CHAPTER IV.
Wednesday, May 5, to Thursday, May 20.
HE abnormal amount of wet delighted the Kabyles, for they knew it meant heavy crops; and they had suffered from droughty seasons, so that the olive harvest of the previous autumn had been an entire failure. However it was most annoying to us. What had happened? What had we done to deserve this? We began to consider the advisability of making some offering to Uncle Zaïd’s Kouba, to propitiate the gods.
For Jove his fury pours,
And earth is laden with incessant showers,
When guilty mortals break th’ eternal laws,
Or judges, bribed, betray the righteous cause;
From their deep beds he bids the rivers rise,
And opens all the floodgates of the skies:
Th’ impetuous torrents from their hills obey,
Whole fields are drowned, and mountains swept away;
Loud roars the deluge till it meets the main,
And trembling man sees all his labours vain.
Weather permitting we painted, and as our days much repeated each other, I shall not attempt to follow them regularly, but make desultory remarks upon such things as struck me. One day we went to a neighbouring market, Souk-es-Sebt; Saturday’s market. Unlike Souk-el-Jemāa, this is held at the top of a bare mountain. In clear weather this point must command a magnificent view; it was very fine with the Jurjura wreathed in clouds. I have given an illustration of men at a market selling fig-cuttings.
Some in deep mould
Plant cloven stakes, and (wondrous to behold!)
Their sharpened ends in earth their footing place,
And the dry poles produce a living race.
These fig-cuttings look like unpromising bundles of dry sticks; but ‘as the earth bringeth forth her bud, and as the garden causeth the things that are sown in it to spring forth,’ even so may the people ‘put on the garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness.’
Not till we arrived at the market did we perceive the reason for its being held at such an inconvenient and exposed spot; we then saw a number of villages before us, perched on the crests of precipitous ridges.
The market is on the boundary between the Aïth Ménguellath and a tribe called the Aïth or Beni Yahïa. Beni is the Arabic for ‘sons of,’ the word Aït or Aïth has the same meaning in Kabyle. The locality of markets is often on the boundary of tribal territories, such as Souk-es-Sebt and Souk-el-Jemāa. Souk-el-Arba at Fort National, on the contrary, is in the centre of the tribe Beni Iraten.
Such points of junction were esteemed neutral in old days, when the country was disturbed, and tribesmen could attend and transact business in safety when it would have been dangerous to overstep the limits of their own lands.
An institution that rendered travelling in safety possible when the country was embroiled, is that called Anaya, which is a reciprocal compact between two persons to guard each other from attack. A traveller wishing to pass through antagonistic tribes, or for any reason apprehending danger, sought a friend, who granted him Anaya; this friend, if he did not accompany him gave some token, to be presented in the tribe whither the stranger was going, which would ensure the respect and hospitality due to himself; the new host would in his turn offer the stranger Anaya, and so pass him on in safety. Since the French have introduced settled government, this custom has disappeared, or more truly speaking, lies dormant, for I have myself met a Frenchman who assured me that his life was saved by it in 1870. When the revolt broke out, he was far away from home, but a native friend accorded him Anaya, and by means of tokens, he was passed in safety to a French settlement, though the country was in a flame.
A woman could give Anaya in the absence of her husband; it was in consequence of its violation, that a war occurred in which several tribes took part. It was ‘à propos’ of this same affair, that the villages beneath which we were encamped received the names of ‘Taourirt en Taïdith’ (The Peak of the Dog) and ‘Ouarzen’ (the Ogre). The following is the story: A man of the Aïth Bou Yousef, desiring to pass through the territory of the Aïth Ménguellath, but fearing to fall a victim to the vengeance of an enemy, presented himself at a house in Taourirt, and solicited Anaya. His friend being absent, the wife gave him as token a dog, well known about there as belonging to her husband. Shortly after, the woman saw her dog return alone, covered with blood. Not knowing what to think, she called friends together, who starting in quest of the stranger, soon discovered his body disfigured with wounds, lying at the bottom of a ravine. Indignation was felt at this perfidious act; two parties were formed, and no terms of accommodation being arrived at, fighting began.
The French first dominated this part of the country by marching a column to Souk-es-Sebt, in 1854. The Aïth Ménguellath finding themselves threatened, tendered submission; three years later, in conjunction with other tribes, they rose in arms. They were then attacked by General Macmahon, who carried their villages by storm, and consigned them as a prey to the flames.
