Aurélie, whose maiden name
was Aurélie Picard, the daughter of a gendarme. She had met the
Marabout of Aïn Mahdi at Bordeaux when he had been exiled during
the insurrection of 1870. She married him in France, and when he
was allowed to return to Algeria she came too, and became a great
personage in the country. At his death she married his brother,
and continued as lady of this desolate area, loved and respected
by all. Finally the second husband died too, and she remained on
alone for a while in the wonderful house she had built. She is
still alive, but she rarely returns to the scenes of her greatness
for two reasons; in the first place, the present _marabouts_ are
not quite the saints they should be, and secondly, they are all a
little jealous of her reputation.
As I had never seen this desert castle I accepted with alacrity,
and left with a friend one Saturday morning in a car. The road
on leaving Laghouat is to the north, but soon it turns southwest
across a desolate land of sand and rocks. I had decided to lunch
with an old friend of mine, the Caïd of Tadgemout. I reached the
_ksar_ at noon: a sad, desolate little village partly in ruins,
perched on the top of a rocky eminence overlooking a small oasis,
very green in the midst of the desert. The road climbed up behind
the rock and emerged before the _caïd’s_ house, which dominates
the oasis. The view from his terrace is one of the most impressive
in these parts. In the immediate foreground, the oasis, then a
silver thread of water running down the river-bed and away, away,
the desert. But unlike most of the Saharan views the horizon is cut
all of a sudden by a group of rugged hills standing up grim and bare.
Again, looking to the northwest the scene is not at all expected,
as one’s eyes rest on the great range of the Djebel Amour, deep
blue against the brilliant sky.
[Illustration: Storks Nesting on the Roofs at Constantine]
[Illustration: Bonfarik, Religious Print Seller]
[Illustration: Vegetable Market]
Tadgemout is said to mean the “Crown of Death,” and was the
capital of a desert queen whose every punishment even for the
smallest crime was death. It is a place which grows upon one,
and one is loath to leave its lonely site.
The _caïd_ himself is a charming person, far superior to most of
his kind, both in intelligence and manners. This is partly due
to his own efforts and also to the fact that during the war he
was made prisoner and, being eventually exchanged as an invalid,
spent a long time in Switzerland, where he attended lectures at
Geneva University and came in contact with all kinds of people. He
received us before his door and led us into the guest-house where
one of those interminable repasts was prepared. We discussed all
manners of extraordinary subjects, or rather I was subjected to a
series of endless questions, as the _caïd_ is of an inquisitive
turn of mind. One remark is worthy of note as showing the curious
working of an Oriental brain.
He suddenly said:
“Why don’t Protestant clergymen wear vestments like the
Catholics?”
I began with a dissertation on the Reformation, but he knew all
about that.
After lunch he accompanied us on our journey. The road dipped down
into a dried river-bed, where the car stuck; we all had to climb
out and push; no comment was made, as this is one of the most usual
occurrences when motoring across the Sahara. The road continued
desolate as we drew near to the blue mountains.
Suddenly a great block of buildings stood out of the wasted land;
a garden covering at least a square mile surrounded it, making a
wonderful contrast of green.
“Kourdane,” replied my companion to my inquiry; “the house
built by Madame Aurélie; the garden created by her with water from
many wells; everything done on the most lavish scale and now hardly
appreciated by her descendants.”
Indeed, as we approached the wide portal of the outer wall, I noticed
that the building had not been whitewashed for years and that the
plaster was peeling off. Fissures had appeared, and though the mass
of the edifice struck one forcibly after the usual one-storied Arab
houses, I realized that we were in a splendor of the past.
The _marabout_ hurried out to greet us. Small of stature, with
decidedly negro features, his general appearance on first contact
was not impressive. And yet as one watched him one realized a kind of
superiority engrained by many generations of domination. My _caïd_
kissed his hand, the chauffeur kissed his hand and his head; the
young man took it all as calmly as the hand-shake I gave him.
He led us along the side of the house to the front and here,
of a sudden, one was transported out of any sort of Arab setting.
Instead of the usual small doorway leading to some dim ante-chamber
or narrow staircase, we came upon a great flagged space interspersed
with flower-beds and fountains and rivulets, while tall cypresses
grew about, protecting the garden from the desert winds.
A broad staircase built of rosy stone led up to a terrace pillared
and tiled in delicate shades, giving an impression of majesty, of
far-away power, of magnificence. We mounted the stairway and were
led into a dining-room quite simple in spite of its size, and then
into a drawing-room. An array of superb Arab furniture filled the
room, not the tawdry tables and chairs bought in Algiers, but the
real work of the country: chests of drawers, cupboards, brackets
inlaid with mother-of-pearl, priceless carpets on the floor, and
lovely hangings over the doors; swords and daggers of all periods
festooned the walls. We passed out of the drawing-room on to a
gallery running all the length of the building, and on to which
opened the guestrooms. As we entered the first, I was struck by
the richness of the setting, by the real Arab bed hung about with
brocaded curtains, then I realized that I was not in one room but
in a series. I turned in surprise to the _caïd_. He smiled at my
astonishment and explained that at Kourdane every guest had his
private suite—bedroom, sitting-room, dining-room—and that in
the old days of the Great Marabout meals were sent separately to
each person who spent the night there. The importance of the repast
varied according to the standing of the guest, but great or small,
he was waited on in his own apartment. Afterward every one met in
the drawing-room for coffee.
“Even now,” he added, “we shall dine in the dining-room
without our host, who will be served apart.”
I could find nothing to say; the old baronial hall of the Middle
Ages with the high table seemed eclipsed.
We returned to the garden and were led with reverence to the tomb of
the _marabout_. It was built round an ancient tree under which he was
wont to take his afternoon sleep. A light burned perpetually there.
We visited the domain, and the richness of the vast garden in the
middle of the desolate land was almost as impressive as the pomp
of the house.
