enabled to rouse at least a spirit of inquiry both among Jews and Mussulmans. Those who may have attended Mr. Weiss's services, or rather domestic meetings, held in several languages, must be satisfied that his is no unsuccessful or barren mission.

CHAPTER II.

Preparations for travel

him

Dragoman Tents Licence for arms - Letters Advice of the governor - A mulish baggage-horse Disastrous start - Fort l'Empereur - Orphelinat - Dely IbraProtestant institute Douera Interesting prisoners Bouffarick-Successful colonization - Beni Mered A valiant guard-Mausoleum of the kings of Mauritania - Lake Halloula — Blidah - Gorge of the Chiffa Scenery - Monkeys - Arab Gourbis Making game of a naturalist — Meeting Bedouins - Dog lostTaking an inn by storm-Cheap lodgings - Mines of Mouzaïa — Medeah-Native review - A Sheik's farewell of his son-Eagerness for Parisian education.

BUT we must not spend more time upon Algiers; our goal was the far desert, and October was approaching. Neither few nor simple are the difficulties that beset the traveller seeking an outfit in French Africa. Whatever is required by an officer for a Kabyle campaign, and is not supplied by the "Intendance Militaire," is to be had at once, but nothing more. Long and anxious were the discussions about those most important and indispensable of companions, our horses. The decision on them I prudently left to P., a better judge of horseflesh than myself. The next in importance, and the most difficult to secure, was a trusty dragoman. No such skilful and ready-witted desert couriers, if I may so term them, are to be found in Algiers as lounge in the Strada Reale of Malta, or hang about the doorway of Shepherd's Hotel in Cairo. Travelling is not yet here reduced to a system, nor is it, with its few attractions, likely to be so for years to come. At length, through the kind assistance of Mr. Elmore, H.B.M. ViceConsul, to whom I can never sufficiently express my

obligations for his valuable exertions, suggestions, and information, a dragoman was secured, the only one of his acquaintance, Mr. Elmore assured us, on whom the slightest dependence could be placed. Alas! as we afterwards found to our cost, Punic faith was the best in the market. However, we had some hope of being able to start, when one afternoon Omar ben Yaya made his bow and presented his credentials, a tall well-knit Arab, with dark intelligent and kindly eye, nose long and straight, and oval face. His fez, laced jacket and waistcoat, were of brilliant crimson, his loose trousers of dirty olive, and his complexion to match. Without much parley we were glad to engage him on his own terms of 25 dollars per month. But alarming was the list of necessaries which he assured us were absolutely requisite for our campaign, and the three camels' burden of our dreams became the seven or eight of waking reality.

Our tents were ordered of the most approved shape and make, and experimentally pitched in the Bab-elOued, while we, simple freshmen, without the experience of Mr. Galton, did not detect that no windcords had been supplied. The canteens were soon provided, two pair of stout second-hand French officers' equipment, besides a very commodious pair of bullock trunks, with honest English straps I had brought from home. Our beds were, I flatter myself, articles the most perfect of their kind. Long sacks of sheepskin, "with the woolly side in," the lower portion extending a yard beyond the upper, and forming at its upper end a bag into which all the wardrobe of the day could be stowed, composed a most convenient pillow, and one of which no pilferer could rob us; while a flap with strings attached turned up over the shoulders to the neck, and secured the body from the attacks of any insects, save the most inquisitive.

I determined to be content to spread my humble couch on the ground, protected by a mackintosh sheet I had brought from England. P., more ambitious, had his stretched on a canvas frame between poles, extended head and foot over his canteen boxes. The tent, 12 feet by 8, was to shelter P. and myself; a smaller and lower one sufficed for the servants. A portable table and two camp stools completed our furniture, and one pair of canteens were crammed with culinary apparatus, boxes of chocolate, tins of butter, a case of tea, bags of coffee, tobacco, "biscuit viande" (a very valuable ingredient in soup maigre), and two loaves of sugar. For our further needs, ammunition and barter with the nomads must provide. I had taken care to be well supplied with good English cutlery and some bundles of the best silk handkerchiefs, which we found most valuable stores afterwards, in acknowledging hospitality and kindness among the desert tribes. These, and my preparations for natural history collections, together with a few instruments, sextant, hygrometer, self-registering thermometer, hair compass, &c., fully charged another pair of canteens. Fortunately, the cases of instruments had inspired the Custom-house officials with such respect for the character of a "savant," that all had passed unchallenged on entering the port.

Next, as we should be for some time in French territory, came the momentous business of putting all our papers en règle. First of these was the "permis de chasse," or certificate to carry a gun, the process of procuring which may certainly teach grumblers that the "Circumlocution Office" is not a peculiar institution of the British Isles. In the first place, we had to present ourselves at the "Bureau des Etrangers," and procure our passports with the due visas. 2nd. To go to the

24

FRENCH "CIRCUMLOCUTION" DEPARTMENT.

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CHAP. II.

"Bureau de Police Centrale," whose officials, on our making the formal declaration usual in such cases, stated that they knew nothing against us, and sent us, with a duly stamped certificate of this most gratifying fact, to (3rd) the Mairie. Here we obtained a recommendation to the Receveur Municipal, a functionary residing in another part of the city, our 4th visit, who kindly accepted the introduction, and on payment of 20 francs gave me a receipt for the same, and sent me on, 5thly, to the Receveur des Domaines, which gentleman-official took 30 francs, gave me a receipt and a blank form of 'signalement," or personal description, and sent me, 6thly, to the Stamp Office to pay 1fr. 75c. for stamps on these papers. 7thly, I revisited the "Mairie," where P. and I were put down on paper, our measure taken, and our features scandalised-I in particular obtaining from the official artist the information of having a "nez ordinaire," "front" and "menton" ditto, "barbe,” however, blonde. Our 8th visit was to the "Prefecture," where the precious document was deposited; and 9thly and lastly, we called there the following morning and received our permis duly signed. As it proved, we might have avoided all this journeying amidst dark streets and mysterious galleries, for we never used our arms in the "territoire civile," and in the "territoire militaire' arms are as ordinarily and as necessarily worn as trousers, and the authorities demand no permis, since no one without a special permission can travel there at all.

Those far more valuable documents, our letters to the various generals and commandants of the interior, without which we could not have moved a step, cost far less trouble. H.E. le Maréchal Randon, the Governor, who had himself kindly suggested to me this tour during my former visit to the country, supplied us promptly, with