The tribe of the Beni Yahïa was in former days the nucleus of a Kabyle state known to Spanish writers as Cuco, which was also the name of their chief town. It corresponds with the confederation of the Zouáoua. The outlet of the country was by the roadstead of Azefoun, where commerce was transacted with the Marseillese. Marmol, who wrote A.D. 1573, gives an account of the country which answers to its present condition; and he speaks of the warlike inhabitants, who recognised no master, and paid tribute to none. They were rich in corn, in flocks, and horses, and though constantly fighting, they had free markets on neutral ground, where hostile tribes could do business without fear.
History does not deign to speak much about the Kabyles. These mountaineers appear to have remained generally untouched by the political movements that distracted North Africa. A little book by A. Berbrugger, ‘Les Epoques Militaires de la Grande Kabylie,’ published 1857, enters into details of their history, though the author has difficulty to find continuous firm ground for his statements. What he makes evident is, the unchanging character of the people, their troublesome and dangerous qualities as neighbours, and the pertinacity with which they were always ready to fight for their independence.
Ebn Khaldoun, himself a Berber, and the historian of the race, wrote towards the end of the fourteenth century. He speaks of the confederation of the Zouáoua, and gives the names of tribes, many of which still exist. It is to the Zouáoua that the word Zouave owes its origin. The Kabyles were then less exclusively confined to the mountains, and many led a nomadic life in the adjoining plains. They were dressed in striped garments, one end of which thrown over the shoulder, floated behind, they also had heavy burnouses, black, and of a tawny brown colour, and went generally bareheaded, only shaving from time to time.
One day, in the Aïth Ménguellath, I met an old man with a burnous striped all over with thin dark lines of blue, and further ornamented with chess-board patterns; this I bought off his back, as it was the only thing of the sort I had seen in the country. As the ends of the burnous are commonly flung over the shoulder, I conclude that the striped garments mentioned by Ibn Khaldoun were of this nature; though possibly he refers to striped cloths such as are still worn by the women.
Throughout the long dominion of the Romans, the Berbers were continually breaking the peace, and were rather hemmed in, and overawed, than assimilated to the higher civilisation surrounding them.
In those times they were known under the name of the Quinquegentians, or five tribes, and various proofs can be brought to show that they were of a very refractory character. For instance a Roman inscription preserved at Aumale, runs to this effect: ‘To Q. Gargilius, victim of the attacks of the Bavars, on account of the love he bore the citizens, and his single-minded affection for his country, and besides, on account of his courage and vigilance in taking and killing the rebel Faraxen with his partisans, the municipal body of Auzia, at its own cost, has raised and dedicated this monument, 24 March 221 of the province.’ Or 261 A.D.
The word Faraxen is supposed to apply to the leader of the Beni Fraousen, one of the present principal tribes.
The war of Firmus, an account of which is given by Gibbon, took place in these regions. An outline of the revolt in a few words, is this: The Roman governor of Africa, Count Romanus, instead of protecting the colonists against the inroads of the tribes, sought only by unjust oppressive measures to benefit his own pocket, and having powerful friends at court, he was able to hide his iniquitous proceedings from the Emperor. At this time Nubal was chief of the Zouáoua. He had many sons, some natural, some legitimate. Zammer, a natural son and friend of the governor, was killed in a dispute by a legitimate son, Firmus. He, in order to avoid threatened punishment, revolted, and the rising became formidable on account of the disordered state of the province. This was about A.D. 370. To quell the rebellion, Count Theodosius was sent over to Africa, he landed at the modern Gigelli, and proceeded to Setif, and shortly advanced with an army to Tribusuptus, the present Bordj Tiklat, some twenty miles from Bougie, where Roman ruins exist in abundance. From this point he proceeded to attack the Quinquegentians. The names of the tribes mentioned are the Tindenses, Massinissenses, Isaflenses, Jubaleni, and Jesaleni. The Massinissenses are still to be recognised under the name of the Imsissen; Massen Issa, meaning the sons of Aïssa; the Isaflenses are the Iflissen; the Jubaleni appear to be the mountaineers of the Jurjura, for the Romans were checked in their attack on them, on account of the difficult nature of the country.[2]
The war, after continuing for some time, was brought to a close by the Kabyle chief Firmus destroying himself, to avoid being given up by Igmazen, the chief of the Isaflenses, to the victorious Romans. The principal interest of the story of the war is, that it shows the possibility of tracing certain tribes up to this remote period; it proves also to what an extent they were independent, and on what turbulent terms they lived with their neighbours; a state of things which continued till they were conquered by the French.