At seven-thirty we dined, and as the _caïd_ had predicted, our
meal was partaken without the host. There was a sheep roasted
whole, with one of the best Bordeaux wines I had tasted for a long
time. Afterward the little _marabout_ came in and took his coffee
with us in the gorgeous drawing-room. We talked for a while about
shooting and then, turning toward a battered piano, contrasting
sadly with the rest of the furnishings, he asked if any one could
play. My English companion was persuaded to approach the keyboard.
The holy atmosphere inspired him to play Nazareth, but the sounds
evoked from the yellow notes were so unexpected that he swiftly
changed into a Waldteufel waltz, though it did not sound at all
like the tune I knew. However, this did not in the least matter,
and the Arabs sat spellbound as the unspeakable discords burst from
the instrument which had not been tuned for fifty years.
Finally the party broke up and we retired to our respective
apartments in an atmosphere of decadent grandeur. During the night
I was awakened by the casements rattling, and though I tried to
turn over and sleep again, I knew instinctively what it meant. As
soon as I was called I walked out on to the terrace and at once
realized that my intuition was right. A fierce wind was blowing up
from the southeast and clouds of sand and dust were whirling across
the desert. As the day increased the wind rose and the sand which
had merely been coming in gusts became a cloud which swept across
the land, enveloping all.
The sun tried to pierce the pall of dust, but little by little
it was obliterated and the atmosphere became that of a sea mist
mixed up with a London fog. Dust, sand, grit filtered its way in
everywhere while the wind roared through the cypress trees and
about the house. By lunch-time the sand-storm was at its height
and the light of day was no brighter than at dusk. We had, however,
promised to go over to Aïn Mahdi, a few miles farther on, and visit
the head _marabout_. We rolled ourselves in burnouses, wrapped our
heads in _chechs_, and started off in the car. The Djebel Amour was
quite obscured, and the whirling sand stung our faces, while above,
miles above it seemed, the great yellow cloud swept on.
Aïn Mahdi is a holy city, walled and fortified, which lies at the
western end of the Djebel Amour. Built about the eleventh century it
used to be a university town and a city of great learning, where some
of the most valuable manuscripts were produced. During the middle
of the last century the holy order of the Tidjanis was founded and
took up its headquarters here. The Tidjanis have branches all over
the Moslem world, which explains the riches of Kourdane, as well as
the great fortune of the old gentleman we were going to see. All
the members of these branches send their yearly offering to the
seat of their order, and the annual revenue of the _marabout’s_
family probably exceeds any income in the world.
We passed in through a square archway and stopped in front of
two fine old doors standing at right angles to one another in the
corner of a small square. The first was the mosque, the second the
_zaouia_. Taking off our shoes we entered the mosque. Built on old
foundations, the present structure is only some hundred years old,
but it is exceedingly picturesque. A courtyard with tall trees
growing in the middle first meets the eye; at the foot of the
opposite wall is an old bronze cannon captured from Abd-el-Kader,
who besieged the holy city in 1838.
Turning to the left, we entered the shrine, small and dim, but which
nevertheless disclosed some lovely green tiles lining the walls. On
the floor were beautiful carpets, while banners of the saints hung
from the graceful arches. On the far side a dark mass, suggesting
a catafalque, with glints of gold and silver and precious stones,
draped about with costly stuffs, could be seen, and under it the
tomb of the Great Marabout, founder of the order.
On leaving the mosque we went to the _marabout’s_ house and were
received by his son, a very strong negroid type, but always with
that look of self-assurance, that almost regal presence. He could
not have been more than twenty, but he held out his hand to be
kissed as if he ruled the world.
His house was clean but modern, and after eating cakes and drinking
sweet tea we took a walk through the town. Unlike most of the oasis
villages it is built entirely of stone, and though the houses might
be in a better state of repair, it gives a more solid impression
than the usual mud streets. Another most striking thing is that
the women not of _maraboutic_ blood all go about unveiled, and the
marriages are not arranged as in ordinary Mohammedan centers—by
the parents— but the young men are allowed to court the ladies
of their choice, who are at liberty to refuse their suitors.
The female descendants of the _marabouts_ are, on the contrary,
veiled at the age of eight, and never unveil until they die.
My companion of Tadgemout took us to visit his uncle, the Caïd of
Aïn Mahdi, who again plied us with tea; from there we progressed
to the house of another _marabout_, and so on until we were so
saturated in mint and tea and coffee that we could hardly walk,
and we had practically no time to visit the looms where they weave
the famous blue and red carpets of the Djebel Amour. However, the
day was drawing on, and we had to think of returning to Kourdane,
so, accompanied by a host of _marabouts_ of all ages we reached our
car, where the accolades and hugs rebegan. One felt as if one had
stepped right back hundreds and hundreds of years into some scene of
the past, and indeed it might have been so, for the life of these
people has not changed in the least degree since the days of the
foundation of the city, when King Harold sat on the throne of Britain
and William the Conqueror cast longing glances across the channel.
Armor, trunk-hose, laces, curls, ruffles, knee-breeches, pantaloons,
tall hats, have come into fashion and disappeared in England since
those days, but to the children of Aïn Mahdi it has never occurred
to dress otherwise than in a _gandourah_ and burnous, and I don’t
suppose that it ever will.
When we left the gates of the city the wind had dropped, but the
sand still hung like a great pall over the land, just as when a
dust is raised in a room it hangs in the air for some time before
settling. Our visit was almost over, and next morning we took leave
of our hospitable little host, and returned to Laghouat, realizing
that we had had an experience which would last long in our minds.
4. _A Day’s Fishing in Southern Algeria_
Jelloul ben Lahkdar, _bash agha_ of the Larba tribe about the oasis
of Laghouat, is a man with the presence of an emperor, and when I
meet him I feel that I ought to kneel down and kiss his hand.
I do not do this, however, partly because it would be misconstrued,
and partly because the _bash agha_ is a charming old gentleman with
a sense of humor, and one whose soul is simplicity itself. He is
rather a tyrant with the younger members of his family, and I know
that they are very frightened of him, and that they are like young
schoolboys when he is with them.
However, this does not prevent his being a very entertaining
companion, and though he rarely maintains a lengthy conversation,
what he says is wise and to the point. When I met him, therefore,
in Chellala, a little market-town nestling among the hills some
two hundred miles north of the Sahara, I was delighted.
