CHAPTER V

SOCIAL CONDITIONS

By constantly seeing the same people for nearly three months at Auderas and in the neighbourhood, I was able to dissipate much of the innate diffidence which the Tuareg display in their relations with Europeans. Language always remained a source of difficulty. An interpreter is never satisfactory, more especially if he belongs to a people whom the Tuareg at heart really despise, while real proficiency in a language cannot be attained in so short a time as I had at my disposal. By the end of my stay in Air I had acquired a sufficient knowledge of Temajegh to be able to travel comfortably with a guide speaking only that language, and to collect a considerable amount of vicarious information, but never at any time was I able to discuss really abstruse questions. At Auderas I was lucky enough to find that Ahodu, the chief of the village, had a working knowledge of Arabic which was almost as indifferent as my own; but we both made up for lack of grammar by volubility. The local “inisilm,” or holy man, named El Mintaka, was a Ghati who had been settled for fifteen years in Air, where he had taken a Tuareg wife. He, of course, spoke Arabic in addition to Temajegh, and acted as scribe to Ahodu, who could neither read nor write. With these two men in the village, with my servant Amadu, a Fulani soldier who had served with distinction in the West African Frontier Force during the war, and had a working knowledge of English and Hausa, which most of the Air Tuareg speak, and with my interpreter Ali, a man from Ghat, I found myself quite at my ease.

This Ali ibn Tama el Ghati had lived for some years in Kano and had travelled all over the Central Sudan. He was small and very black, but constantly cheerful and as clever as a tribe of monkeys. Somewhat of a rogue unless watched, he was tireless and devoted, and proved to be one of only two natives who, after I had been obliged to return home, completed the whole journey with Buchanan. He was one of the original race of Ghat, now called the Atara, who were there before the Tuareg and Berbers came. Ali spoke no English, but was loquacious in Hausa, Temajegh and Kanuri; he also spoke some Tebu and Fulani, in addition, of course, to Arabic. His especial joy was to wear many different combinations of gay clothes for periods of about ten days at a time. He would then change his apparel and adopt another disguise until the novelty of appearing as a Tuareg or a Hausa or an Arab in turn had worn off.

PLATE 16

[Illustration: AUDERAS: HUTS]

[Illustration: AUDERAS: TENT-HUT AND SHELTER]

On reaching Auderas I took up my residence in some huts which Ahodu had prepared on the edge of a diminutive plateau between the main bed of the valley and a secondary affluent. The area between the valleys and ravines which intersected the little plain was bare, but the sides of the valleys were covered with vegetation. About a hundred yards away across a steep gully was Teda Inisilman, the House of the Holy Men, the smallest of the three hamlets which together make up Auderas. On the other side of the main stream bed, where the water-holes of the village were dug in the sand, lay the larger hamlet called Karnuka, containing the house of El Mintaka. The third settlement was a few hundred yards further down-stream. These hamlets were all built of reeds and palm fronds, but the little plain was covered with what proved to be the ruins of stone houses, many of which were inhabited until 1915. Teda Inisilman is the village of the nobles where Ahodu and the only other three Imajeghan families of the place lived, together with their own dependent Irawellan and Ikelan, and the Enad or smith, a most important person in Tuareg society. Down-stream of Teda Inisilman and Karnuka lay the date-palm groves and most of the gardens; there were a few above our camp also, in a side valley and in the main bed under a huge mass of overhanging rock resembling the keep of a fortress rising high above the sheer side of the stream. To the south were only dûm palms and the rugged hills, called Tidrak,[150] which formed the further edge of the valley. Elsewhere the ground was more open. Down-stream to the west were the low Mafinet and T’ilimsawin hills, joining on to the T’inien peaks north of the point where my road had emerged from among them on the way from Agades. To the north the ground rose over a low ridge to the Erarar (plain) n’Dendemu, the Taghist plateau[151] and the distant peak of Dogam.[152] The glistening black domes of the Abattul and Efaken peaks were rather nearer, on the far edge of the Auderas valley itself. A few miles north and north-east, this basin reached to the foot of the mountain group of Todra, which towers 3000 feet and more above the valley to a total height of about 5500 feet above the sea. The rounded sides rose out of a bed of green and yellow to a crest of bare red rock at the top. The mountain used to change colour all day, a whitish gleam off the rocks at high noon giving place to blue-black shadows under storm clouds and in the evening. At sunset it seemed to glow vivid red from within. It is one of the most beautiful mountains in the world. The Tuareg regard Todra and Dogam as one group, but separate from the Bagezan Mountains, and this is certainly the case. They are reckoned among the five principal massifs of Air, the others being Taruaji in the south, Bila or Bilet north-west of Todra, and Tamgak which includes the Azañieres, Tafidet and Taghmeurt ranges in the north.

The advent of Europeans in Auderas caused a certain amount of excitement, but the novelty soon wore off as the routine of life was resumed. I was welcomed by Ahodu’s wife and other persons with a present of fresh dates, which were then ripening,[153] and newly-made cheese, known as T’ikammar, which is excellent food. The Tuareg live very simply and take so little trouble about their food that for Europeans it is almost uneatable. The staple diet is milk and cheese, but the more sedentary people eat locally grown or imported grain. The millet is pounded in a mortar as in the south and cooked with water, making a sort of porridge; but whereas in the Hausa countries this “pura,” or “fura” as it is called, can be quite palatable when seasoned or eaten with meat, the Tuareg in Air are too poor and too lackadaisical to dress it in any way. They often even forget to add salt, and without it the mess is peculiarly nasty on account of a certain glutinous consistency which it acquires. The finer flour obtained from the millet after it is pounded is also mixed with water and dry powdered cheese and drunk uncooked as very thin gruel; the dry cheese gives it a sour taste to which in time one gets used, and then it becomes really rather refreshing if one is thirsty. It is much better on the march for the stomach than large quantities of plain water. The drink is called “ghussub” in the south; it is often the sole means of sustenance of a Tuareg travelling quickly without baggage or when a scarcity of fuel makes it impossible to light fires. In the place of millet, guinea corn is also eaten; it is pounded and baked in embers into a heavy tasteless cake which is slightly more edible than millet porridge. The best food in Air is undoubtedly the wheat “kus-kus” of the Arabs and Berbers in the north: it is made in the same way by grinding wheat into rough flour, and then steaming and rubbing it until it forms grains about the size of small barley. It is carried dry and can be prepared by boiling in water or stock for a short time. It has the great advantage of requiring very little fuel to cook it. With no other adjunct than a little salt it is very good indeed. During the latter part of my stay I lived almost exclusively on kus-kus and rice, with hardly any meat, but as many vegetables as I could procure. When neither millet, guinea corn nor wheat is available, the Tuareg collect the seeds of various grasses and grind them, notably of the grass called Afaza and of the prickly burr grass. The former is a tall grass with stems of such strength that they are used when dry with a weft of thin leather strips for making the stiff mats which are spread upon their Tuareg beds. The stalks grow as much as five feet high; the grass is dark grey-green when fresh, or yellow when dry. The burr grass is fortunately rare in Air. One can only be thankful that Nature has found some useful purpose in this damnable plant as food for the Tuareg.