The Romans on going to North Africa, found native Berber kingdoms, Numidia, Mauretania, Gætulia, Lybia. The inhabitants of these kingdoms were all of one race, and spoke dialects of the same language, usually known as Berber, but the native name for it is Tamazirght or Amazirgh.
In all the more inaccessible places of North Africa their direct descendants are to be found; they speak varieties of the old language, and have the same character and institutions.[3]
Berber belongs to a class of languages named Hamitic, which comprises ancient Egyptian, Coptic, and Ethiopian languages. An obvious peculiarity which strikes an Englishman, is the prevalence of Th sounds, both hard and soft, as in the English words ‘the’ and ‘thin.’ T is often softened into Th, and S into Z. But natives of the same village do not always pronounce words alike. For instance, one would say Aït Ménguellat, another the Aïth Ménguellath. Other peculiarities there are, upon which I need hardly enter.
Those who have not tried the experiment, can hardly be aware of the difficulty of writing down the speech of an illiterate peasant, in which sounds recur which do not exist in European language. It would require an intimate knowledge of the various sections of the Berber race, to have a just appreciation of their language, classified as Morocco Berber, called Shilha, or Tamazirght, descended from ancient Mauretanian; Berber of the Jurjura and Aures mountains, or Kabyle, descended from ancient Numidian; Touareg from ancient Gætulian; and Ghadames from ancient Garamantian.
The number of localities in Kabylia where traces of the Romans have been found, are too numerous to mention. On the coast were the towns of Saldæ, the modern Bougie; Rusuccurum, now Dellys; and Rusazus, now Azeffoun. There are ruins of importance at Taksebt on Cape Tedles, and at Jemāa-es-Sahridj, a central point in the tribe of the Beni Fraousen. This latter spot I visited in 1873. Its site is beautiful, and celebrated for abundance of springs. I have a pleasant recollection of the songs of nightingales among shady groves, and of the courteous manners of the rural chief, who was entertaining his friends beneath a cane-trellised arbour; but I cannot say I was much impressed by the antiquities, which consist chiefly of rubble walls on the top of a hill. In the market-place are blocks of masonry, supposed to be the remains of a Roman bath. It is obvious to the most uninitiated in military matters, that a station here must have blocked the natural outlet from the higher mountains towards the sea. Since my visit, a flourishing school has sprung up under the superintendence of the Jesuits.
The Kabyles, engaged in internal disputes and struggles to maintain their independence, having their simple wants satisfied by rude manufactures and the land they tilled, never had intercourse with nations more advanced than themselves, and felt not their own deficiencies. Every man guarded above all things his individual liberty, with a jealousy that prevented him combining with others to carry out any works of importance, and none had the capital which might have induced the many to labour for an end in common; the only sentiment of sufficient strength to bind them together was fear of the invader. From time immemorial Kabylia has been the home of peasant proprietorship, of communism, of local self-government with popular assemblies, of social equality; but owing to the limited resources of the country, to the crude notion that the people have of liberty, and to an excess of the democratic spirit, their civilisation has crystallised in a primitive form.
The French have now changed all this, and hold the country with a firm hand. But in 1870 they were obliged to withdraw from Algeria most of their troops in order to fight the Germans.
Incited by ill-judging men, the native tribes unhappily thought the moment to strike for independence had come; they rose, and committed barbarous and frightful excesses; though, to be just towards them, the cruelties they had themselves suffered from must be borne in mind. The Franco-German war over, the troops returned and put down the revolt. The French, full of the bitterest feelings, confiscated the rich wheat-growing lands, and imposed a crushing war tribute, that it took the Kabyles five years to pay. Complete disarmament was also effected, and the country became for the first time safe. Fort Napoleon sustained a long siege without being the worse for it, and changed its name to Fort National, with this new era of ‘Liberté, Égalité, et Fraternité.’