“Why, what are you doing here, _bash agha_?” I exclaimed,
after we had passed through the lengthy Arab greeting which is very
poetical but rather tedious in the long run.
“I have taken up my summer quarters with the Caïd Ali, my
cousin,” he replied. “And you, my friend?”
“Oh, I’ve just come up for the sheep-market.”
“You dine with us to-night,” he went on, “you will taste
some fish.”
“Thank you,” I replied, “it will be a pleasure to dine at
your hospitable table and a luxury to eat fish from the sea.”
“They do not come from the sea,” he replied. “They are fish
from the river at Taguine, forty kilometers from here.”
“Freshwater fish,” I exclaimed. “I have lived in this country
long, but I did not know such things existed in Algeria!”
He smiled.
“Come and see,” he went on, and, patting my arm, continued his
stately promenade down the road.
I went and found a party of Arab chiefs I knew. More solemn
greetings. At the beginning of the long meal the fish was served.
There was no doubt about it, they were good-sized river-fish,
a kind of carp or perch or gudgeon with little taste.
The _bash agha_ smiled at my surprise.
“Would you care to fish them yourself?” he enquired.
“Most certainly,” I replied, “but I have no rod or line
with me.”
“I am going to Taguine to-morrow,” he went on, “and if you
come here at eight I will give you a lift, and you can lunch there
with me. I’ll see that you are supplied with rods and lines.”
I thanked him warmly, wondering in myself what the fishing could
be like.
The next morning a _cavalier_ or Arab retainer came round and,
entering my room, roused me from my slumbers by telling me that
the _bash agha_ awaited me.
I bounded from my bed and looked out of the window at the clock on
the Administrateur’s office, but it said only seven. I pointed
this out to the _cavalier_ and explained that I had been warned for
eight. He did not seem in the least impressed, and only repeated
the information that the _bash agha_ awaited me. I gathered that
he expected me to run down in my pajamas. Arabs rarely undress,
and wash only at the Turkish bath and at meals, and they can not
understand that a European can’t walk straight out of his bed to
his daily duties.
I failed to convey any of this to the _cavalier_, and he left me,
repeating that the _bash agha_ awaited me.
At seven-thirty the Caïd Madani came into my room and, after
passing through the ritual of early morning salutations, informed
me that the _bash agha_ awaited me.
I said, “But he warned me for eight, and it is only
seven-thirty.”
He said, “But the _bash agha_ is ready.”
I said, “Well, he ought to have told me to come earlier.”
The _caïd_ did not seem to understand my point of view, and only
replied, “Well, perhaps you will hurry; I will wait down-stairs.”
I hurried, and eventually dashed out, followed by my companion,
to where the car waited. The _bash agha_ sat in a chair and smoked
a meerschaum pipe. He was surrounded by a group of Arab chiefs.
“What respect,” I said to myself. “The old man goes out for
the day and all the chiefs come to see him off.”
The _bash agha_ saluted me and made no reference to the hour of
our departure. I felt relieved.
His chauffeur got into the car, the old gentleman got in beside
him. The Caïd Madani motioned me to get in behind, the Caïd Madani
got in after me, the Caïd Aïssa got in after the Caïd Madani,
the Sheik Marhoun got in after the Caïd Aïssa, the _kadi_ got in
after the Sheik Marhoun. The Caïd Ali said, “I don’t think I
shall come, there isn’t much room left.”
All the others protested, so he got in too.
The Caïd Mohamed categorically refused to make a ninth.
The _bash agha_ turned round and said, “Well, I think we are all
here. Let us start.”
The car moved off. At the entrance of the town the Sheik Marhoun
said, “Do you think that we’ve got enough petrol to get there
and back?”
_“Inch Allah,”_ replied the chauffeur.
The _kadi_, who is a practical man, and who likes his comforts,
interposed, “I think you had better make certain.”
The chauffeur made certain and found there was enough to do about
one mile down hill.
We therefore returned to the town to get some. No one seemed to mind,
though; my seven Arabs made no comment and remained as placid as
if the filling of the petrol tank was merely a childish whim of
the _kadi_. I felt certain that they were saying to themselves,
“If the car lacks fuel, Allah will surely provide.”
I said to the _kadi_, “Lucky you thought of asking.”
He smiled benignly. I love the _kadi_. He is a charming person.
He is the Mohammedan Judge of Chellala, and he looks like an early
Victorian Englishman: fair beard, very white skin, a slightly
rubicund nose, clear blue eyes, and long white hands. If he wore
a pair of nankeen pantaloons and a choker instead of a burnous and
a turban, he would be the image of what Alfred de Musset must have
been in his prime. The _kadi_ has, moreover, a great sense of humor.
When we had filled up, we rolled off first of all through the
mountains of Chellala and then on to the great open plains which
run down to the Sahara, forming some of the finest pasture-land
of Algeria.
My companions all chatted away to each other about their
sheep-raising, their crops, their horses, their falcons, their
shooting—all those things so dear to these country gentlemen.
Occasionally they poked fun at the _kadi_, who is not a warrior nor
a sportsman, but he always had a sharp retort which sent them into
helpless laughter.
Finally we arrived at Taguine and stopped for a moment at the
monument which marks the place where the Duc d’Aumale’s flying
column captured the whole of the Emir-el-Kader’s _smala_ in 1843
and thus broke his long resistance.
This was an occasion to rain more jokes on the _kadi’s_ head,
as he is a direct descendant of the great _emir_, and it was the
great-uncle of the Caïd Aïssa, the loyal General Yusuf, who was
in command of the native cavalry on this occasion.
As soon as we alighted, the various chiefs had business to attend
to, and I was despatched to fish. I was furnished with a long pole,
on the end of which was a piece of thin rope to which was further
riveted a hook. There was also a box of worms.
My guide was an ex-soldier dressed in a tattered burnous on which
was proudly pinned the Croix de Guerre, and under which he wore a
seedy frock coat with satin facings. He had no socks, but a pair
of very battered slippers.