Of all the Tuareg food their cheese is best. It is usually made of equal parts of sheep’s or goat’s and camel’s milk, but any of them alone will do. The rennet is obtained from the entrails of the goat; the curds are pressed in matting made of dûm-palm fronds and formed into cakes about 4 in. × 5 in. × ¾ in. thick. The fresh cheese is pure white and soft, but nevertheless crisp; it is delicious with dates or with any other form of food, for it has no sour or “cheesy” flavour. It dries yellow and hard and is carried about by all Tuareg as a staple commodity, but in this state requires soaking or crumbling before use, and acquires rather an unpleasant sour smell. Butter is made of goat’s or sheep’s milk, churned in bottle-shaped gourds or in small skins. It is not bad mixed with kus-kus or rice or in cooking, but indifferent on bread or biscuits. Meat is very little eaten, for it is a luxury. But even when an animal is slaughtered and divided up the Tuareg do not seem capable of turning it into a very edible dish. They neither roast nor fry; they either stew their meat in a pot with vegetables or with millet porridge, or on the march broil it in the hot sand under the embers of a fire until it becomes shredded. If ever there is a surplus supply of meat, it is preserved by soaking in brine and drying in the sun strung on cords.

The preparation of food in the villages is done by the women, on the march by the “buzu,” or, where there is no slave present, by the youngest member of the party, whatever his caste or status, so long as he has not reached his majority. When there are no minors or slaves an Amghid does the work, but where all are of the same caste, the duty reverts once more to the youngest member of the party. The most arduous function is preparing the millet flour. Nowadays the millet is almost invariably pounded in a mortar with a long pestle, and the meal is then graded and separated from the husk and other impurities by shaking it with a circular motion on a flat tray. The mortar and long pestle, which is used by men and women standing up and working alone or pounding rhythmically with one or more companions, is certainly a southern invention; the wooden pestle is double-headed and some 3 feet long; the mortar is cut out of one piece of wood and stands about 12 inches high. The indigenous and more primitive fashion is to grind grain on the rudimentary saddle-stone quern, a form which has been preserved unchanged since prehistoric times. A large flat stone is placed on the ground, and the person grinding the wheat or millet kneels by it with a basket under the opposite lip of the stone to catch the flour as it is made. The wheat or other grain is poured on to the flat stone and crushed by rubbing it with a saddle-stone or rounded river pebble about the size of a baby’s head, held in both hands and worked forwards and backwards. As the grain is crushed the flour is automatically sorted out and pushed forward into the basket in front, the heavier meal remaining on the flat stone. These querns may be seen lying about all over Air on all the deserted sites; the lower stones can readily be recognised by the broad channel which is worn along their length. Except for wheat, which is too hard to be pounded, they have largely been discarded in favour of the handier mortar and pestle. I do not think a more widespread use of the quern necessarily indicates that wheat was more extensively eaten than millet in olden days nor yet that agriculture was formerly more pursued than nowadays. The explanation of the fact is merely that pounding grain in a mortar was found a simpler method in a country where millet was the staple cereal and the consumption of wheat a luxury. Moreover, the Northern Tuareg when they came to Air were probably less familiar with millet than with wheat, and only modified their habits and utensils after they had settled down.

Though certain wild herbs are employed for medicinal purposes, I know of none which is used in cooking. Besides Afaza and the burr grass, several other seeds or berries are used by the more nomadic Tuareg for food; there are said to be some twenty odd varieties in Air which ripen at various times of the year. The Abisgi (_Capparis sodata_) leaf has a biting taste and is sometimes used as a condiment; the tamarind does not grow so far north; limes are found only in Bagezan, and are rare. Dates are eaten fresh, or are preserved by soaking them for a short time in boiling water, and pressing them into air-tight leather receptacles, which are then sewn up. The practice of drying dates and threading them on a string is resorted to in Fashi and Bilma but not in Air.

Food is cooked in pear-shaped earthenware pots of red clay. The vessels are only half baked when they are manufactured, principally in the Agades neighbourhood, and have to be fired before they can be used. They are plain and unornamented, with a lip or rim round the mouth, which is bound with a cord to prevent cracking. More elaborate pitchers with a blue design are used for liquids, since the universal calabash of the south is comparatively rare in Air.[154] These pots are also made near Agades. The designs appear to be of local origin. The Sudanese jars and pots with bands of geometric design in straw-coloured slip and blue pigment are not used in Air. Many small pots for inks, spices and condiments are found in the houses of Northern Air: black and red pottery is used for such vessels and for saucers and little bowls. With the exception of what may be termed the “grape design” (Plate 22), none of the pottery is very remarkable. The pots used in the urn cemetery at Marandet seem to have been shaped like the common cooking-pot or with a slightly more round appearance: they are reported to have stood in saucers or plates. None of the pottery is wheel-turned.