It was defended by native troops, who thus proved their fidelity under the most painful circumstances. Great numbers of Kabyles have been ruined, and forced to gain their bread by working for the French, and many disgusted with the state of things, have fled to enjoy the license of the native province of Tunis, in districts remote from the hated foreigner.[4]
A knowledge of French is essential for natives who desire to gain a livelihood by working for Europeans, and likewise in the settlement of disputes, which otherwise are fostered by go-betweens, who thrive on the ignorant by pretending to advance their interests with those who govern. It is specially to this work of education that the missionary Fathers apply themselves. They are a society recognised by the State, on the understanding that they do not interfere with the religion of the people. There is besides, little temptation for them to do so, as the jealousy of the natives would be aroused, and their influence with them consequently lost. Truly it would be foolish to cherish fallacious hopes of converting the Kabyles; they respect the sincerity of the Fathers, but there are too many nominal Christians in the land, who, the natives remark, do not believe in their own Marabouts.
The Fathers are the only Europeans that the natives think disinterested friends; the single-minded devotion with which they give themselves to a useful and philanthropic mission, causes them to be universally honoured. An extensive field lies open; so much so, that one is struck by the disproportion between means and aims; they are a forlorn hope of Christian knights valiantly assaulting the stronghold of ignorance; men doing battle on the summit of a scaling ladder, without sympathy given by the army encamped at a distance. Until these schools were founded, the natives picked up French under difficulties. The following translation of a song, will give the reader their sentiments concerning their study of the language:
SONG.
The day on which ‘bon soir’ was revealed to us,
We received a blow on the jaw.
We were nailed in prison.
The day on which ‘bon jour’ was revealed to us,
We received a blow on the nose.
Blessings have ceased.
The day on which ‘merci’ was revealed to us,
We were taken by the throat.
A sheep inspires more fear than we.
The day on which ‘cochon’ was revealed to us,
A dog had more honour than we.
The farmer has bought a mule.
The day on which ‘frère’ was revealed to us,
We received a kick on the knee.
We wade in shame up to the breast.
The day on which ‘diable’ was revealed to us,
We received a blow which made us mad.
We have become porters of dung.
One lovely day, bright and cloudless, on approaching the cemetery of Thililit, we heard the chanting of many voices. There was a funeral. The corpse, wrapped closely round in a white sheet and carried on a stretcher, was laid on the ground; a Kabyle sat beside and led the chant, while the friends of the dead man, in picturesque groups, stood round the grave; one carried a crown of oleander. The body was lowered, the earth filled in, and flagstones fastened down on the top; there was another chant, and then the people dispersed. The cattle, sheep, and goats grazed unconcernedly around; the pastoral pipe but halted an hour in its soft-toned warblings. When it recommenced, it might perchance have mourned the loss of a brother piper, in the fashion of antique measures:
‘The fountain nymphs through the wood mourn for thee, and their tears become waters; and echo amid the rocks laments, because thou art mute, and mimics no more thy lips; and at thy death, the trees have cast off their fruit, and the flowers have all withered; good milk hath not flowed from ewes, nor honey from hives, but it has perished in the wax, wasted with grief; for no longer is it meet, now that thy honey is lost, to gather that.’
The long line of mourners issuing from the cemetery was a beautiful spectacle; golden reflections in shadowed burnouses harmonising charmingly with the lichened tombstones. A youth only remained behind, the son of the deceased; he sat upon the tomb wailing.
I have sometimes seen locks of hair laid upon graves, reminding of similar Greek offerings.
In the play of ‘Electra,’ Orestes says:—
first honouring my father’s grave,
As the god bade us, with libations pure and tresses from our brow.
Electra at her father’s tomb says to her sister:
And then do thou,
Cutting the highest locks that crown thy head,
Yea, and mine also, poor although I be,
(Small offering, yet ’tis all the store I have,)
Give to him; yes, this lock, untrimmed,
Unmeet for suppliant’s vow.
The first discovered traces of the return of Orestes are offerings laid on their father’s tomb.
Chrysosthemis, the younger sister, says:—
And lo! my father’s bier was crowned
With garlands of all flowers that deck the fields;
And, seeing it, I wondered, and looked round,
Lest any man should still be hovering near;
And when I saw that all the place was calm,
I went yet nearer to the mound, and there
I saw upon the topmost point of all
A tress of hair, fresh severed from the head.