After trudging through the fields of standing barley for about half
an hour we came to a kind of brown ditch with a rivulet one yard
broad trickling sadly down the middle.
“Here is the river,” said the guide proudly.
I said nothing, but looked anxiously into the trickle, but all I
could see were five or six tortoises paddling about. Eton days when
I kept these beasts in a biscuit box in the wash-stand, hidden from
the eagle eyes of m’tutor, returned to me, but I somehow did not
connect them with rods and hooks.
My companion seemed to read my thoughts. “The fish are further
on,” he said simply; “come!”
I followed him along the bank and eventually we came to a deep,
muddy pool about twenty feet square. The Arab squatted down,
knotted a cork into the middle of the rope, baited my hook and
handed me the pole. I took it and felt inclined to laugh. It
reminded me of that stupid Christmas game where one fishes for
useless presents out of a tub. However, I lowered the worm into
the opaque water and waited. Two minutes had hardly passed when
down went the cork. Instinctively I struck. Memories of sudden
thrills by tumbling streams, the hiss of a line running out, the
bend of the rod, flashed before me. But they were only visions,
for I had struck so violently, and the string or cable at the end
of my pole was so strong, that I jerked the fish right out of the
pool and on to the bank.
My fisherman instantly rescued it from the hook and I took it up
to examine it. I expected to find the mud-fish which I had often
come across in certain Indian rivers; but not at all. In shape it
resembled a perch, but though the fins were red, there were none
of the sharp points on the back, and the color was more that of a
carp. Its weight was about two ounces.
I continued fishing. We visited some three or four pools, and in
two hours I caught nearly one hundred of these fish. The majority
were like the first, but there were a dozen or so of over a quarter
of a pound, and two must have weighed a good twelve ounces.
Finally surfeited with this somewhat crane-like occupation, I
trudged back.
Clouds were banking up over there toward the north, and the Arab
watched them with interest.
“Two days, rain now, _sidi_,” he exclaimed, “will double
our crops and afford pasturage for the flocks for the rest of
the summer.”
I reached the house of the Caïd Aïssa to find my friends all
sitting in a circle on a priceless Djebel Amour carpet, and looking
hungrily out of the door where four Arabs turned a sheep spitted
on a long pole before a brushwood fire. The sheep was becoming
a glorious golden color as the chief turnspit poured fat on its
roasting sides. After my long walk the smell of this cooking meat
roused my appetite.
I slipped off my shoes and went and sat down on a cushion beside
the _bash agha_. I told him all about my fishing exploits, but
he didn’t seem to take the least interest in my tale. He merely
turned to me and said: “These foolish young men have brought you
out to lunch here and they have forgotten to bring knives or forks
or plates, so you will have to eat like us.”
“Oh,” I replied, rather nervously, “I consider that eating
with one’s hands is much more cleanly than using knives and forks
which may not have been washed.”
The _bash agha_ grunted and the others looked anxiously about. I
realized that the old man was in one of his tyrannical moods.
At last one of the cooks came in and demanded if he should serve.
“Of course,” said the _bash agha_, “but where is the Caïd
Madani?”
“He is saying his prayers,” ventured the Sheik Marhoun.
The _bash agha_ said, _“Alham dullah!”_ (“May Allah be
praised”), but his eyes expressed, “Why the deuce must this
idiot say his prayers at lunchtime?”
I was seized with an uncontrollable desire to laugh, so I went to
the door and I saw, out on the plain, the tall figure of Madani,
his burnous spread out before him, bowing and prostrating himself
with that complete lack of self-consciousness so remarkable in all
Mohammedan devotions.
However, he finished and, after remaining for a moment in meditation
gazing out toward Mecca, he took up his burnous and returned to us.
A low table and tray were brought and placed before the _bash
agha_. He motioned me to seat myself beside him, he called the
_kadi_, and he called an aged _agha_ who seemed to have suddenly
grown out of the earth at the smell of food. The others went and
squatted at a respectful distance from the old man and spoke in
whispers.
A man passed round with a brass basin and jug and we all washed
our hands in silence.
A large bowl of _schorba_, highly spiced soup, was placed on the
table, some loaves of barley bread and some wooden spoons. We all
dipped into the bowl and commenced the meal. When the _bash agha_
had finished we all put down our spoons, which were carried away
with the bowl and placed before the others.
The long Arab midday meal began: the _bourak_, or sausage roll;
the _mechoui_, which we clawed at with our fingers; the _leham
lalou_, stewed mutton with prunes; the _kous-kous_; and finally
the honey cakes.
As we finished each dish the remains were taken to the others,
who by this time had been joined by the _bash agha’s_ chauffeur.
A large jug of skimmed milk was passed round and we all took a sip.
_“Alham dullah,”_ said the _bash agha_.
_“Alham dullah,”_ repeated the _kadi_ with the aged _agha_
and the young _caïds_.
The man passed round with the brass tray and jug and the water,
and the _bash agha_ went through a lengthy toilet which commenced
with his beard and ended with his fingers.
Coffee appeared.
We all sighed contentedly, the tension of before lunch had
disappeared. The _bash agha_ lighted his pipe. I did the same,
while the others looked at us with envy, as they themselves could
not smoke in the old chief’s presence. Gradually they slipped
toward the door to get at their cigarettes.
“I wish to play cards,” suddenly said the _bash agha_.
The _caïds_ paused at the door.
“Go on, Madani,” said the Caïd Aïssa.
“No, no, it’s not my turn,” he replied.
“And it isn’t mine,” said Marhoun.
“The _kadi_ must play,” said the Caïd Ali.
“Yes, send along the _kadi_,” they all said.
“But I am always made to do this,” protested the man of peace,
“and I always lose.”
“It’s about all you’re fit for,” laughed Marhoun.
This was considered a great joke, and they hustled him back into
the presence of the _bash agha_, smiling at his woebegone expression.
He squatted down opposite the old gentleman, the chauffeur
brought in some stones and placed them between the two players
for counters. That mysterious Hispano-Mauresque game began, a game
which came from the Peninsula when the Christian kings retook the
Alhambra and drove out the Arabs. The _kadi_ looked more and more
like an early Victorian dandy than ever.