Auderas being essentially a sedentary and servile community, did not contain many characteristic noble Tuareg. Neither Ahodu nor his wife represents the fine physical type of the race, for he is of somewhat mixed parentage, having, according to his own tradition, some Arab blood in his veins, while she is a Kanuri woman. Among the Tuareg, as in all races, it is hard to find the absolutely pure type. I came across one or two examples, and must count myself lucky to have seen so many. I was never able to confirm the story one had so often heard of Tuareg with blue eyes, but such accurate observers have recorded this feature that its occurrence must be admitted. In Air it must certainly be most uncommon; nowhere is it the rule; light brown and grey eyes, however, are not unusual, nor is it rare to see hair which is not so much black as dark brown and wavy; it is never crinkled or “fuzzy” unless there has been an obvious infusion of negro blood. Very fair skins, as fair as among the people of Southern Europe, are comparatively frequent, but the transparent white skin of the North is not known: no deduction can be drawn from this, as skin pigmentation is notoriously unreliable. Fair skins are held by the Tuareg to represent the purest type: a range of every shade to the black of the negro occurs. The Tuareg of Air differentiate the colouring of people somewhat arbitrarily: they call the pure negro “blue,”[155] but the dark-brown Hausa, “black”; the Arab is always “white,” whatever shade of bronze he happens to be; the Tuareg himself is “red,”[156] which is the most complimentary epithet he can apply to others. Fairness of complexion is much prized and is a social distinction, though when carried to such extremes as among Europeans it is apt to be regarded as strange and odd. Certain tribes in Air are reputed, even among the Tuareg, to be more than usually fair. When von Bary was in Air his acquaintances seem to have chaffed him about his celibacy; they offered to find him a woman of the Iwarwaren tribe, for, they said, she would match his own complexion.[157] Once on a time in Auderas I dressed completely as a Tuareg, a disguise which was not difficult, for I had grown a full dark beard and was very deeply sunburnt all up my arms and legs from wearing a sleeveless tunic, diminutive shorts and no shoes or stockings—the ideal garb for hot weather and an active life. I rode into the village on a great white camel by a circuitous path: the people were puzzled about my identity, and some, as I was later told, decided from the colour of my limbs that I came from the Igdalen tribe. It was typical of the Tuareg that they eventually recognised not me, but my camel, and so guessed who I was.

PLATE 17

[Illustration: THE AUTHOR DRESSING A WOUND AT AUDERAS]

In spite of the occurrence of many fair-skinned people, it must be admitted that the vast majority of Imajeghan and Imghad in Air are comparatively dark, yet these Tuareg are among the purest of their race. Their skin pigment seems to have changed before other characteristics. The darkness of their complexion in Air is accentuated by the prize set upon indigo clothing, which is so impregnated with dye that it wears off on the skin of the proud owner, whose ablutions are conspicuously infrequent. The Tuareg does not believe in washing unless it is absolutely necessary, and he avers that an indigo-stained skin is good protection against strong sunlight, which may or may not be true. In justice to my friends, I must admit that they washed their clothing, especially their white trousers, very frequently, and when they washed their person, they did so very thoroughly from head to foot, with much rubbing and a prodigious splashing of volumes of water.

The beauty and grace of their bodies are the principal characteristics of the Tuareg. They are tall, more commonly in the neighbourhood of six feet than shorter. They look much taller owing to their flowing robes. When at rest they have little superficial muscular development; their bodies are not corrugated and knobbly like the powerfully built Latin: they are more like Nordic folk in that their limbs and backs are smooth until exerted, when the muscles stand up hard and tough. Their arms and legs are long and shapely and exceedingly graceful; they never have flaccid or cylindrical limbs like Abyssinians or certain Indian races. Their bones are small. They have wrists and ankles as slender as a woman’s; it is noteworthy that whatever the degree of negro admixture this sign of high breeding is the last to disappear. It is a most infallible mark of pure Tuareg parentage. With it, of course, go slenderness and refinement of hands and fingers. The men never grow fat: they are hard and fit and dry like the nerve of a bow, or a spring in tension. Of all their characteristics the one I have most vividly in mind is their grace of carriage. The men are born to walk and move as kings, they stride along swiftly and easily, like Princes of the Earth, fearing no man, cringing before none, and consciously superior to other people.

Grace and mystery are added to their appearance by the veil over the face and by their long black robes, which are called “takatkat.” They are of plain indigo black cotton stuff, and though some are embroidered on the breast, the old-fashioned men shun such ornament as ostentatious. More rarely their robes are white. Their dress, to be in good taste, must above all be simple. Silk is hardly known and not in great demand: plain native cloth made up of many narrow slips sewn together to the desired width is esteemed superior to the European sorts. Buchanan had brought for presents an indigo stuff of excellent quality, made in Lancashire and better than anything of the sort that could be bought in Kano. It was much appreciated, but as it had a thin white stripe in it, not a single man would wear it for a dress. They gave it to their women for skirts.

Broad Moslem trousers called “takirbai” are worn beneath the robe; they are always of white cotton. Sometimes a tanned goat or sheep skin is worn around the loins below the trousers, more especially in bush country where burr grass is very prevalent.[158]

The best sandals used to be made in Agades only, but since the emigration of so many craftsmen from Air they can now also be procured in Kano, and more cheaply. They are of a shape peculiar to the Tuareg and are much in demand all over the Sahara. The form is pleasing: it is wide and round under the toes, slender under the instep, and at the heel, and just broad enough to carry the weight of the body. They are made of two thicknesses sewn together with neat white raw-hide stitching; the top piece is of red leather with a stained black border: the lower piece is of raw hide. Two red straps from the sides level with the instep join a thong, which passes under the top leather and is fastened between the two thicknesses of the sole in order to protect the sewing from wear on the ground. The thong is slipped between the big and second toes; the red straps pass over the breadth of the foot to the sides of the sandal. The heel is free. It is the ideal footwear in sandy country, as nothing can collect on the surface and rub the foot. I wore nothing else for nine months and can vouch for the comfort of these sandals. They are usually made in two sizes[159]; the correct pattern for all those who can afford them is 12 inches long and 6 inches broad across the toes. This great surface, leaving several inches all round the breadth of the foot, gives much support on loose sand, on which it rests like a platform. Many other forms of improvised sandals are made, covering the sole and sometimes the sides of the foot, but the most ingenious home-made type I saw was woven in a few minutes of green dûm-palm fronds. These sandals were really a sole of palm matting under the foot: they have the advantage of costing nothing and, when the fronds are still green, of being supple and springy in any weather, whereas the leather sandals become flaccid on wet ground. They are, however, not proof against long acacia thorns, as I learnt to my cost. During the rains I used to have a new pair made for me every day by Ahodu’s son, aged nine, at the grossly excessive rate of about 6_d._ a dozen. The best leather sandals cost as much as 6_s._ a pair at Agades nowadays.