On a previous visit to Kabylia, when living at a farmhouse in part of which resided a native family, I one morning heard a lamentable cry, and running out, I, unperceived, observed what passed. A man sat crouched upon a stone, with burnous flung about him, and hands pressed against his bent-down head; his attitude was precisely that of mourning figures I have seen painted on Greek vases.
At his side stood a woman swaying backwards and forwards, with face raised as if questioning that stainless sky which seemed to mock her with its deep serenity, with wearisome iteration uttering the same piteous lament. She held her arms stretched upwards, and ever and anon her clenched fists descended with merciless blows upon her breasts. A boy, their first-born, had just fallen down dead in a fit. The parents rushed out of the house into the fields, and in this unaffected manner they showed their anguish. The image of that poor woman will ever remain graven in my memory, a picture of dire and bitter lamentation. What passionate gestures were these! How human! But how un-English! This vehemence, this spreading forth of hands when there was none to comfort, recalled Biblical wailings.
‘Behold, I cry out of wrong, but I am not heard: I cry aloud, but there is no judgment. He hath fenced up my way that I cannot pass, and he hath set darkness in my paths. He hath stripped me of my glory, and taken the crown from my head. He hath destroyed me on every side, and I am gone: and my hope hath he removed like a tree.’
The day after the funeral at Thililit, we returned to the same place and found two big vultures promenading slowly backwards and forwards over the fresh grave; they remained there the greater part of the afternoon. What mysterious faculties have these birds, both of wing and scent. At Souk-el-Jemāa, we saw a flock of thirty or forty, sitting on the refuse of the slaughtered animals, whilst the market was still crowded, and we approached within twenty paces without disturbing their repast. There must be a great number in the high mountains, for some are usually in sight. When painting, I have heard a rushing noise overhead, have looked up, and seen one of these great birds sweeping swiftly along without moving a feather. Thus they wing their flight, soaring in any direction to a prodigious distance, performing this feat apparently by a mere effort of the will. The power this bird possesses of discovering its prey is attributed in the Book of Job to keenness of vision.
‘There is a path which no fowl knoweth, and which the vulture’s eye hath not seen.’
‘Whence then cometh wisdom? and where is the place of understanding? Seeing it is hid from the eyes of all living, and kept close from the fowls of the air.’
Eagles also are common, some of great size.
One day last winter an eagle pounced on a chicken that was unconcernedly pecking about in front of a cottage in Taourirt Amokran. For an instant the bird remained half stunned by its rapid descent, and a Kabyle sitting in the doorway, threw his burnous and caught it alive. They are not birds to be trifled with, and I was told how, on another occasion, a Kabyle following a badly wounded eagle, was attacked by the bird, which struck at his head, clawed out one of his eyes, and would have killed him, had not a friend come to his assistance. Neither of us had provided ourselves with guns, and our encampment would not have been well chosen for sport. The natives kill a few wild boars in the ravines, hares, partridges and quail; it was the closed season, but they bagged partridges nevertheless, going out with a call-bird to attract others. Quails are left almost unmolested on account of their nests being in the midst of the ripening corn. We continually heard their liquid note of contentment, for contented they no doubt were, living unharassed in the midst of such abundance.
A sportsman brought some birds of fine plumage, which I skinned; but having only salt to cure them with, the ants got at them, and few remained of any value.
The hoopoo is common; we often heard its thrice-repeated flutelike note, or saw it with crest proudly erect, perched on the topmost branch of a tree. A young one was brought us which we thought of rearing, an odd little bird, always looking as if going to topple over; it had no tail, and the crest and long bill looked out of all proportion; it perhaps resented being laughed at, for it had a furious temper, which we knew not how to conciliate; and when the little creature was discovered one morning to be missing, it was not followed by many regrets. The golden oriole is not uncommon. Other birds more familiar were not wanting; frequently we heard the home-reminding notes of the cuckoo; and swallows flitted about all day. At dinner-time they would perch on a figtree within six feet of us, gently chatter, skim through the air, and return to chatter again.
Of butterflies I noticed none that are not native to England; but I found a curious insect, simulating exactly a decaying leaf of evergreen oak; under the microscope it has the appearance of being covered with crystallised spikes.
