Page:The Burton Holmes lectures; (IA burtonholmeslect04holm).pdf/172

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
This page needs to be proofread.

The Ouled Nayels coming from other oases in the far south or from remote villages of the plateaux enjoy a freedom denied to the women of more thoroughly Mohammedanized regions. They refuse to veil their faces, although they invariably turn them away when threatened by the camera, often to the advantage of the latter, for the faces of the older specimens would test the endurance of the strongest make of apparatus. We examine with interest the curious jewelry with which these desert damsels deck themselves.

OULED NAYELS IN BISKRA By permission

Many wear suspended from the neck a little fortune in coins, a breast-plate formed of louis d'or, English sovereigns and other golden coins. My friend examining the collections discovers a gold eagle from the United States. "Mais oui, Monsieur," replied the damsel, "j'étais á l'Exposition de Chicago." She danced in the Algerian Theater on the Midway. Nor was this the only echo of the