Walking barefoot over loose sand in time produces severe cracks in the sole of the foot. The ball of the big toe and the inside part of the foot are particularly liable to be affected. In cold dry weather it is common to see men rubbing fat into the callous skin of their feet and warming them in front of a fire to soften the leather, for when a crack has begun to appear it is very difficult to induce healing. The skin of their feet is so insensible and thick that men often take a needle and thread and sew up their sole as one would mend a sandal. Some form of foot-wear is likewise desirable when there are many thorns about, and in the bush, where burrs find their way into the tender skin between the toes. As I often wore no foot-covering at all my feet became very hard, but I contrived on several occasions to pick up thorns, which went as much as three-quarters of an inch into the sole of my foot. I well remember how the extraction of these spikes used to cause a most peculiar form of pain; it produced almost physical sickness. Curiously enough, these wounds never seemed to get septic, and I have always wondered why. For several months I did have septic sores on my feet and legs whenever a rub or scratch occurred, but they were principally due to being run down after malaria and the rainy season. Acacia thorns or burrs in my feet never became infected.

With a veil, robe, trousers and sandals, the wardrobe of the Tuareg is complete. Some carry a white blanket of heavy native cotton stuff known in Nigeria as “Kano cloth,” woven in six-inch strips sewn together, with a blue border and fringe. But the article is a product of the Southland and almost seems to be considered a luxury in Air, where few men have any additional clothing or covering in cold weather. Some wear the conical hats of Kano basket-ware associated with the Hausa countries, but the practice is regarded as an affectation and is not very common.[160]

The scantiness of the clothing of the Tuareg in Air is very remarkable. Their robe is admirably suited for hot weather, since any covering which hangs in loose folds over the back is good protection against the sun. The garment consists of two large squares of stuff, forming the front and back, the height of a man’s shoulder, or say about 5 feet × 5 feet. The two lower corners of the squares are sewn together, the bottom and sides are left open. The top is sewn up except for a space of about 18 inches where the head is put through, and a slit with a pocket is cut on the breast. The sides of the upper part either fall down the arms or can be looped up over the shoulders to leave them clear. As the sides are open, the circulation of air under the robe is quite free. In cold weather the ample volume of the robe enables it to be wrapped well around the body, nevertheless it is very inadequate protection when the thermometer falls to freezing point. It speaks highly of the hardihood of these people that they wear this garment only throughout the year in spite of variations in temperature, such as in December I encountered on my way south through Azawagh, of as much as 60° F. in twenty-four hours. The three Tuareg with me had no sort of extra covering for the night until I gave them a ground sheet in which to wrap themselves near the fire. But they discarded it, because the canvas, as they said, “attracted the cold” more than did the sand. The dying embers of a fire warmed the soles of their feet, but the rest of their bodies must have been frozen.

The Tuareg woman wears a long piece of indigo cloth rolled round her body as a skirt and tucked in at the waist. Over her shoulders is a garment which resembles a sleeveless coat, but is really a small square of light indigo or black stuff with a hole for the head. The ends hang down in front and behind to the level of the waist, the sides are open. She never veils her face; the upper garment, or a dark cloth worn over the head like a nun’s hood, may be drawn across the face, but more often in coquetry, I think, than in prudery. This upper garment is sometimes embroidered with a simple cross-stitch pattern around the neck; usually it is a piece of plain native cloth made, like the robes of the men, of narrow bands sewn together. Women who can only afford one piece of stuff wear it wound round their bodies close under the armpits, though, as a general rule, it may be said that there is no feeling of immodesty involved in exposing the body above the waist.[161]

This ease of garb among the women and their unveiled countenances are in keeping with the perfect freedom which they enjoy. Irrespective of caste or circumstance, whether they be noble or slave, rich or poor, the women of the People of the Veil are respected by their men in a manner which has no parallel in my experience. It is the more significant in a Moslem people, inasmuch as Islam has not hitherto taught the men of the Eastern world to treat their women-folk as their equals, still less as their betters. In saying this much I write in no depreciatory spirit, for the Western world has happily long ceased to regard the followers of Muhammad’s teaching of the Faith of the One God as heathen or pagan. But the morals and ethical code of Islam differ most essentially from those of the north of Europe and America precisely in regard to women; and in this respect Islam has lagged behind. But even in European countries the complete emancipation of women is only a modern development which may perhaps have just begun in Islam. Yet judged by our Northern standards the Tuareg have much in common with ourselves. So strange in Africa seems their conduct to women, that early travellers called them the Knights-Errant of the Desert Roads. The extent to which they have earned this name is their justifiable pride.

Their women have position and prerogatives not yet achieved by their sisters in many of those countries which we term “civilised.” The Tuareg women are strong-minded, gifted and intelligent. They have their share in public life; their advice is proffered and sought in tribal councils. Contrary to Moslem practice and to that of many European societies, a Tuareg woman may own property in her own name, and, more than that, may continue to own and administer it after her marriage without interference by her husband, who has no rights over it whatsoever. At death a woman’s property, unless otherwise disposed of in satisfaction of her expressed wish, is divided in accordance with the Moslem laws of inheritance, but if her family has been provided for as custom demands, she may bequeath what is over as she pleases. There are many instances of Tuareg women of noble birth being heiresses or receiving a share of property which has become available, by conquest or the extinction of some group, for distribution generally among the community. Sometimes, if a tribe moves away from an old area, the community goes so far as to divide up and settle the free land on the chief women, who become, as Duveyrier has called them,[162] the “femmes douairières” of the Tuareg.