When it became hot, ants were busy in every direction; one sort, with a big red head half as large again as its black body, was remarkable for long legs, it ran more quickly that any other ant I ever saw; there were lots of these always in a hurry. I noticed one enter a nest of small black ants, and afterwards reappear without commotion ensuing; probably a hot-headed freak of curiosity. If I were to bolt into the houses of the Kabyles in that manner, thought I, I should meet with a very different reception.
Several times I saw swarms of wild bees. I have seen the boys, who were quick in detecting the approaching hum, spring to their feet and rush off in wild excitement, I knew not at first why. They tried to change the course of the swarm by throwing dust into the air; it was a pretty sight—eager boys with draperies tossed and flying about, and an afternoon sun lighting up the handfuls of dust and the swarming bees.
Thus in the season of unclouded spring,
To war they follow their undaunted king,
Crowd through their gates, and in the fields of light
The shocking squadrons meet in mortal fight.
(. . .) this deadly fray
A cast of scatter’d dust will soon allay,
And undecided leave the fortunes of the day.
On this occasion the scattered dust had no effect, for the winged army poured on.
Dusky they spread a close-embodied crowd,
And o’er the vale descends the living cloud.
Another evening, two lads returning home with our painting traps suddenly put down their loads. One of them, Kassi, troubled with great animal spirits, always up to mischief, made passes with a stick at a bush by the wayside, protecting himself by throwing his burnous about his head. We found him in great excitement, thrusting at a wasp’s nest hanging in the bush. It reminded me of another of Homer’s similes in the ‘Iliad.’
As wasps, provok’d by children in their play,
Pour from their mansions by the broad highway,
In swarms the guiltless traveller engage,
Whet all their stings, and call forth all their rage;
All rise in arms, and with a gen’ral cry
Assert their waxen domes, and buzzing progeny.
In this case the guiltless travellers remained unstung, and Kassi was called off before he learnt that the wasps could fight like Greeks; for Homer says again:
When wasps from hollow crannies drive
To guard the entrance of their common hive,
Dark’ning the rock, while with unweary’d wings
They strike th’ assailants, and infix their stings.
A race determined that to death contend.
So fierce these Greeks their last retreats defend.
And again—
So burns the vengeful hornet (soul all o’er),
Repuls’d in vain, and thirsty still of gore;
Bold son of air and heat, on angry wings
Untam’d, untir’d, he turns, attacks, and stings.
Formidable wild animals are rare, but are still to be found in fastnesses where wild boar offer means of subsistence; they are occasionally driven abroad from their lairs into populated parts, by winter’s severity. Then the unhorned tenants of the wood, sorely grinding their teeth, roam the thickets; ‘then truly are they like unto a man that goes on a stick, whose back is well-nigh broken, and head looks towards the ground; like such an one they roam, shunning the white snow.’
Last winter there was an unusually heavy fall of snow, covering Kabylia with a coat more than a foot thick; it still whitened all northern slopes and blocked the passes, when I visited the country six weeks later. I was told that the roar of a lion had been heard shortly before, in a ravine of the Aïth Ménguellath; this may possibly be true: the Fathers told us that they heard the laugh of the hyena.
Returning last winter to Algiers, whilst passing through the village of Tizi-Ouzou, a dead panther was brought in, shot by a native beside a stream ten miles off, in a populous district separated from the Jurjura by a broad valley; and a little later a second was killed in the same neighbourhood. Curiously, when I was at Tizi-Ouzou before, the same incident occurred; the panther had then been shot in the forests in the direction of Bougie. The only wild animals we came across while camping were jackals, which are numerous; on fine nights we heard their wild empty-stomached howls, when they prowled up from the valleys, and all the dogs in the villages would begin barking. These were the only discordant noises at night; more pleasant was the constant sound of distant frogs croaking in damp places, the welcome melody of nightingales, and the melancholy note of a bird called the Taab, which I believe to be some kind of owl.
And owls that mark the setting sun, declare
A star-light evening and a morning fair.
That solitary mysterious note, hardly uttered before answered in another quarter by some brother, suggested how, when rude settlements dreaded night attacks, the owl, harmless towards men, might from its sleepless vigilance have been chosen to symbolise a protecting goddess of wisdom.
We heard also little animals pattering over the tent in the dark, sometimes rustling the papers under our beds. Thinking of field-mice as likely to make these sounds, we sent for a trap; we caught a few only, and ultimately discovered that the noise was caused by harmless green lizards. I was not aware that these creatures run about in the dark; they must have singular eyes, for animals that are active by night do not usually dart about in the brilliancy and heat of noonday.
