tribes unless he is known to be a skilful and plucky cattle lifter. The penalty, severe as it is, does not deter them, though the thief knows well enough what fate awaits him if caught red-handed. A flogging until death is near, and then to be thrown as a feast to the village dogs would, it might be thought, arrest their occupation; yet such is not the case. Quite lately the writer reached a village where, a few nights before, a victim

Sedentary Berbers.

paid this penalty. Caught in the act of stealing sheep, he was flogged with ropes until almost past recovery, then bound hand and foot, and, still conscious, handed over to be torn to pieces by the dogs. Horrible as is even the thought of such a death, it seems in no wise to influence the conduct of the tribes, and robbery is still to-day the aristocratic calling of the richer Berbers. Yet, strange as it may seem, the tribesmen are not by nature cruel. Devoted to their families, they

live a far more homely and happy domestic life than is the case with the Arabs, to whom they are also vastly superior in morality.

It is during these summer months that all the feasts and festivities of the tribes take place. Though the total adoption of Mohammedanism has largely influenced the Berbers in their traditions, there are yet to be discovered, by the careful observer, traces of older rites that bear no resemblance to the tenets of Islam. Principal amongst these is the marriage ceremony. The preliminaries to a wedding the sending of a deputation and presents to the bride's parents-much resemble the custom in use throughout Morocco, but here the similarity ends. The price is arranged which the bridegroom shall pay for his wife, and as, usually, the youth is not possessed of such a sum, a period is allowed for him to engage in almost nightly robberies of cattle, etc., until he can collect it-or die in the attempt. At length the day arrives and the bride, mounted upon a mare, is brought into her husband's village. Here she is received by the bridegroom's female relations in the tent which she is eventually to inhabit. A jar of butter is placed in her hands, with which, after raising it toward the stars, she smears the poles and crossbeam of the tent. The "haidus"-or national Berber dance-then takes place. Two long lines are formed, one of men, the other of women, who, facing one another, approach and retire, clapping their hands and singing to time beaten on drums. After the "haidus "food is served, steaming dishes of "kuskusu" and stewed mutton, with tiny cups of sweetened green tea, and finally the bridegroom is conducted to his tent by all his relatives.

Although the nomad Berbers are by far the most wild of all the race, it is perhaps

the sedentary division of the people who offer to the traveller the most attractive features, more especially from the strange castles they build and inhabit. The greater part of these are to be found only on the southern side of the main chain of the Atlas Mountains, a district which the writer has been the only Englishman to visit. Although on the northern slopes a few examples of this curious architecture exist, they can be counted almost on the fingers, and even then they do not offer all the peculiar characteristics to be found further to the south, where whole villages of betowered and battlemented castles call to mind the feudal times. Nor is the life of the people unlike what existed in England in the eleventh and twelfth centuries, for every tribe and subdivision of a tribe is at war, and even when, rarely enough, peace prevails amongst the tribes, every householder seems to seize the opportunity to wage war on his neighbor.

There is no sight more striking in all Morocco than the positions occupied by many of these castles, for usually some elevation above a river is chosen for their site, where the natural formation of the

ground gives additional protection in times of siege. Wherever an oasis exists in the northwest portion of the Sahara, these "ksor"-as they are called-are to be found, often rearing their towers far above the heads of the surrounding palm groves, and giving a warlike and majestic appearance to districts otherwise poverty stricken and inhospitable. Of all these "ksor" the castle of the Kaid of Glawa is perhaps the most important. Situated some six thousand feet above the level of the sea, and two thousand below the southern end of the Glawi pass, it dominates almost the only road leading from Morocco into the Saharan dominions of the Sultan. An hereditary family of governors resides within its walls, their jurisdiction extending over an enormous area, though it is only by force of arms that their authority is maintained. The present representation of the family is the Kaid Sid Madani, a young Berber chieftain, whose record of bravery and skill at arms upholds the traditions of his family. Continually at war with all or any of his neighbors, he seems seldom or never to obtain a respite, but as soon as one expe

dition is over, to be off upon another. Nor are the duties of holding in check the wild tribesmen over whom his authority extends, by any means sinecures, for the construction of the castles in which they reside often necessitates a long seige before submission can be extracted and the rebellious subjects punished. The material with which these castles are built consists of beaten soil, which forms a concrete hard and durable in a country where rain is rare. Under the action of water, however, it soon disintegrates, and the object of the attacking party is always, if possible, to weaken the foundations by this means. If the building is not situated above the reach of water, woe betide the inmates! for under the shadow of night and the protection of rifles, canals will be dug and the stream let loose upon the walls. The soil instantly crumbles away, and a breach is formed, if indeed the whole side of the building does not fall. Then commences the bloodshed; for no lives are spared, and every man and boy capable of carrying arms is put to death. So intense are the blood feuds and so largely has the population been decimated by war, that a life is worth a life, and a male spared may eventually mean the death of one or more