I sat and watched while the others poked fun at the victim,
discreetly, from the corner of the room.
But this time luck seemed to favor the judge and he began to win;
the _bash agha_ got cross again; then he got sleepy; his head began
to nod, and finally he dropped off. The _kadi_ turned to me and
winked knowingly while he gathered up his winnings.
I dozed off too. Arab lunches are conducive to slumber, and I
understand why the Orientals recline at their repasts. . . .
Suddenly I was roused by Madani. “We ought to be getting away,”
he said, “but the _bash agha_ is still asleep.”
“Well, wake him,” I replied.
“Oh, I can’t. None of us can; we’d never hear the end of
it,” broke in Madani. “But you can.”
“But I certainly won’t,” I retorted. “I’m sleepy enough
myself. Make the _kadi_ do it!”
This seemed to amuse Madani, and he returned to the other chiefs
and I saw that my suggestion was causing them joy. But not to the
_kadi_, who, as usual, protested, and I realized that he was the
sort of joke-man of the district. At last, however, he was bustled
into the room.
He looked anxiously about and, finally, seeing the large brass tray
on which the _mechoui_ had been served, he took it up and dropped
it with a crash on the part of the floor which was uncarpeted. Then
he fled out on to the plain.
The _bash agha_ opened one eye, then the other, then seemed about
to sleep again. However, at that moment a diversion was caused by
the entry of the aged _agha_ with the statement that there was a
man with a petition to make.
The _bash agha_ came to and, sitting up, settled his turban and
became at once the “Emperor.”
The _caïds_ became “princes,” and squatted down in a semi-circle
on the carpet; the chauffeur ventured back and started mending a
tire. The petitioner marched in and, after kissing the old man’s
shoulder, went and sat at a distance. For ten minutes he said
“How-do-you-do” in different poses and accents. For a moment
there was a lull, and then all of a sudden the storm burst, as in
a torrent of words he poured out his story.
He talked so rapidly that I only understood vaguely, but I gathered
that his flock had been stolen by nomads of the _bash agha_ who
had come up from the south. The _bash agha_ was silent for a time,
then he too burst into a flood of verbiage.
It was a most extraordinary group. The _bash agha_ at one end
of the room, sitting on a heap of cushions, his whole attention
riveted on the man before him who squatted, speaking rapidly,
but with practically no gestures.
Occasionally one of the _caïds_ would throw in a remark,
but otherwise one would have supposed that the matter was quite
indifferent to them. And yet it was a question which to these Arabs
was one of the greatest importance.
The complaint was of the tribe of the district who accused one of
the nomad tribes of the Larba, now pasturing near-by, of stealing
sheep. The sheep had disappeared ten days ago and had been tracked
with that mysterious instinct across those limitless wastes of desert
to Ghardaia, three hundred miles to the south. The man wanted their
return as well as the punishment of the thieves.
The _bash agha_ turned to the _kadi_, who for the moment ceased
being the joke-man, and spoke a few words to him.
The _kadi_ nodded.
The _bash agha_ addressed the Caïd Madani.
“This affects your tribe. You will send a mounted man to Ghardaïa
forthwith. He will apprehend the robbers and have them drive the
flocks back here. You will bring them before me at Chellala.”
_“Inch Allah,”_ acquiesced Madani.
Justice was done. A horseman was to ride over the desert to Ghardaïa
and back, and I pictured a Lord-Lieutenant of Sussex saying to the
sheriff: “You will tell a constable to bicycle to Edinburgh and
fetch back a couple of hundred sheep,” just as one might say,
“Go and post this letter.” It was a marvelous example of the
simplicity of primitive justice.
The _bash agha_ rose. The complainant kissed his turban, and we
all followed the old man out.
During lunch the sky had become gray and the wind was coming from
the north in cold gusts, bringing clouds of sand and grit.
We all piled into the car again and started on our return journey.
The sky grew darker and in a few minutes the rain began. Rain in
Algeria is quite common on the coast in winter or spring, but rain
in the neighborhood of the desert rarely comes after March, and
when it does it is good for the cultivator but it is not amusing
for those who travel. The first dried river-bed we came to was far
from dry, the second was running with water, the dry track before
the third had become a morass, the third was gurgling gaily down,
and the road was an inch or so under water.
At this point we punctured. We all got out and looked at the flat
tire, but no one did anything.
I said, “Suppose we change the wheel.”
The chauffeur said, “The spare wheel is punctured too. We must
change the inner tube, but I don’t think it will last long.”
We got out the inner tube; it looked rather wretched, and a
preliminary pump-up revealed that it held little air. Another
one was found which appeared to be air-tight. The rain swept icily
across the great plain. The kadi shivered and drew his burnous about
him. Marhoun took off the wheel; the _bash agha_ smoked his pipe as
he sat on the running-board. The _caïds_ talked and laughed at the
miserable _kadi_. There was none of that fever and excitement and
cursing of the chauffeur which one would have seen among Europeans
on such an occasion. The chauffeur had forgotten to mend the spare
wheel; it was the will of God and nothing could be done to remedy it.
At last we started again, but the next _oued_ was a rushing
torrent. The car floundered in water swirled about the axles, the
engine roared, the chauffeur shouted something and every one, except
the _bash agha_, tumbled out into the water. I followed and started
pushing, while the water raced round us about up to our knees. The
car began to move, and at last laboriously climbed out of the river.
“Only just in time,” exclaimed Aïssa. “Look.”
I did so, and I saw, to my amazement, a kind of swirling mass of
water sweeping down the river, and before I could count two the
_oued_ had become a raging, overflowing torrent. A few minutes
sooner and car and all would have been swept away.
“Luckily that is the last _oued_,” said Ali.
We all got in and started off again. The chauffeur put on speed,
and we bumped furiously over the holes in the road. Then the other
tire went. We stopped and all got out and then all got in again.
_“Ma kanch chambre à air,”_ said the chauffeur. (“No more
inner tubes.”)
