ALGERIA.
M. de la Blanchère reports that in Algeria M. Gauckler investigated in 1891 the provinces of Algiers and Constantine, and spent some time at Cherchell whose antiquities he studied and partly published alone or in collaboration with M. de Waille. He planned at the same time an excavation. M. Marye was charged with the plan for organizing, for the first time, a collection of mussulman art, of native industrial art, and of Turkish and Arabic monuments.
The work regarded as most pressing by M. de la Blanchère in 1891 was the publication of African museums. The first series of the collections du musée Alaoui was almost completed: the musées d'Oran and de Constantine were in the press, following the musée d'Alger published in the preceding year. The general catalogue will be drawn up as each establishment is definitively organized. The first place belongs to the Bardo museum whose catalogue had already been partly compiled by M. de la Blanchère. The museum of Oran, under its conservator, Demaeght, has been finally organized, and occupies a fine building given by the city. It has been enriched by several additions, notably the famous inscription of king Masuna. The museum of Constantine has received among other things, the results of an interesting excavation made at Collo, especially some curious vases with female silhouettes. The museum of the Bardo can, however, never be rivalled by any of the museums of Algeria. The immense palace is already nearly full, although the museum in 1891 was but four years old. The large hall is full, with its nine large cases; there are about 500 square metres of mosaics, 50 statues of large fragments, about 1200 inscriptions, and a multitude of small objects.
TIPASA.--The local curate, M. l'Abbé Saint-Gérand, has made some important excavations in an early Christian church. He found that the altar was placed at the end opposite the apse on a kind of platform or béma attached to the wall. Several inscriptions were found set into the mosaic pavement. One is the epitaph of Alexander, a bishop of Tipasa, another the dedication of the construction by him. To this bishop is attributed the merit of grouping about the altar the tombs of certain "righteous ancients," justi priores, by whom are undoubtedly meant his predecessors in the Episcopacy.--Chron. des arts, 1892, No. 14.
Professor Gsell assisted in the excavations above described and further details in a communication to the Académie des Inscriptions. The building mentioned was a funerary chapel built to the east of Tipasa by Bishop Alexander to contain the tombs of his predecessors. Near by a Christian sarcophagus was found with reliefs of Christ giving the law, Moses striking the rock and other subjects.
In the same locality is the basilica of Saint Salsa erected over her tomb. Built in the fourth century, it was decorated in the middle of the fifth by Potentius, probably a bishop; and enlarged in the second half of the sixth. It was still an object of veneration in the seventh century.--Chron. des arts, 1892, No. 28.