Their bravery is famous in Africa. Instances are not lacking where they have played great parts in war. In one engagement in Air the Kel Fadé women led their men into battle, covering them with their own bodies and those of their children to prevent the French firing.[163] When Musa ag Mastan, the Amenokal of Ahaggar, went to France in 1910 his sister ruled the people in his stead. Though no instances are recorded in Air itself of women becoming chiefs of tribes they rule several villages among the Kel Geres. By usage and by right their functions are more consultative than executive. They do not seek election to tribal councils. They enter them as of right and not in competition, but not even then do they order men about. Their function is to counsel and to charm. They make poetry and have their own way. In recent years there seems to have been only one example in Air of a woman playing a definitely masculine rôle. Barkasho, of the Ikazkazan, was already an old woman when, as a small boy, Musa, of the same tribe, who was with me at one time as a camel-man, knew her. Soon after she married, Barkasho told her husband that she was going about a man’s work and proceeded to don the robe, veil and sword of the other sex. She set off on a raid to the east to avenge some depredations on her people. As her courage grew and became famous she turned her attention to the west and led a raid, it is said, as far afield as the Tademekkat country. On one of these expeditions she lifted, single-handed, seven camels from a party of three men who were guarding them. The curious side of Barkasho’s personality was that when she returned from these excursions, she put off her male attire and quietly resumed her place and occupations in the household. Evidently, however, her husband must have become restive, for in the end she advised him to get rid of her, or at least to marry another woman as well, since she was useless to him as a wife. But history does not relate what the husband did. Musa last saw her as an old, old woman, sitting in front of her hut, looking into the sunset over the country where she used to raid, and dreaming. I failed in my endeavours to obtain other stories of women leaders. I found, therefore, nothing to bear out the Amazonian legend,[164] except the survival of the matriarchal system generally.

Kahena lives on among the Tuareg only as a memory and as a proper name. They do not claim as one of their race the Berber queen who defended Ifrikiya against the Arabs in the seventh century. Ahodu had heard of her as a woman of the Imajeghan who were in the north when the Arabs came. “She led these noble people and defeated the Arabs, it is true, and those Imajeghan were great people, of course, but she was not one of our people: our people are older than they; and the Arabs—why, the Arabs have only just come to the land,” said Ahodu, who, where his own Kel Tadek were concerned, was always an intolerable snob.

Under Moslem law a man may take unto himself four legitimate wives in addition to a number of slave concubines. The rules laid down by the Prophet for the governance of the marital relations of good Moslems are theoretically, at least, in force among the Tuareg of Air. In practice, however, monogamy is more frequent than polygamy. I am not clear whether an explanation of this phenomenon is to be looked for in a survival of a matriarchal state of society where one would indeed be led to expect polyandry rather than polygamy, or whether the reason is rather to be sought in the economic condition of a people whose poverty does not allow them to keep more than one wife. I have no hesitation in disagreeing with Jean when he says[165] that monogamy is rare and even anomalous in Air. It does not accord with my personal observations, nor is it consistent with what I heard of those traditions and conditions which I was unable to verify. How often has it not been said to me that “the Imajeghan respect their women, and _therefore_ have only one wife, not like the negroes, and heathen”? It does not accord with the conditions governing the status of women as described by Jean himself, nor yet with the remarks which he makes on the subject of the matrimonial relations of the Tuareg. It is, finally, in contradiction with the accounts given by Duveyrier[166] and others of the Northern Tuareg, concerning whom his enthusiasm even led him into the exaggeration of asserting that polygamy was unknown.

After considering the question carefully, I have come to the conclusion that monogamy is probably an old tradition dependent upon and consistent with the status of Tuareg women, and not a consequence of economic conditions which have, however, served to perpetuate the custom. It is certainly connected with the matriarchate. The practice of concubinage is restricted, and where it does occur, is usually confined to women of the slave caste. A noble woman is not, and never could be, a concubine so long as the status of noble and of serf continues to exist; but if the maintenance of only one wife were due to economic necessity alone, the same conditions would not obtain in regard to concubinage in a community where every additional slave, male or female, is an asset as a productive unit. The position of women among the Tuareg has no real parallel in any other Oriental country. Even in Ashanti, where there are analogies for some of the matriarchal survivals found among the Tuareg, the exceptional positions of some of the royal women seem to be less favourable than that of any of the noble and most other women in Air, where all the sex is held in honour.

At Auderas I played the rôle of doctor to the best of my ability. I found a great ally in Ahodu’s wife, who, though not a Tuareg by race, had acquired all their traditions and manners. Her appearance was not in the least characteristic; her negroid features were frankly ugly from the European point of view. But she made up for these physical disadvantages by her unfailing sense of humour and constant cheerfulness, which are very valuable qualities in Africa. In general the young Tuareg women are handsome and possessed of considerable charm. They are smaller in build than the men, but when their parentage is reasonably pure, they possess the same aristocratic features and proportions. Their demeanour is modest and dignified. In this Ahodu’s wife resembled them. She was perfectly natural and had great quickness of mind. She was what might be called “une femme du monde.” Ahodu had divorced at least two previous wives for their uncouth or unrestrained behaviour. He was devoted to his present one. He always used to speak with pride of her capability, which he averred was second to no man’s: one could place complete reliance in her. I made a point of taking her with me when visiting sick women and children in the hamlets, and through her tact and presence of mind gradually came to understand their perfect ease and bearing. In their tents or huts they would sit and listen without fear or shyness. After the inevitable diffidence had worn off they talked and were free from awkwardness, but never familiar like the negro or negroid women. They are gay but not infantile. They never lose their dignity. Their dress is staid and sombre like that of their men, with a few ornaments of beads and silver.[167] As they grow older the women of good family and wealth become fat, especially, as Barth remarks, in “the hinder parts,” for fatness is a sign of affluence, since it implies a sufficiency of the good things of life, like slaves and food, to obviate having to do much manual work. But among the unmarried women I saw no large-proportioned ladies: indeed few enough even of the married ones at Auderas were fat, indicating, I am sorry to say, the poverty of most of them. When the women do not run to fat, they age with great beauty; nearly all the old women looked typical aristocrats and conscious of their breeding.