In a few minutes the original tire went again, and we all got out
again and all got back. We crawled along on the rims. Suddenly I
became aware that my feet were getting very cold and wet. I could
not understand. I asked Madani, but he had reached a state when he
no longer seemed to care. He was telling his beads.
I moved my legs about and suddenly, to my astonishment, discovered
that my feet were hanging in space. I peered down and perceived
water and mud splashing all round me, and realized that the bottom
of the car had fallen out. Visions of the pantomime gentleman
whose carriage loses its floor and who is obliged to run between
the wheels, sprang before me. And I saw myself and Madani being
precipitated on to the road and having to run wildly back to
Chellala, unable to make the chauffeur hear our cries of distress.
However, this catastrophe did not take place, for the simple reason
that the car suddenly stopped of its own accord. We all got out
again. No one seemed to dare to ask what the matter was.
_“Ma kanch petrol,”_ said the chauffeur calmly.
“No more petrol!” exclaimed the _bash agha_ nervously. It was
the first time during the whole of the proceedings that he had
shown any emotion.
_“Ma kanch,”_ repeated the driver.
No one spoke. I heard Madani murmuring _“Mektoub,”_ but
otherwise there was silence as we stood there in the driving rain
watching the car. Then suddenly the _bash agha_ said, as if to the
skies, “I pray Allah that it is raining like this in the Tell;
my brother’s crops have sore need of rain.”
_“Inch Allah,”_ they all said.
It filled me with amazement. I had before me the complete abstraction
of immediate discomfort, the unaccountable Oriental mind, praying
to Allah, miles from anywhere, soaked to the skin, and with no
means of getting home. I thought of my English friends and their
attitude and thoughts on such an occasion. However, it was no good
standing in contemplation.
“Well, what do you propose doing?” I ventured at last. “I am
getting cold.”
“I don’t know,” replied the old man, brushing drops of rain
off his beard. “What do you think, my friend?”
“To my mind the only possible thing to do is to walk back before
it gets too dark,” I said.
“But the rain,” said the _kadi_, “and the mud, and the wind!”
“A little rain and wind more or less never did me any harm,”
I replied; “though perhaps I am more used to it than you.”
“Of course, he is right,” said Madani. “We will leave the
chauffeur with the car and we’ll be in Chellala before six.”
“Come on,” said the Caïd Ali. “I know a short cut across
the hills which will reduce our journey by at least a third.”
The _kadi_ started murmuring again, but seeing that the _bash agha_
agreed to this proposal, he felt that he could not let an old man of
seventy do what he feared to do, so he reluctantly followed us. In
single file we started across the waste of water and tufts of alfa.
Madani led, then came Ali, after him Aïssa, then the _bash agha_,
then myself, and behind me the _kadi_, with Marhoun bringing up the
rear. The wind blew fiercely across our path, bringing great sheets
of soaking rain, but our camel’s hair burnouses kept the wet out
wonderfully. Only the _kadi_, who had a kind of black woven burnous,
complained that he was getting soaked. I distinctly heard Marhoun
laughing in the driving rain.
Gradually we approached the hills, all wrapped in mist, and
descending into a habitually dry river-bed, splashed up the muddy
bank.
Suddenly the _kadi_ gave a yell.
“I’ve lost my shoes,” he screamed.
“Where?” I exclaimed.
“In the mud! They got stuck and came off!”
The procession stopped. Aïssa started laughing. I became perfectly
helpless as I watched the wretched judge making futile dives for
his slippers in the muddy torrent.
At last Marhoun got the better of his mirth and managed to secure
the lost property, but, as can be imagined, the elegant slippers
looked like bits of old leather ready for the dust-heap. The _kadi_
began wailing again, and said he would go back, but Marhoun pushed
him up the bank and he plodded on.
We soon came to a goat-track and gradually began climbing the steep
slopes of the hill. As we rose, the mist closed down upon us and
wrapped us in its damp embrace. I could no longer see Madani, and
the _bash agha_ was only a dim form before me. The _kadi_ I didn’t
need to see as his wail of malediction on motor-cars and excursions,
and idiots who could live out in the desert, never ceased.
After an hour or so we reached the summit and gathered together in
a ghostly group.
“Not very far now,” said Ali gaily. “Reminds me of winter in
the trenches. Eh, Aïssa?”
“Yes, the Vosges,” he replied. “Not too tired, _bash agha_?”
The old man shook his head and he brushed the drops from his burnous.
“Well, let’s proceed,” said Madani. “We don’t want to be
caught by the night.”
“My shoes are full of stones,” moaned the _kadi_. “Well,
take them out,” exclaimed Marhoun.
Without further ado we started along the crest and soon began
descending another path. The wind was less fierce on this side of the
mountain, but the mist swirled like a great shroud about us. None of
us spoke as we plodded on in our dripping burnouses. My mind became
a sort of damp blank as I mechanically followed in the procession.
Suddenly the _bash agha_ said to me over his shoulder, “What has
become of Miss G., who was in Laghouat for two months this spring?”
“Eh?” I said.
He repeated his question.
“Oh, she has gone back to Scotland,” I replied.
“Why did she go?” again asked the old man.
“Oh, I suppose she wanted to see her family and get back to this
sort of weather,” I answered vaguely.
“She was a very nice girl,” said the _bash agha_. “She was
full of gaiety. I liked her.”
He lapsed into silence again. I followed on, wondering how the brain
of Jelloul ben Lahkdar, _bash agha_ of all the Larbas, reasoned,
that he should suddenly ask me the whereabouts of an English friend
of mine while descending the slopes of the mountains of Chellala
in a Scotch mist. The working of an Oriental mind has always been
and always will be a mystery to me.
However, the mist was beginning to clear and the rain was abating
when suddenly, from nowhere, the sun, brilliant in its setting,
burst through the clouds, and we looked out on to the smiling
village of Chellala nestling among its green trees, and out on to
the great plains of the Sersou, right away to the blue mountains
of the Atlas in the distance. That wonderful Algerian climate,
where there is never a day without a little sun to keep one’s
spirits alive to the glories of nature!
Every one seemed to cheer up.
