Beriberi

“ The Berbers, short, squat figures, high cheekbones, small eyes, square frames, great walkers, only becoming horsemen by necessity, as when the Arabs have forced them to the desert; as fond of mountains as the Arabs are of plains; in general agriculturists, whereas the Arab in his true sphere prefers a pastoral life; the Berbers, little known outside their mountains, look rather Scottish in appearance, that is, Scotch as ordinary mortals see that race, and not as seen through “kailyard” spectacles. ”

“ There was no placing this figure of radiant ease, for Berridge, in any relation that didn't appear not good enough—that is among the relations that hadn't been too good for Berridge himself. He was all right where he was; the great Gloriani somehow made that law; his house, with his supreme artistic position, was good enough for anyone, and to-night in especial there were charming people, more charming than our friend could recall from any other scene, as the natural train or circle, as he might say, of such a presence. ”

“ Roughly speaking, therefore, it can be said that the groups of pure Berbers are located in the high mountains, in the Mzab and in the Hoggar; that the Berber influence is predominant among the people who inhabit the country immediately south of Algiers, as far as the southern slopes of the Atlas, the department of Constantine, and an arm of the southern territories running from Biskra down to Ouargla and the great belt of desert running right across the Sahara from the Atlantic to Tripoli on a latitude just south of El Golea. ”

“ Their white veils are twisted into the head-dress behind, and fall in long folds to the ground, but are hardly ever used to cover the face; for these Biskris, and the dwellers in El Kantara, are descendants of the original inhabitants of the country, the Berbers. They belong to the same race as the tribes of Kabylia and of the Aures, and their ways, characters, and language are not those of the Arabs who invaded their land and drove most of them back into their mountain strongholds. They are the cause of many theories and much speculation. ”

“ An Egyptian of the middle class would pay his Berberi about 40 piastres a month, besides board, lodging, some small perquisites, and presents on certain occasions. This, however, will not induce a man to travel, especially to cross the sea. [FN#23] A man from the Sa'id or Upper Egypt. [FN#24] A favourite way of annoying the Berberis is to repeat the saying, "we have eaten the clean, we have eaten the unclean,"-meaning, that they are by no means cunning in the difference between right and wrong, pure and impure. ”

“ As far as I could find out, they were generally esteemed more honest than the Egyptians, and they certainly possess a certain sense of honour unknown to their northern brethren. "Berberi" is a term of respect; "Masri" (corrupted from Misri) in the mouth of a Badawi or an Arab of Arabia is a reproach. "He shall be called an Egyptian," means "he shall belong to a degraded race." [FN#22] Who becomes responsible, and must pay for any theft his protege may commit. Berberis, being generally "les Suisses" of respectable establishments, are expected to be honest. ”

“ These Berber peoples seem to be allied to the ancient Egyptians. The whole of North Africa and Southern Europe may have even been peopled from one ethnical source in prehistoric times, the populations, like the animal and vegetable species, thus radiating from a common centre. The oases and upland valleys in the Sahara have also been occupied by the Berbers, some of whose tribes, designated by the name of "Moors," dwell even south of the desert along the right bank of the Senegal. ”

“ We are to have the honour of going on and occupying Berber, and will show ourselves worthy of it. There is little chance of our meeting the Dervishes. Had they been in Berber, we should have heard of them before this. If we meet them we will fight; and you, Abu, who have the fastest camel among us, will ride back here at all speed, and the General and his soldiers will come up to help us. ”

“ Berbers, whose one desire as to clothing seems to be absolute freedom of limb. The haik, or toga-like garment of the Arabs, is used amongst the better-class Berbers, but merely as a luxury. Their typical costume consists of the chamira, or long loose shirt reaching from the neck to below the knees, and the haidus [65] above, the open hooded cloak called by the Arabs s’lham. This in the case of the mountaineers takes the form of the black goat’s-hair article, and in that of the Berbers of the plains of a thick but finely woven garment of white wool. ”

