From the terrace on which our tents were pitched a mound rises towards the middle of the cliff. This has been formed by the detritus of the rocks above, and on this the village is built. The houses rise one above another in a series of steps, the roof of one being on a level with the floor of that above it, and actually forms a terrace to it, or part of the public road. All the houses in the Aures are built of small stones and mud, the walls being strengthened by longitudinal layers of timber inserted in the masonry every few courses. The roofs are of Thuya wood rafters, supported at intervals by posts and post plates, and covered with a thick cement of mud and chopped straw, which becomes nearly as hard as stone.
The flocks live on terms of the greatest harmony with the owners, and seem to occupy the better portion of their houses. It is very pleasant to see them returning in the evening from their pasture over the rustic bridge which crosses the river, and winding up amongst the steep lanes which separate the houses, led by the young girls of the family, nearly always of singular beauty and never veiled.
In the morning before starting we went through many of the houses, where we were objects of far greater curiosity to the villagers than they were to us. They may have seen officers of the Bureau Arabe or stray French travellers, but I doubt whether any European ladies had been there before.
On the 28th we started for Menäa shortly after sunrise. The distance is about 16 miles and occupied us five hours of actual travel. We crossed Djebel Tirmis to the south-east, by an elevated pass 5,760 feet above the sea, connecting the valleys of El-Erbäa and Bou Zeina. On each side are the remains of a Roman tower, built to defend this important position. The valley of Bou Zeina is richly cultivated at the bottom wherever the ground is capable of irrigation by the stream, but the upper parts of the hills are bare and stony. After passing the village of Murkäa on the left bank the character of the valley began to change; the limestone strata, which had been running parallel to our route like paved Roman roads, give place to white marble of dazzling brightness, cropping up among the red rocks which lie between; soon the ground becomes almost entirely white, which gives its name to the next village, El-Beidha, on the left of the road. A very short distance beyond is Takoost, pronounced Tagoost, a more important village, where we stopped for a short time, and were entertained to an excellent breakfast by the Khalifa. The ladies of the household did not appear openly, but they were very glad indeed to receive us in their private apartments, and had no objection to allow their comely faces to be seen even by male visitors.
This part of the country is of singular interest from a geological point of view. The high bare mountains to the north-west are stratified like the most beautifully striated agate; behind the village the rock resembles a pavement of huge cubical blocks of stone laid at an angle of forty-five degrees. Many have been detached from their setting, and have rolled down to the village. The deception was so perfect that at first sight we mistook it for Roman masonry of an unusually massive character.
The cultivation round all these villages is very similar, small square patches of corn-land forming perfectly level terraces, irrigated by canals derived from the river which flows along the bottom of the valley. They rise one above another as high as the water can be made to reach them, and are dotted over with, or sometimes bordered by fruit trees, which grow in great abundance and variety. We noticed apples, pears, peaches, apricots, figs, walnuts, and generally all the fruits of temperate countries, and such tropical ones as can stand the cold of winter, like the pomegranate. After passing Tagoost the road crosses the Bou Zeina, here called the Oued el-Ahmar, or Red River, from the prevailing colour of the hills on its left bank, and winds up the chain of mountains separating it from the Oued Abdi. The road is very wild and picturesque, and is bordered on the right by a steep precipice, sometimes a thousand feet in vertical descent. The rock is a conglomerate, or pudding-stone, of large water-worn pebbles, cemented together by a calcareous paste.
Shortly after crossing the summit of this hill the village of Menäa appeared in sight, and in a very short time we found ourselves under the hospitable roof of Si Mohammed bin Abbas, the Kaid of the Aures. It is by no means as an empty term of compliment that I style him hospitable; he is a very grand specimen of Arab nobility, his ancestors being from Morocco, and not of Chawi descent. Every day he is said to feed 200 people, and he even keeps a French cook, the better to entertain the few Europeans who pass through his country. He has many houses in various parts of the Aures. That at Menäa is his principal one, and is almost a small village, containing apartments for himself and family, rooms for his dependants, a Zaouia, within which the family are interred, and spacious and comfortable rooms for the reception of guests. He had gone to Batna to meet the Governor-General, but his son, a noble-looking young fellow of about twenty, did the honours of his house with the most perfect grace. Our table was luxuriously supplied, even with choice wines, and in the evening an exhibition of dancing girls was got up for our entertainment. The Arabs seemed to enjoy it mightily and praised the principal performer as the most celebrated dancer in the country, but I don’t think we appreciated it as we ought, and found the monotony of the cadence, and the constant repetition of the same step, very wearisome.
Menäa is picturesquely situated on the slope of a low hill at the confluence of the Bou Zeina and the Oued Abdi. The streets are extremely filthy, but every year this manure is carefully collected, and employed in cultivation. There are no Roman remains of any interest, but fragments of sculpture and tombstones are found in abundance, generally built into the angles of the houses, while frusta of columns have been hollowed out into coffee mortars, and stone coffins utilised as drinking troughs.
The land about Menäa is highly cultivated in small fields, perfectly level, to admit of irrigation. They are arranged in terraces, which, according to tradition, have existed since the Roman epoch. Certainly, if they were constructed then, they have been kept in admirable repair by this industrious people. Land fetches a high price, and as much as 15,000 francs per hectare, or 240l. an acre, has been paid for ground capable of easy irrigation. Date trees begin to appear here and add a very pleasing feature to the landscape; the fruit, however, rarely ripens, and is never good.
Near this village, and indeed at every other in the Aures, are the remains of watch-towers used in former times as posts of observation; now that the French occupation has ensured the tranquillity of the country these have been allowed to fall into picturesque decay.