The women use henna, which grows in Air, on their finger and toe nails, and “kohl” (antimony) for their eyes. On festive occasions they have a curious habit of daubing their cheeks and foreheads with paint, prepared either from a whitish earth found especially near Agades, or with red or yellow ochres which occur in several places. The effect of these colours on different shades of skin is uniformly ghastly, especially when the more usual yellow pigment is used, but they apparently like the habit. A possible explanation is that in the first instance the custom was intended as a symbolic or conventional method of expressing the respect felt for the fairer complexions of their original ancestors. The negro is despised in Air, the “red” man is respected; painting the face was perhaps at first intended to create an illusion of purer blood. Although the practice is supposed to be restricted to festive occasions, where the women have little work to do, they remain daubed most of the time: this seemed to be the case at T’imia, for instance, where the women were noble and had plenty of slaves. Tuareg men do not so adorn themselves.[168]

Before marriage, which for Oriental women occurs comparatively late in life, Tuareg girls enjoy a measure of freedom which would shock even the modern respectable folk of Southern Europe. They do no work, but dance and sing and make poetry, and in the olden days they learned to read and write. The art of literature is unfortunately dying out, but the women still are, as they always were in the past, the repositories of tradition and learning. Where the script of the Tuareg is still known and freely used, it is the women who are more versed in it than the men. It is they who teach the children. When families have slaves, the noble woman does as little work as she can: her occupation among the poorer people is confined to the household work or to herding goats and sheep. They make cheese and butter and sort dates, but they do not as a rule work in the gardens. They are never beasts of burden. They have never learnt to weave or spin, but they plait mats and make articles of leather. The leather-working industry at Agades is exclusively in their hands. Their knowledge of needlework is limited; the men on the whole are more skilled than the women at cutting out and sewing clothes.

The household duties are simple but laborious. The children for the first few years of their lives are washed frequently, but when they are able to look after themselves in any way the practice is abandoned. The hut or tent is cleaned out several times a day and food has to be prepared. This entails pounding millet in a mortar and stewing the porridge, or steaming wheat to make kus-kus. The women eat their food with the men, a privilege often denied their sex among other Moslems. Among the Kel Ferwan[169] the women eat their food before the men do so, and the latter have to be content with what is left, which is often not very much. A man once said to me, to emphasise the good manners required by usage to be observed before women, that in the olden days if anyone had dared to break wind in their presence, the insult was punishable by death alone.

Half the poetry of the Tuareg deals with the loves and adventures of young men and women. Marriages are not arranged as among the Arabs. It often happens that a girl has two or more suitors, when her free choice alone is the deciding factor. It is common for a girl who is in love with a man to take a camel and ride all night to see him and then return to her own place, or for a suitor to make expeditions of superhuman endurance to see his lady.[170] Fights between rivals are not uncommon. Illicit love affairs inevitably occur: if they have unfortunate consequences, the man is called upon to marry the woman, but infanticide is not unknown. Once married the woman is expected to behave with decorum and modesty. Public opinion on these matters is strong. The married state, however, does not prevent a woman admitting men friends to an intimacy similar to that existing, perhaps, only among the Anglo-Saxon peoples. In a passage in which Ibn Batutah describes the Mesufa, who before becoming debased were of the Western Sanhaja Tuareg, but had in part settled south of Air, he comments on the status of women in these charming terms:[171]

“The women of the Mesufa feel no shame in the presence of men; nor do they veil their faces. Despite this, they do not omit to perform their prayers punctually. Anyone who wishes to marry them can do so without difficulty. . . . In this country the women have friends and companions among men who are strangers. The men for their part have companions among women not in their own families. It often happens for a man to enter his own house to find his wife with a friend. He will neither disapprove nor make trouble. I (that is, Ibn Batutah himself) once went into the house of a judge at Walata after he had given me permission, and found quite a young and very beautiful woman with him. As I stopped, doubting, and hesitated, wanting to return on my steps, she began to laugh at my embarrassment instead of blushing with shame.” The great traveller is evidently very much shocked, for he goes on: “And yet this man was a lawyer and a pilgrim. I even heard that he had asked the Sultan for permission to perform the pilgrimage that year to Mecca, in the company of this friend. Was it this one or another? I do not know. . . .” Again, he goes on to describe how he visited the house of one of his companions of the road and found him sitting on a carpet, “while in the middle of the house on a couch . . . was his wife in conversation with a man seated by her side. I asked Abu Muhammad: ‘Who is that woman?’ ‘It’s my wife,’ he replied. ‘And who is the individual with her?’ ‘It’s her friend.’ ‘But are you, who have lived in our countries, quite satisfied with such a state of affairs—you who know the precepts of the Holy Writ?’ He replied: ‘The relations of women with men in this country bring good and are correct, they are right and honourable. They give rise to no suspicion. Our women, as a matter of fact, are not like those in your country.’”

And that is the whole truth. The Tuareg men and women are not like the other inhabitants of North Africa. But Ibn Batutah must have been none the less shocked, because, though Abu Muhammad invited him to visit him again, he did not go.

Conditions have not changed since those days among the People of the Veil, but habits which would be considered natural in America or in England admittedly seem strange in Africa. They are all summed up in the Tuareg proverb which says: “Men and women towards each other are for the eyes and for the heart, and not only for the bed,” as among the Arabs. The consequence of such a frame of mind is that the men and women of the People of the Veil are often blessed, or cursed, with love so lasting, so sincere and so devoted that, like in our own society, it makes or mars a life.

