fingers on which to enumerate. "The Chaambra
were ever men. Warriors, bedouin; not for us the cities and villages of
the Zenatas, and the miserable Haratin serfs. We Chaambra have ever been
men of the tent, warriors, conquerors!"

El Aicha still nodded. "That was before," he murmured.

"That will always be!" Abd-el-Kader insisted. His four fingers were
spread and he touched the first one. "Our life was based upon, one, war
and the spoils of war." He touched the second finger. "Two, the toll we
extracted from the caravans that passed from Timbuktu to the north and
back again. Three, from our own caravans which covered the desert trails
from Tripoli to Dakar and from Marrakech to Kano. And fourth"--he
touched his last finger--"from our flocks which fed us in the
wilderness." He paused to let this sink in.

"All this is verily true," muttered one of the elders, a _so-what_
quality in his voice.

Abd-el-Kader's tone soured. "Then came the French with their weapons and
their multitudes of soldiers and their great wealth with which to pursue
the expenses of war. And one by one the Tuareg and the Teda to the south
and the Moors and Nemadi, yes, and even the Chaambra fell before the
onslaughts of the Camel Corps and their wild-dog Foreign Legion." He
held up his four fingers again and counted them off. "The four legs upon
which our life was based were broken. War and its spoils was prevented
us. The tolls we charged caravans to cross our land were forbidden. And
then, shortly after, came the motor trucks which crossed the desert in a
week, where formerly the journey took as much as a year. Our camel
caravans became meaningless."

Again all nodded. "Verily, the world changes," someone muttered.

The warrior leader's voice went dramatic. "We were left with naught but
our flocks, and now even they are fated to end."

The elderly nomads stirred and some scowled.

"At every water hole in the desert teams of the new irrigation
development dig their wells, install their pumps which bring power from
the sun, plant trees, bring in Haratin and former slaves--_our_
slaves--to cultivate the new oases. And we are forbidden the water for
the use of our goats and sheep and camels."

"Besides," one of the clan chiefs injected, "they tell us that the goat
is the curse of North Africa, nibbling as it does the bark of small
trees, and they attempt to purchase all goats until soon there will be
few, if any, in all the land."

"So our