May 21 to June 14, 1880.—The wet season came at last to a close, and we were favoured with the most perfect weather imaginable. The heat was by no means oppressive, and the air was bracing and life-giving, the sky was of exquisite colour, and the light so intense that the tops of the trees seemed frosted with silvery flashing lights. All snow had disappeared from the high mountains, except here and there a minute patch; a pale apple-green played on their slopes mixed with delicate rosy grey tones, a mass of subtle glowing tints softened by the purple bloom of distance. The azure of the sky appeared to soak into the landscape and blend with the flesh-tint of the distant soil. Fallow fields, as if stirred by a secret spirit of joy they could no longer restrain, brought forth a multitude of wild flowers, whilst the corn turned by degrees from green to gold. The natives changed their hours for going a-field, becoming more matinal. On the first signs of approaching dawn, the birds broke out in a concert of melody; this was followed by the pleasant chattering of the women going to draw water. When the sun rose and ‘tipped the hills with gold,’ the men appeared with their flocks.
Haste, to the stream direct thy way,
When the gay morn unveils her smiling ray;
Haste to the stream!
Between ten and eleven they drove them home again; then they dined and reposed themselves, while the beasts were kept in the cool. After three o’clock men were again abroad, till deepening twilight ushered in the night, when lanes were crowded with flocks, herds, and tired peasants slowly mounting homewards. Except during these hours we saw few people, and felt at last like mariners stranded on a forsaken shore. This was because most of the male population betook themselves to the plains about Algiers and Constantine in quest of employment, as it was a time of year when extra hands were required for harvesting; on their return with a small store of hardly-earned money, as soon as the harvest of their own fields has been garnered, then is the season for feasts and marriages.
The effects at sunset were magical: the mountains would turn to warm violet and gold, set off by the greens and purples of nearer ranges. The sky was of a mellow Claude-like serenity, and as the sun sank rocks and trees glowed with a more than Venetian warmth of colour. It was curious to observe how differently trees took the light. Ash seemed to grow greener, whilst ilexes and corks lost their green altogether and appeared of a rich glowing bronze. We were not without good intentions of trying to represent this; but whenever the looked-for moment came, and splendours deepened about us, we put aside brushes with feelings of despair.
At this hour there was no fear of chill or fever, for the warm air in the confined valleys rose gradually.
Among the studies we painted in these days was one of the fountain; we had anticipated remonstrance, but none was made.
One day a party of men begged us not to go painting there, as a ceremony was about to be held, nor were the women allowed to draw water after their early morning visit. At mid-day sheep were slaughtered and cut up under the shade of the trees, the meat carried to the villages, and the greater part, I understood, was given away to the poor. The richer men had contributed the animals; the chief Marabout also assisted at the slaughter. After this some slight repairs were effected, stones that formed a rude paving in front of the fountain were relaid, and weeds growing too luxuriantly were pulled up.
I did not hear of this custom in other tribes, and I could not understand what ideas they associated with it. It must not be confounded with the great Mahommedan festival that occurs later, when there is a general slaughtering of sheep, so that everyone can eat mutton. It looks like a relic of Pagan sacrifice, which may well be, in a country so unchanging. Have not the women from time immemorial carried their pitchers to the fountains just as they do now? An early Greek vase in the British Museum represents women carrying vases in the same way I saw here. When the pitcher is empty and more difficult to balance, it is laid on its side upon a kerchief wound into a circle and placed on the head; the mouth of the vase projects in front; one handle kept lower than the other rests on the edge of the twisted kerchief, and helps to steady the vase; an arm raised to it is therefore bent. When the vase is filled and poised on the head, both handles are at a convenient height to be grasped when the arms are at full stretch.
The most interesting relic of ancient custom that I have met with in the country, was at a marriage festival at Aïn Soltān in the neighbourhood of Borj Boghni.