I turned round and looked at the _kadi_ and I mercifully restrained
my laughter, as the picture of wretchedness he presented was too
genuine to admit of more jests.
“You’ll be in dry clothes soon, _kadi_,” I exclaimed.
“I shall take great care never to leave my home again, _Inch
Allah_,” he groaned.
At the moment Marhoun started singing one of those strange, melodious
songs of the great South with the deep, long note drawn out at
the end. Aïssa picked it up and sent back the verse, trembling,
high and melancholy. Marhoun returned with the refrain, so soft,
so gentle, that I approached the _bash agha_ and asked him the
meaning of the words.
He smiled and said, “I can not give it exactly translated because
it is too beautiful in Arabic, but it runs thus: ‘My love is as
great as the fire, and it consumes my heart.’”
And I repeated it to myself, wondering on the strange nature of the
Arabs, as the sun, all orange and gold, dipped behind the hills,
wrapping the land in golden radiance.
5. _The Turkish Bath in Algeria_
We have heard a great deal in this book about religion; let us turn
our attention for a brief moment to its great adjunct, especially
in the Moslem faith— cleanliness.
To the average Englishman the words “Turkish bath” suggest
tiled chambers, whiteness, great heat, much water and complete
exhaustion. This is what he has seen in Jermyn Street. In his
imagination he may have conjured up a vision of the _hammam_ of the
East with its marble halls and multi-colored tiles, its splashing
fountains and exhilarating hashish, while ebony-bodied negroes
flit noiselessly about. Now, though this average Englishman will
never be bathed in this _Arabian Nights_ atmosphere in Algeria,
let it be known that his imagination has not altogether run into
the realms of fable.
In certain private houses of great chiefs this atmosphere, to a
lesser degree, exists, and the owner of the bath insists on all the
most luxurious rites being carried out. However, as this remains
private property it can not be entered into, and it will suffice to
describe the common Turkish bath known in Algeria as _le bain maure_,
which resident or tourist, pedler or _caïd_, respectable maiden
or _femme du Quartier_, must use if cleanliness is to be observed.
In this haunt of steam and strange odors there will be found neither
the tiled chambers of Jermyn Street nor the splashing fountains of
Haroun al-Raschid. The entrance to the bath is usually imposing;
this is presumably to attract the passer-by. The entrance-hall is
also roomy, and with a purpose, as it is here that many of the
Faithful come to say their prayers after their ablutions. After
this there is a series of primary disillusions. I purposely use
the word “primary.”
To undress, one is ushered into a small chamber, where probably
a number of other persons of all ranks and ages are already
undressing. One hastily confides one’s purse to the owner or
manager of the bath, who puts it in his pocket. This looks risky
at first sight, but it is in reality quite safe. Having disrobed,
an emaciated bandit appears and, placing a towel about one’s body
and one about one’s head, proffers a pair of wooden clogs, which
are flat pieces of wood the shape of the sole of a shoe with a strap
to go across the foot. They appear to be harmless affairs at first
sight; I emphasize “sight,” for the moment one suggests that
they should be modes of locomotion one is disillusioned. For some
unknown reason these clogs have a distaste to progress in a forward
direction and seem bent on going either to the right or to the left,
or in both directions at the same time—anyway, at right angles
to the proposed progress of the wearer, which rationally should be
toward the bath.
At first it needs the strength and will power of a great and
persevering man to advance with the aid of the wall out of the lofty
court to the heated chamber. The passage is usually narrow and full
of stagnant water, the light is conspicuous by its absence, and as
one gropes for the entrance one’s mind rushes back to memories
of the dungeons beneath the Ducal Palace in Venice. When at last
the massive door has been pulled back, one’s terror, if anything,
increases. A cloud of damp, suffocating steam fills the chamber,
the body becomes suddenly moist, and one instinctively turns to
the exit. However, it is too late; the emaciated bandit is behind,
and pushes one forward through pools of water to a large square slab.
The eyes are gradually getting used to the dim light thrown by a
single sputtering candle, and one distinguishes little by little
the forms of other people washing in various corners of the room.
The heat is intense, the steam swirls about the ceiling, the
grunts and murmurs of the bathers make one think of Doré’s
illustrations of Dante’s _Inferno_. However, little time is allowed
for reflection in this place of torment, as suddenly the skeleton
which has done the undressing and the guiding pushes one on to the
floor, where, lying on a kind of blue duster, one awaits the rack!
[Illustration: _Photograph by Mr. Julian Sampson_
The Oasis of Guerrera, from the Maison Arabe]
[Illustration: Roman Sarcophagus at Tipaza]
[Illustration: Pictures Done by Roman Children on Damp Bricks Drying
in the Sun]
And here the beauty, the glorious compensation for all the rest,
begins. Of all the masseurs in the world, be they British, Latin,
or Scandinavian, there are none I have met who can equal the Arab
of the Algerian south. No training, no knowledge of anatomy—these
men, by some curious instinct, understand the wants of the body,
and as one lies in this steaming atmosphere one feels all the
pains and poisons of the human frame being magically pressed out
of one. It is a complete relaxation, a complete cure to all ills,
and when the coarse glove is put on and the rolls of fat come out
of the opened pores of the skin, it is done as gently as a mother
powdering her baby. Soap follows, warm water after that, until the
cold douche, poured out of a wooden bucket, brings one to one’s
feet and, transformed and light-hearted, one returns fearless along
the dark passage to be massaged with towels till dry.
The result is magical; magical the swiftness with which it is all
accomplished, magical when one realizes that the total fee for the
bath is five francs.
The white-tiled chamber and the exhilarating hashish may add to the
delight of the thing, but to feel a sensation of real fitness give
me the common Arab masseur in the common Arab bath in the far south.
I am told that the negresses who look after the women who attend
the bath on specific days of the week have also great merits. Of
this I am ignorant, but of all things I miss most, when away in
Europe, my emaciated bandit who “masses” out of my body all
weariness—mental and physical—disease and cares, who sends me
out into the street capable of sitting down to write a chapter of
_Algeria from Within_.
