IT'S SECOND PAPER: FROM CONSTANTINE TO THE BORDER OF TRIPOLI BY ABIGAIL H. FITCH TS unusual site makes Constantine a conspicuous feature in the lovely landscape. The city stands on an immense, isolated rock or, rather, series of rocks, which rise from the plain perpendicularly for one thousand feet; it is encircled on the south and east by a great gorge, one hundred and seventy meters deep, through which rushes the sinister river Rummel. Constantine is the Cirta of the Romans, and was considered by them, as it is considered by the French to-day, virtually impregnable. Nevertheless, though it has withstood eighty sieges, it has been conquered by the Arabs, Turks, and French. There are two entrances to the chasm, one being near the handsome bridge which connects the city with the railway station. It was this entrance that we elected to take. We descended a flight of steps into what appeared to be a pretty ravine filled with flowering fruit-trees and shrubs. The day was charming. A roar as of many rushing torrents mounted up to us. Dashing waterfalls came darkly foaming from the steep, slimy walls. The sun had vanished suddenly without warning, and brooding twilight reigned. We continued to descend. A frail, wooden suspensionbridge spanned the chasm, from the midde of which a view up and down the cipitous walls rise six hundred feet; on gorge was obtained. On one side the prethe other, one looks into the mouth of a black, dome-shaped vault of extraordinary height, through which the Rummel thunders and takes a glorious leap into the valley. good-by to Constantine, and took the road On a fresh, pleasant morning we said to Philippeville. After a few hours' drive we reached El Arrouch, and descended over mountains as bare as billiard-tables, into a lovely valley dedicated to the culture of the olive and the vine. La Calle, to which we motored the next day, is the frontier town of Algeria. Tourists never loiter here unless it is for the purpose of being reimbursed the duty paid on an automobile when entering the country. at the clean little hotel, went hopefully We arrived at noon, and, after lunching forth to the custom-house, only to be inness could be transacted until the morrow. formed that it was a holiday and no busiAs 1198 francs were to be refunded, there was no alternative but to spend the night in La Calle. The people-French, with a scant sprinkling of Italians, were pleasuring on the bay or picnicking inland in the woods. Toward evening they began THE SITE OF CONSTANTINE (ON THE TOP OF THE ROCK AT THE LEFT) AND THE GORGES OF THE RUMMEL much gaiety, yet I fear there is also much illness, for in the post-office could be read a notice in French and Arabic advising every one to take from twenty-five to thirty centigrams of quinine daily, whether tered Tunis. Vast forests of cork-trees abound in the region. The trees are not so tall or so fantastically shaped as I have seen them in the mountains of Spain, but commercially they are quite as valuable. THE SITE OF ANCIENT CARTHAGE AND THE REMAINS OF HER HARBORS Every ten years the tree is stripped of its bark, and when full-grown it yields several hundred pounds of cork. In Babouch, the first Tunisian village, we were detained a short time by the courteous officials of the customs, and again followed the magnificent mountain causeway, which there made a sudden drop to the borders of the Mediterranean. We had enjoyed the drive over the mountains in a manner almost jubilant, but truth compels the admission that there were certain steep descents which lent a doubtful charm to the landscape. Before noon we reached Tabarka, on the sea, and after replenishing our gasolene and taking luncheon, we continued our journey to the capital, called by the Arabs "The White Burnoose of the Prophet." Along the coast were high sand-dunes of deep orange-red. After crossing an immense plateau, we descended into a fertile plain dotted with well-cultivated farms and low, whitewashed farmhouses. The evening was still young when we entered Tunis la Blanche, Tunis l'Odorante, long held by the Mussulman to be the most beautiful of Eastern cities. It is undoubtedly a city that captivates; it possesses the mysterious charm of the Orient, with the prosaic comforts of the Occident. From the modern French town one can step into the land of the Arabian Nights and wander with the rich merchant of Bagdad through strange, fascinating streets which never affront the most sensitive sense. The moment you pass through the Porte de France and enter a tangle of little streets, the trammels of your identity drop from you like an inconvenient mantle; your Western personality ceases for the time to be the center of the cosmos, from which you gaze with condescension upon your strange environment: you are Zadi Abou-Hassan or Ahmed Mustapha, and Allah is great, and Mohammed is his prophet. And something else happens: you have lost your way, and care not a fig, not an amber-colored date, that this is so. After wandering through a labyrinth of little streets, you finally arrive at the "souks," the bazaars of old Tunis, and one look convinces you that they are the same to-day that they were five hundred years ago. There are a hundred thousand Mussulmans in Tunis, and you are willing to believe that ninety thousand are shopping, or selling, or strolling in the souks. Hadj Mohammed's shop cannot be entered; it is too diminutive. You sit on a convenient bench before the door, and he sits cross-legged in the middle of the shop, from which, by stretching out his hand, he can reach every article of his valuable and fragrant stock. He opens his bottles of essences, rose, heliotrope, amber, violet, geranium, one after the other, and rubs a drop of each on your glove, your sleeve, your shoulder, till you are intoxicated with sweet odors. He does this for the pleasure of your company, and by no means because he desires you to buy. He converses in excellent French on the increased cost of living in Tunis since the tourists have come; on the high price of chickens; on the scarcity of good vegetables; and in the same breath calls your attention to the delightful fragrance of the "vrai jasmin de Tunis" by a perfumed drop on the lapel of your coat. In the meanwhile Achmet or Morabec or Imbrahim brings black coffee in small, white cups, and Hadj Mohammed Cabet begs you to honor him by drinking; and what with the cof fee, the perfumes, and the graceful attentions of the incomparable Hadj, you end by gaily purchasing more than you want. When you enter your hotel three hours later, every person in it with a nose is aware that you have that day been to the Souk el Attarin. Each morning an auction is held in the Souk el Trouk. In the narrow streets, packed with Jews and Arabs, every one is crying, bargaining, disputing prices, and no one ever seems to buy. The auctioneers walk up and down, pushing their way through the human mass, holding high above their heads a single vivid-colored waistcoat, a shawl, or a soiled, white burnoose, and shrieking the prices. Women sit at the entrances of diminutive shops and watch with eyes peering through black veils. They have brought articles to sell, and are waiting the return of their auctioneers. Now and then a tall Arab halts before a cluster of chattering women and, singling out one, offers her a pinch of snuff. With her thumb and forefinger she takes the snuff, and sneezes gratefully. If a foreigner purchases anything of value in a shop, before eventide every merchant in the souks knows the exact article he bought and, to the ultimate sous, what he paid for it, and every guide in Tunis is equally well informed. It is safe to assert that if that same foreigner escapes the lures awaiting him next day, or any day during the remainder of his sojourn in the town, he either possesses the wisdom of Solon or has no money left to spend. It comes to the same thing in the end, and that, somehow, remains a comforting thought. The imperative trip to take from Tunis is to the site of ancient Carthage, and one's interest does not languish on discovering that absolutely nothing remains of the famous city and that the few scattered monumental ruins are of Roman, not of Phenician, origin. The beauty of the panoramic view from the crest of the Byrsa (the hill formerly occupied by the citadel of Carthage) is as great now as when the fugitives from Tyre gazed upon it. The Gulf of Tunis shines as deeply blue, the distant islands Zimbra and Zinbretta are as lightly slumberous in their From a photograph, copyright by Lehnert and Landrock, Tunis REMAINS OF THE ODEON THEATER AT THE SITE OF ANCIENT CARTHAGE |