Bates has discussed the marriage customs of the Libyan tribes mentioned in the classics. While some of these groups of people may represent the ancestors of the Tuareg, there is no evidence of the outrageous performances mentioned, for instance, by Herodotus, having persisted into modern times in Air. Divorce among the Tuareg is fairly frequent and is carried out in accordance with Moslem prescription, but adultery is not very common. Prostitution exists, but perhaps, on the whole, is less common than in more favoured parts of the world. It is, of course, more frequent in Agades than in the villages, and in the latter than among the tribes. The harlot is not respected, and her marriage with a decent man is reprobated.

The husband is required to purchase his wife, the money or equivalent being paid to her parents. The sum varies from a few silver francs to several camels. Marriage portions in cattle, sheep or goats, according to the circumstances of the parents, are frequently given to women; the “dot” remains the property of the bride.

The children of the Tuareg, and especially the little girls, are adorable persons. They are fairer than their parents, largely, I think, because they wash more often than their elders, but even discounting this factor they appear to turn darker as they grow up. Up to the age of seven or eight the children wear no clothes at all, summer or winter, indoors or out of doors, except perhaps a rag to keep off the flies when they are asleep. After that, their first clothes are white cotton shifts. Small boys have their hair cropped close, except for a crest along the top of the head; in some tribes, notably in the west of Air, a lock on either side of the head and a patch on top are sometimes left. Little girls are allowed long hair until they first put on a smock or cloth about their waists. At the age of puberty both sexes dress their hair in one of the several fashions current in Air, usually in small plaits all over the head; thereafter the boys continue to wear white shirts, but the girls put on the indigo skirt cloth. The children are so well brought up that European parents might be envious of them. I have never met small boys with such perfect manners and so free from selfishness as I experienced in Air. As soon as they are old enough to take an interest in things, the boys accompany their fathers on journeys, to which they are thus gradually broken from an early age. They are made to work and do all the domestic duties that their powers allow in camp or on the march. They feed the camels on the road with grass or plants picked by the way; they carry water to their elders to drink; they bring in stray camels at loading-up time and hobble them when turned out to graze. The slaves, who prepare the food, are assisted by the boys and send them out to do all the hundred and one little jobs that are required. So the boys grow up to be useful men before they are mature, and in the process learn the respect which is due to their elders, and their elders show them such devotion as these pleasant little people deserve. The training is evidently successful, for nowhere else have I seen children so thoughtful or so kindly to all and to each other. It had never been my lot until I met the Tuareg to see a right-minded boy, for instance, who had been given a sweet or a penny or some equally valuable object, run off and offer it first to his father and then to his companions, who refused it. And this I saw not in an isolated instance, but as an universal practice.

In the primitive conditions of life in Air, infant mortality is high. The happiest and some of the most successful days I spent in Air were doctoring people, and especially children, at Auderas. There are not many diseases in the clean dry mountain air, but under-feeding and malaria, which comes after the rains, take their annual toll. The almost miraculous effect of quinine on the fevers is a very saving grace. One can never have enough quinine, but fortunately small doses at frequent intervals will keep fever in check during bad attacks and prevent collapse. Thus can a great deal be achieved. But it was the good sense of the women, who had some faith in my elementary remedies, that did most to save several children of Auderas in the autumn of 1922.

I was interested to find how long women went on suckling their children. I saw children of three and four years still feeding at the breast, though they were already eating solid food. A woman will go on suckling an older child for many years so long as her younger ones do not suffer; she is especially prone to do so if her last baby has died. In company with most races living under primitive conditions, even advanced pregnancy does not interfere with a woman’s activities, nor do mothers suffer much from the effects of childbirth. The processes of nature take place unassisted: there are neither local medicine men nor midwives. Women in labour are attended by their older relations or intimate friends, whose assistance is limited to massaging the body with hands steeped in butter or fat. Death in childbirth appears to be rare. Newly-born children are wrapped in some ragged garment, but receive no especial care. Cradles or swaddling clothes are unknown; but perhaps a cushion of grass or leaves for the infant is prepared on the family sleeping mat or bed. Babies are carried on their mother’s back or by a slave woman, slung with one tiny leg each side of the woman’s waist, in a fold of the cloth which constitutes her skirt. The cloth is firmly rolled round the baby and the woman’s body, and tucked in over the breast; only the child’s head emerges from this pouch on her back. So the child sleeps or cries or sucks its finger, and the mother goes about her daily occupations, pounding millet or plaiting mats.

PLATE 18

[Illustration: TEKHMEDIN AND THE AUTHOR]

Neither at birth nor later is any form of bodily deformation practised. Such horrors as flattened skulls or filed teeth are unknown. The only eunuchs in Air are negroes purchased in the south. As in the case of all good Moslems, the boys are circumcised at the age of a few months. The diseases which I myself observed in Air, I must admit, seemed few. Syphilis, malaria, certain digestive troubles, dysentery, a few minor skin diseases and eye troubles were the most serious. Syphilis is common, but apparently not very virulent: its method of propagation and origin are well known to the natives: in the Northern Sahara it is called the Great Disease. Von Bary thought that it, like malarial fevers, came from the Sudan, but there is no reason to believe this, for it is very evenly distributed all over North Africa. The juice of the colocynth as a purge is believed to do good in cases of venereal disease. Guinea-worm is fairly common; the milky juice of the Asclepias, known as _Calotropis Procera_,[172] which grows all over Air, is said to have a curative effect, in addition to the usual method of extraction known to everyone who has travelled in Africa. I saw one case of tuberculosis of the lungs at Auderas, accompanied by hæmorrhage. It was rather an interesting case of a woman whose family for three generations was said to have died of the disease. I was too honest, I suppose, to profess to be able to cure her, but I need hardly say that my servant, Amadu, took over the case. He claimed to have established a complete cure in a few days with some herb which he had found. My reputation suffered, but my advice to Ahodu to move her hut to the outskirts of the village was nevertheless admitted to be reasonable, and was followed. Duveyrier[173] mentions a form of ulcer in the nose, said to be due to constant sand irritation. He describes hernia from long-distance camel riding as being frequent: to prevent abdominal strains from this cause the Tuareg bind a long strip of cotton stuff tightly about their waists. Von Bary[174] records having seen, in addition to the above diseases, epilepsy, atrophied children, skin eruptions, small-pox, hypochondria and madness. He remarks that the Kel Owi seemed to suffer more from disease than the other tribes, that their women were very fat, and that they appeared to have irregular periods. My investigations into local medicine were unproductive. I brought home some drugs which were used locally as purges, lotions and astringents, but they were without value. The empiric knowledge of the Tuareg may yet be worth investigating, but has so far disclosed nothing of any value.

