The active practice of slavery has ceased, though the frame of mind still persists. Boys and girls are still sold out of families, quietly, but there is no cruelty in the transaction, for the slave class of a Tuareg family are permitted the complete freedom of the household so long as they observe the laws of their position. As a rule, the serf has not a very brilliant mentality, and the lifelong habit of toil is not easily disturbed. They are accustomed to serve, and, indeed, so long as they are fed and have a place to sleep, they appear as content as those in their natural homes in Hausaland or elsewhere. Many of these serfs who are alive to-day, were in the first instance bought and sold in the market-place, or were direct captives of nomadic raids. Under the military regime of the French they are more or less free to go their way to-day; but they make no change. They remain in the families as before, assured of protection and livelihood that might not be theirs if they cast adrift.
It is on this slave class that all the hard work falls, whether in the Tuareg camps or in the centres of cultivation or commercial enterprise; and all are accustomed to their nomad overlords.
A TEBU WOMAN
A TEBU MAN
SEDENTARY IN OASES OF KOWAR
The widely scattered places of sedentary occupation in the Sahara may take two forms: they may be oases in the midst of sandy desert, or they may be havens among the mountains.
The desert oasis has its planted belt of date palms and plentiful supply of water, usually drawn from wells, sometimes from springs in open ditches. Under the shade of the palms are the irrigated gardens, where constant labour, at the seasons of cultivation, is demanded to flood the soil and nurse the plants to maturity in surroundings that would give no life without artificial aid.
The gardens are sandy and small: a network of closely crowded allotments, each fenced with palm staves to hold in check the driving sand. By means of a regular system of irrigation channels the soil is fed with water at intervals each day; drawn to the surface by oxen, or by hand, at the expense of a good deal of patient labour. The consequent dampness and humidity breed malaria, which is, perhaps, a further reason for the importation of the negroid serf, who is, through hereditary environment, familiar with the destructive malady. Indeed, in this respect, at the time of rain it is common practice for many semi-nomadic masters to evacuate the oases altogether and roam far out into the more healthy desert, tending their flocks while leaving their serfs alone to look after the cultivation.