es donkeys come
to the aid of their mistresses, at some sacrifice of the picturesque,
but with great advantage to comfort.

A water-supply thus obtained must be, it is obvious, inadequate to the
demands of scrupulous cleanliness. Accordingly, the desert wanderer has
the advantage in this respect of the Kabyles, crowded into a village
perched on the summit of a rock and traversed only by pathways cut, as
it were, through solid blocks of houses. These abodes are of but one
story, and generally of one room. Bipeds and quadrupeds live together,
eating and sleeping on the same earthen floor. There are no chimneys and
no windows. Cutaneous and ophthalmic affections are of course common,
and typhus fever now and then redresses the balance in Malthusian
fashion by reducing the crowd. Death is the great sanitary regulator or
superintendent of hygiene. His functions in this regard are but
slightly, if at all, interfered with by the authorities of the village.

The head of the municipality is an officer called an _amin_: we might
style him the mayor. He is chosen by popular suffrage from each of the
family or patriarchal groups or clans composing the community in turn.
He is guided in his administration by a code of written laws bearing the
name of _khanoun_ or canon, established from time immemorial. He is
checked also by a city council chosen from among the notables, and is
required to consult it before taking any executive or judicial step. The
secretary of the council, elected by it, bears the title of _chodja_. He
is generally an old codger, for the double reason that clerks usually do
grow old in harness, and that writing is not a universal accomplishment
among the Kabyles and competition for the office is not great. He keeps
the journal of the municipality, and conducts all its correspondence
with other towns and with the French authorities. He enjoys a salary,
paid in kind with figs, olives, etc. In this pleasant feature of his
post he seems to be distinguished from his associate functionaries. We
do not find that they receive any pay, unless in the indirect shape of
bribes and perquisites--a mode of compensation as well understood in the
East as in the West.

Moslem influence shows itself in the close association of Church and
State. The mosque of each town has its treasury, fed by the fines
imposed on transgressors by the municipal council and by dues from the
registration of marriages, births and deaths. The sacred bu