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THE WALLS OF SOUSSE, TUNISIA

Photo by Neurdein

This ancient city was an important town when Carthage was in all its glory and it was spared by the Romans when they destroyed Carthage in 146 B. C. Like all Arab coast towns, it is protected by a wall

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HERE AND THERE IN NORTHERN AFRICA

picion upon Troglodytes of other districts and with hatred on a stranger. Many were the looks of hatred cast at me by the inhabitants of the rock caves as we wound around the narrow and slippery trail in front of their dwellings.

My companions, Mohammed and Brebisch, were very quiet; this was unknown country to them, and they remembered the stories told in their childhood about their great enemy, the Troglodyte town. of Guermessa.

About three months in the year the inhabitants of Guermessa live in their stone caves, dug deep into the sides of the mountain. Nine months of the year they spend as nomads on the borders of the Great Sahara, or in their gourbistents made of goats' and camels' hair woven together-on the mountain side, where their great herds of long-haired goats, broad-tailed sheep, and young camels can find pasturage.

Down in the valleys are to be found plantations of superb olive and fig trees, and here and there fields of barley. Every drop of rain has filtered down to the valley, and by a system of crude but practical stone walls the fields have been terraced, one below the other, so that all the water has been utilized; not one drop goes to waste.

When the olives and figs begin to ripen, the Troglodytes leave a few trustworthy men in their ksar, or fortified storehouse and citadel, fully armed, of course, and the rest move down to the valleys, where they can protect their olive and fig groves, for unless the fields were guarded day and night all the olives and figs would be stolen by Troglodytes of other districts.

Unlike the underground cave-dwellers of Matmata and the Houaia Mountains, the men of Guermessa have separate establishments for themselves, their wives and families.

How many caves were owned in Guermessa by the sons and grandsons of Sidi Hadj is impossible for me to state, but they owned a great number.

THE INTERIOR OF A CAVE-DWELLING

Sidi Hadj's own cave was large, and the rear part of the floor was raised

3

about a foot higher than the front of the cave. Rugs from Kairowan and Persia were laid over the stone floor and numerous Touareg leather cushions stuffed with sheeps' wool were strewn about.

These thick Oriental rugs were intended to sleep on and not to walk upon. The uneven stone floor of a Troglodyte cave is a very uncomfortable place to sleep on, but use a couple of thick Oriental rugs and cover oneself with a bernous, or Arab cloak, and you have a most comfortable bed.

On the stone walls of the cave hung a miniature arsenal of flint-lock pistols and long-barreled guns and shotguns. A very large wooden chest, painted green, with Moorish designs in red and gold, stood at the back of the cave, which was about 7 feet high by 14 feet wide and about 24 feet deep.

Two Persian pictures of Mecca decorated the walls, and some ornamental bernous for wearing during a fantasia, and the usual cous-cous plates and platters brought from Ghadames, usually used for decoration by the Troglodytes. They reminded me of our Indian woven plates and baskets of certain tribes of the Far West and New Mexico. They are so well woven that they hold water or liquid like a dish, and they have simple but decorative patterns worked in color.

Being far away from the wells, none of our animals were watered that evening. Arab horses of southern Tunisia are watered but once every 24 hours, and frequently not for 48 hours. It seemed to me terribly cruel, but the animals are used to it.

About 5 p. m. is the usual time for watering the horses. Strange to say, when watered they do not seem to want to drink more than half as much as horses in America. They like to splash their noses and heads and play with the

water.

We had an excellent dinner, prepared by the wives of Sidi Hadj's sons and Ben Saada, our own remarkable cook. About twelve of us ate first, including Mohammed ben Cadhi and Brebisch ben Kaliphe, my devoted friends and companions during my trip.

Here we see an Arab family on a journey. How

the fully draped

A CARAVAN ON THE MARCH

Photo by Bougalt

carefully the privacy of the women is secured, even under the difficulties of travel, is shown by palanquin for their use on the camel in the center

of

the

picture

Sidi Hadji as host was picturesque, and

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most

he entertained us with wonderful stories of his pilgrimage to Mecca and what he had seen and heard. He described the Kaaba, "The Holy of Holies," that curious rectangular building that contains the great uncut

ruby that has turned
black on account of the
sins of the world and is
now known as the Black
Stone. He told us that
Mecca was a sacred city
centuries before Mo-
hammed was born, and
the Kaaba was already

a great shrine.
the reason:

This is

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THE CURIOUS TROGLODYTE TOWN OF GUERMESSA

The inhabitants of this strange town, which is composed of three separate villages, are a fierce, warlike people, as are all the mountain-climbing
Troglodytes, or cave-dwellers, of southern Tunisia. Note the odd-shaped houses

preted, means "Stay where you are! Stay where you are!" or "Stop!" And the pool, or well, is known to this day as Zem-Zem. Around this spot was built the famous shrine of Mecca, toward which 220 million Mohammedans turn their faces and bow in prayer five times a day at the shrill sound of the muezzin's call to prayer:

"La il-ah-il-ah Allah. Mohammed ar - ra - sou - la Allah!

Allah is Allah! There is no God but Allah. Mohammed is the Prophet of God."

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Our

As these words rang out that evening at Guermessa my host, his sons, escort, and the guests left the caves and walked a few steps to where an unbroken view could be had on all sides. and, turning toward Mecca, they knelt and bowed together, touching their foreheads to the ground several times. (compare pages 9 and 106, 107, and 108).

None of the Troglodytes ever used a prayer rug: possibly they did in the mosques, but at prayer times I never intruded on their devotions, but out on the mountain sides and on the plains and the Sahara no prayer rug was

ever used.

THE DESERT AT EVENING

The impression of that evening will remain with me as long as memory lasts. Range after range of purple-colored tableland mountains that we had ridden over day by

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