6. _The Keef Smoker_
Before closing these sketches of Arab life a word must be said on
a vice which is luckily not very prevalent, but which nevertheless
exists in many centers.
I speak of keef-smoking.
Keef is the dried flower of the hemp-plant chopped up and smoked
like tobacco, rolled in a cigarette, or in the bowl of a small
pipe. In a different form it is the basis of the hashish sweets,
rarely seen in Algeria, but very common in the Near East.
The effect of keef on the smoker is to make him practically
independent of food and sleep as long as he is under its influence,
and a habitual keef-taker is easy to detect. His eyes are very
bright, his face is pale and drawn, his arms and hands are terribly
thin, his movements are restless. At the same time he is not at all
dazed like one under the influence of a drug, and though after a few
days’ smoking he will drift off into a kind of feverish sleep,
during the early periods he is extraordinarily lucid. In fact,
it is said that the first effects of keef are to make the brain
work at three times its normal pace.
European tourists in the south occasionally get hold of some keef
to smoke, and complain that it has had no effect at all beyond
giving them a sore throat. This is quite normal, as the fact of
smoking a little hemp in a pipe or cigarette will hurt no one
if not continued. To feel the effect of keef one must smoke for
at least one night through, and three days are necessary to get
really poisoned. The danger of an experiment of this kind is that
the desire to go on may seize one, and once keef has taken hold of a
man it is rare to see it give him up. However, it is quite amusing
to go to a keef-smoking den, all the more so as it has to be done
in secret and with the connivance of a smoker, as no outsiders know
where these little nocturnal _réunions_ take place.
As a matter of fact I doubt whether there is much danger of the
police interfering as, though it is against the law to smoke keef,
the French are not going to try to stop something which must always
go on, and unless the offense is deliberately open they will not
peer into the dark streets to catch a few poor Arabs.
The town where keef-smoking is the most prevalent, I believe, is
Ghardaïa—not of course among the puritan Mzabites, but in the Arab
quarter. This is partly due to the fact that these Arabs are far away
from their own people, and club together in small groups to do what
they would not dare do before their relatives in their own oases.
I remember going to one of these places in the Mzab with some
English friends who wanted to see the den for themselves. We were a
curious party—an English girl, a short-story writer and another
man connected with letters—none of whom knew the country well,
while our Arab guide was the _khodja_ of the Bureau Arabe, a man
unbelievably fat, who rather sailed along the street than walked.
We passed through interminable little streets, pitch black, fell
up and down steps until we came to a tumble-down house, all dark
save for a yellow light which flickered in an upper chamber. The
tinkle of a mandolin floated out, a warm breeze sent little whirls
of dust up the narrow way, the stars stood out bright in the sky.
Our immense companion tapped mysteriously at the door, the sound
of the mandolin ceased, and we heard some one coming cautiously
down-stairs. A few whispered words were exchanged, followed by
the noise of heavy bolts being drawn, the door swung back, and
we found ourselves in front of a rickety wooden staircase at the
foot of which stood an Arab in tattered clothes, who held aloft a
hissing acetylene lamp. He scrutinized us closely, and then, bidding
us enter, drew aside as we filed slowly past and followed our fat
friend up the stairs. The janitor waited till we were all inside,
and then with a clash shot back the bolts, and we felt ourselves
prisoners in this illicit haunt.
At the top of the stairs we came to a room dimly lighted, and the
first thing which struck our attention was an enormous skin full
of water. When I say that it struck our attention it is not quite
exact, as in reality it was struck by the head of my friend S. A.,
who had not noticed it until a stream of icy water poured down his
back. When we had recovered from this pleasing little incident we
looked about us.
On the floor all round the little room squatted men of all ages
and grades—some in rags, some in prosperous-looking _gandourahs_,
some in very modern red fezzes—but all with the same hungry look on
their drawn faces. At the far end the Arab who had opened the door
attended to the little fireplace ornamented with colored tiles and
on which he prepared coffee and mint tea; in the middle of the group
sat the mandolinist playing with a far-away look in his shining eyes.
The air was heavy with a sweet, rather sickly smell, an odor not
unlike new-mown hay, only stronger. A bench was mysteriously produced
for us and for our stout companion, who explained that if he sat on
the ground he would never be able to get up again. Tea was placed
before us, and then rather diffidently one of the corpses on the
floor rose and offered Miss G. a small pipe. Seeing she was prepared
to smoke, he drew a wallet from the folds of his _gandourah_ and
filled the bowl with the strange grayish-green, tobacco-looking
matter, and handed it back to her.
In the meanwhile we had also been supplied with similar pipes, and
in a few moments we had lighted up. The taste was not pleasant to
the regular pipe-smoker like myself, and at the same time it was
not as nasty as my first attempts at smoking when in the depths of
a wood my brother and I, aged nine and ten, filled a cast-off pipe
of my father’s with brown paper in the belief that we were smoking!
Keef is better than brown paper. The taste and smell were rather
like that of hay.
When the company saw that we were quite human and ready to join in
the fun there was a general relaxation. All the pipes were lighted,
the mandolinist tuned up, and soon the whole crowd was as merry as
children at a birthday party. In fact, so great was the effect of
the atmosphere that S. A. insisted on singing himself, and would
have danced had not M. J., who has his interests at heart, held
him forcibly on the bench.
I don’t know how long this would have gone on had not a discreet
signal from the street warned us that the police were making their
rounds. In a second the light was dimmed, the music ceased, and we
sat as still as mice until we heard the measured tramp of the Arab
constables disappearing up the street. We felt it more discreet to
depart ourselves, so we took leave of our fevered-eyed hosts and
returned to our inn.
Though I spent a rather restless night, I don’t know if it was
the effect of the reef or not, and we all certainly felt quite fit
the next day.
Still, I can never think of that night without smiling; it was all
so mysterious, so much part of another world, and I often wonder
if M. J., as he sits editorially in London, or S. A., scooping in
royalties, or Miss G., in her English surroundings, realize how
they peeped into the past for a few seconds and lived again the
life which, if it had not been Algerian, would have probably been
celebrated by another De Quincey.