The bridegroom had gone to fetch his bride, and I waited with many others beside a stream that passed at the foot of the village, for his return. Suddenly we heard the sound of pipes, and saw the marriage procession streaming from the summit of a neighbouring hill, and then lose itself among the trees; a few minutes later it issued from an avenue near us, and ascended a slope towards the bridegroom’s house. First came the pipers, then the bride muffled up in a veil, riding a mule led by her lover. As well as I could judge, she was very young, almost a child. Then came a bevy of gorgeously dressed damsels, sparkling with silver ornaments, followed by a crowd of other friends, and Kabyle Dick and Harry. In front of the bridegroom’s house the procession stopped; the girl’s friends lined both sides of the pathway and crowded about the door. The pipers marched off on one side, while the bridegroom lifted the girl from the mule and held her in his arms. The girl’s friends thereupon threw earth at him, when he hurried forward, and carried her over the threshold, those about the door beating him all the time with olive branches amid much laughter. This throwing of earth, this mock opposition and good-natured scourging, appeared to be a symbolised relic of marriage by capture, and was a living explanation of the ancient Roman custom of carrying the bride over the threshold of her lover’s house.
In the evening on such occasions the pipers and drummers are called in, and the women dance, two at a time, facing each other; nor does a couple desist until, panting and exhausted, they step aside to make room for another. The dance has great energy of movement, though the steps are small and changes of position slight, the dancers only circling round occasionally. But they swing their bodies about with an astonishing energy and suppleness. As leaves flutter before the gale, so do they vibrate to the music; they shake, they shiver and tremble, they extend quivering arms, wave veils, which they sometimes cast over their heads thrown backwards like Bacchantes, and their minds seem lost in the ‘abandon’ and frenzy of the dance, while the other women looking on, encourage by their high piercing trilling cries, which add to the noise of the pipes and drums. They also deride the men by clapping their hands to the music and singing verses such as the following:—
Oh alack! alack! Oh dear one, most dear,
Come now—to the place we have spoken of.
Oh grafted apple! thy love kills me!
An old grey head reposes on thy arm.
Oh Thithen! Thithen! with the motley-coloured girdle,
Oh sweet apple! grafted upon a root.
Beauty to marvel at have the Aïth Ouagóuenoun,
Their skin is sleek, their eyes are dark.
Oh winged bird! rest thou near to her upon the figtree,
When Yamina goes forth, kiss me her little cheek.
Even amidst the pomp and splendour of imperial Rome, marriage festivals must have presented some curious resemblances to such primitive customs as I have described, doubtless owing to unrecorded common causes in the remote past.
The bride was brought home in procession, accompanied by the singing of a song and playing on the flute; she was carried over the threshold, and in the evening there was a marriage feast. This habit of carrying the bride was accounted for in various ways.
‘Concerning the bride they do not allow her to step over the threshold of the house, but people sent forward carry her over, perhaps because they in old time seized upon women and compelled them in this manner.’[5]
Another explanation, and I think a far less probable one, is that she thus avoided the chance of tripping at the threshold, which would have been considered an omen of bad fortune. To most people it would appear a sufficiently bad augury if she required help at such a moment to prevent her stumbling. Why should she stumble? ‘Carefully raise over the threshold thy feet, O bride! Without tripping begin this path, in order that for thy husband thou mayest always be secure.’
Let the faithful threshold greet,
With omens fair, those lovely feet,
Lightly lifted o’er;
Let the garlands wave and bow
From the lofty lintel’s brow
That bedeck the door.
See the couch with crimson dress
Where, seated in a deep recess,
With expectation warm,
The bridegroom views her coming near;
The slender youth that led her here
May now release her arm.
In early times, the marriage banquet was not a mere matter of ceremony. It was desirable to have as many witnesses as possible, and such were the guests. At Greek marriages there was likewise a procession with song and flute accompaniment, a feast in the evening, and songs and dance before the nuptial chamber.
Theocritus in his ‘Epithalamium of Helen,’ describes the twelve first maidens of the city forming the dance in front of the newly-painted nuptial chamber. ‘And they began to sing, I ween, all beating time to one melody with many-twinkling feet, and the house was ringing round with a nuptial hymn.’
It was the custom both in Greece and in Italy, when the marriage procession halted before the bridegroom’s house, to salute it with a shower of sweetmeats. This recalls the ruder shower of earth that I saw in Kabylia, and which I took to symbolise a volley of stones. The custom still survives in Italy; for I have often seen sweetmeats thrown among the crowd when a newly-married couple have issued from church; great is the delight and eager the scrambling of small boys on such occasions.