of the attacking force. In contrast, however, to this barbaric treatment of prisoners must be mentioned the case of captured women. With one exception it is all that can be desired, for the women and girls are returned to their relations, or their fellow tribes people, not a jot the worse for their adventure. The captor has the right marrying a captured woman, but only on the understanding that she becomes his legal wife, and that any children she may bear him shall eventually share equally in his property with those by any other wife he may possess. In this case the Berbers are far above the Arabs, for as often as not, with the latter, it is only the desire to obtain possession of the women that stirs them up to deeds of bravery. In the case of women in child, however, the Berber custom is revolting; for they are immediately put to death, for fear of an addition of a male child to the number of the enemy. Some idea of the state in which these tribes live can be gathered from this revolting custom, when it is considered necessary to look so far ahead as the years that must pass before the as yet unborn child can carry arms. None is more ready to deprecate with horror this custom than its

perpetrators. "A life is worth a life, and a life spared may mean the death of one of our own children," they say in excuse. Yet in spite of all this, the writer found a genuine desire for peace, a state the country has probably not experienced for a month together for several centuries, if not much longer.

In this great, gloomy castle of the Kaid of Glawa everything speaks of war. Laughter is seldom heard, and even the very slaves who attend to the household duties are armed. The massive towers that look down frowningly upon the court-yards could tell many a tale of bloodshed and horror, and beneath their foundations not a few prisoners lie in chains, passing their lives away in darkness under-ground. Yet the ardor and spirit of the race is not broken. Athletes one and all, they spend their time, when not fighting, in manly sports, at the chase, or in running races or dancing their war dances, rifles in hand.

One might be led to think from this dreary picture of the life on the southern slopes of the Atlas Mountains that the Berbers are savages. Far from it, though their education is little and their knowledge of the world bounded by the snow peaks and deserts that encircle them. In manners they are charming, and as hosts leave nothing to be desired. Few and far between are the Europeans who have climbed over the Atlas and descended to the castle of Glawa, but such as have reached it have been treated with the lavish hospitality for which, amongst the Moors, the place is famous, and with all the kindness and consideration of the best of hosts. The Kaid himself and his brothers are untiring in their endeavors to render life agreeable, and that without the great fault of the Arabs a vast inquisitiveness that finds an outlet in an unending series of questions. One of the most-to-be-commended customs of the Berbers is that it is a breach of etiquette to ply guests-native or Europeanwith queries as to their professions or the why and wherefore of their travels.

It would be difficult to imagine a country the nature of which is more inhospitable than that which these tribes inhabit. In winter the cold is intense, and the mountains are deep with snow. Even the caravan road over the Atlas is blocked for months together. In summer the arid VOL. XXXVI.—40

But

heat is equally severe, and little or nothing will grow except in a few sheltered valleys where some simple form of irrigation is possible. Here and there a few carefully constructed terraces on the mountain side allow of small crops of barley and turnips to be raised, but as a rule, the natives earn their livelihood as caravan men, driving their sturdy little mules over the passes, laden with the dates of Tafilet, and returning with rough iron bars to be forged into weapons and hoes. A hard, weary existence, indeed, spent in a climate which seems unsuitable to the support of life, with its fierce contrasts of heat and cold. the people are very poor and their time counts for little, as can be judged when it is mentioned that a man and a mule can be hired from Marakesh to Tafilet—a distance of some 300 miles of snow peaks and desert-for six Moorish dollars, about the equivalent of four and a half American dollars-and out of this pittance the man must find food for his mule and himself for the eleven or twelve days the journey occupies. Yet the people seem contented enough, and the little caravans of mules and donkeys keep coming and going, followed by their lithe drivers in their long black goats-hair cloaks. Good, cheerful fellows they are, singing as they skip from rock to rock, and the mountains round echo and re-echo their song until the whole country seems alive with voices. But the Berbers are not the sole inhabitants of these mountain peaks, for even here the Oriental Jew is found, engaged in such skilled labor as the situation demands. Gunsmiths, jewellers, shoesmiths, and petty traders, one and all are Jews, indistinguishable almost in appearance from their Mohammedan neighbors, and speaking Shelha-the Berber language. ber language. Their lives spent amongst the Berbers seem to have changed everything about them with the exception of their religion. They even go armed, and many a Berber has discovered that they can repay an insult with a bullet as readily as he himself. In parts there are whole villages of these Israelites, walled and fortified, and to them the Berbers resort to do their shopping.

These mountain Jews-unlike their coreligionists of the plains and cities-complain but little of the treatment they receive from the Mohammedans, for a system