Festivals connected with social life are not interesting. Births occur without unusual or curious celebrations. The naming of the child is supposed to be in the hands of the local holy man, but the mother brings her influence to bear in his choice by suitable payments. Marriages are celebrated with feast and rejoicing after the bridegroom has wooed his bride and paid the stipulated portion. Burials equally follow the Moslem practice. The body is laid in the ground on its back, the head to the north and the feet to the south, with the face turned towards Mecca. The rope by which the body is lowered into the grave is left lying to rot away on the tomb. The grave is marked by one or two standing stones according as the deceased is male or female. The graves in Air are intimately connected with the architecture and dwellings of the Tuareg, and are dealt with in a later chapter. There are cemeteries all over Air: the little one now in use at Auderas lies on the south side of the valley under the hills of Tidrak, opposite the site of our camp. In the rains, malaria claimed several victims. They were mournful little processions which I used to see from my hut. One such occasion particularly impressed itself upon me. I was returning from South Bagezan one evening, climbing down on a rough path in a ravine with three camels and three men, when Ahodu, El Mintaka and a few more appeared, carrying a man to his grave. They were walking quickly so as to have done as soon as possible, proclaiming as they went that there was no God but God. They did that which there was to be done in haste, and returned at their leisure near sundown when the sky and the mountains of Todra were on fire. It had been raining and the black clouds were still in sight, covering the place of sunset. Above, everything was as red as the light of a blast furnace shining on Todra. Already the darkness had gathered in the north-east and the stars were coming out, and the deep valley with its white, sandy bottom was scarcely seen for the many trees in it. A chilly wind blew down the valley, waving the palms and troubling the gardens. As I reached my hut, Ahodu and his men joined me, and night fell, leaving purple and then dark red and then a yellow glow in the west. Last of all came the pale zodiacal light climbing up nearly to the zenith of the night, and the wind died down. Ahodu did not speak of death because it was unlucky, but he sat on the sand and told me many things. Ultimately came the information that a raid of Ahaggaren had plundered some villages in Kawar. He was afraid they would come on to Air, and that the village would have to be abandoned, and that his people would have to retreat into the mountain which towered as a black shadow in the east. He had left this subject to the last, because there was nothing in the matter to discuss. The raiders either would or they would not come. There was a proverb: “Reasoning is the shackle of the coward.”

PLATE 19

[Illustration: BAGEZAN MOUNTAINS AND TOWAR VILLAGE]

[Footnote 150: Cf. Barth, Vol. I. p. 387. The village of Aerwan wan Tidrak is presumably to be placed in these hills, where there are numerous remains of hamlets. The “village” of “Ifarghan” at Auderas is presumably a mistake, for “Ifargan” means “gardens” in Temajegh. Several of the Auderas gardens are at the point where Barth placed this so-called village.]

[Footnote 151: Barth, _op. cit._, Vol. I., p. 385.]

[Footnote 152: Mount Dogam is not west of the Ighaghrar (Arharkhar) valley as shown in the Cortier map, but to the east at the head of three tributary streams and adjoining the Todra massif. The latter on the map is not named and is erroneously given as a south-western spur of Bagezan, from which it is really quite distinct.]

[Footnote 153: First half of August, 1922.]

[Footnote 154: Three sorts of gourds do exist, but they are valuable.]

[Footnote 155: As does the Arab, and with some reason, for real negroes in the sunlight have, in fact, a blue-black appearance.]

[Footnote 156: Izagarnen or Ihagarnen—the red ones, possibly the etymology of “Ihaggaren.”]

[Footnote 157: Von Bary, _op. cit._, p. 166.]

[Footnote 158: Among the Tuareg I have never seen or heard of the “penistasche,” which Bates regards as so typical of the Libyans.]

[Footnote 159: Sandals are called Irratemat.]

[Footnote 160: The hats illustrated by Bates, _op. cit._, Fig. 32, are typically Sudanese.]

[Footnote 161: I believe this is not so in the north, where Arab influence contrasts with the more negroid customs of Air.]

[Footnote 162: Duveyrier, _op. cit._, p. 401.]

[Footnote 163: Jean, _op. cit._, pp. 192-3.]

[Footnote 164: _Vide supra_, Chap. IV.]

[Footnote 165: Jean, _op. cit._, p. 195.]

[Footnote 166: Duveyrier, _op. cit._, p. 429.]

[Footnote 167: See Plates 36 and 37.]

[Footnote 168: The practice is alluded to in Gsell’s _Histoire de l’Afrique du Nord_, Vol. I. Chap. IV, and a connection with the mysterious term Leucæthiopians is suggested, but I think mistakenly. It is an insult to the classical geographers to suggest that any people were so called because some negroes whitened their faces with paint.]

[Footnote 169: Jean, _op. cit._, p. 193.]

[Footnote 170: I cannot agree with Jean, p. 193, that until their marriage girls never leave their mothers. They are not taken on journeys like boys, but they walk about the villages or encampments in a remarkably free way. Their romances are a proof of their freedom, which is the topic of discussion and the object of remark of anyone who first comes into contact with this race.]

[Footnote 171: Ibn Batutah (French edition), Vol. IV. pp. 388-90.]

[Footnote 172: Known by various native names. In Air the usual name is the Hausa form Tunfafia. Barth refers to it as _Asclepias gigantica_. It is called Turha or Toreha or Tirza in Temajegh, Turdja in Mauretania, Ushr in Egyptian and Korunka in Algerian Arabic.]

[Footnote 173: Cf. Duveyrier, _op. cit._, pp. 433-5.]

[Footnote 174: Von Bary, _op. cit._, p. 185.]