“ They are industrious, and employ themselves in spinning the wool of their sheep, and weaving the yarn into blankets, which they sell at Tafilet. These Berbers have a peculiar idiom, which the Arabs do not speak; they also conform to the religion of Mahomet; they have several wives, who superintend all the household concerns, prepare the food, take care of the sheep, and have besides the laborious task of drawing water for them to drink. They pasture their flocks in the passes of the mountains wheresover they can find herbage, for the appearance of their own country is absolutely bare. ”

“ It was evident that the pasha meditated a formidable irruption into the Ansáry mountains; and the command was given to Mustafa Aga Berber, as governor of their district, and as, moreover, a brave officer, fit to cope with these mountaineers. The Ansárys are that people who, during the crusades, furnished those assassins who devoted themselves to certain death for the sake of destroying the enemies of their faith. The reader will recollect the old man of the mountain and all the traditions connected with that mysterious person, and he will then know those whom Berber was to attack. ”

“ No doubt to a great extent the moral character of the Berbers is due to the fact that their women are allowed entire liberty, do not veil their faces, and mix on almost all occasions with the men. One of the first things that struck me on my arrival at Dads was the good-humoured and innocent chaff that passed between the men and the girls of the tribe, even in the streets of the ksar, and still more when they brought us our food to the minzah on the house-top. The women are distinctly pretty, with very fair skins and clear complexions ”

“ We have every reason to believe the Berbers existed in the remotest times, with all their essential moral and physical peculiarities.... They existed in the time of Menes in the same condition in which they were discovered by Phœnician navigators previously to the foundation of Carthage. They are an indomitable, nomadic people, who, since the introduction of camels, have penetrated in considerable numbers into the Desert, and even as far as Nigritia. ”

“ The Berbers’ weapons are those of the Arab: the long straight sword, the slightly curved and highly ornamented dagger, and the long gun. Berbers are not great town-builders. Their villages, however, are often of substantial appearance: with houses of untrimmed stones, occasionally with two storeys, built on hills, and invariably defended by a bank, a stone wall or a hedge. Sometimes their homes are mere huts of turf, or of clay tiles, with mortar made from lime and clay or cow-dung. ”

“ The aborigines of the Canary Islands, the Guanches, would seem almost certainly, from the remains of their language, to have been Berbers. But the problem of the actual origin of the Berber race has not yet been solved. Perhaps the most satisfactory theory is that of Sergi, who includes the Berbers in the “Mediterranean Race.” General L. L. C. Faidherbe regards them as indigenous Libyans mingled with a fair-skinned people of European origin. ”

“ As a rule, the Berbers seem to be constantly at war without the idea of plunder, their feuds being far more often matters of revenge. With the Aït Atta, however, this is different, and they seem to retain from the [209] time of their Eastern ancestors the love of going afield for conquest and booty, with the result that there is little land of the eastern portion of trans-Atlas Morocco which has not at one time or another been overrun, or at least attacked, by their hordes. ”

“ The Berbers, beholding with wonder the apparently invincible character of their enemy, equally fortunate in plain and mountain fastness, defeating with ease their bravest squadrons, and scaling, despite all obstacles, the all-but impregnable defences of their strongholds, clothed him with the attributes of divinity, and, submitting to his dominion, recognized the power of the Khalif, while at the same time, abjuring their idolatry, they confessed the unity and majesty of God. The advance of Okbah was the triumphant progress of a conqueror. ”

“ But so great is the difference of colour, type, and mental qualities of these populations, that it would be difficult to believe them related, without going back to times far anterior to recorded history. According to a general but probably groundless opinion, the term Berberi, Barabra, corrupted to Berberins or Barbarins in the language of the Franks living at Cairo, is merely the Greek or Latin word "barbarian" applied to the black populations who live above the cataracts beyond civilised Egypt. ”

“ For further discussion of the deposits and trade, see Lassen, I, 229-43; Tavernier, II.
“Beryls,” says Pliny (XXXVII, 20) , ‘ “are produced in India, and are rarely to be found elsewhere. The lapidaries cut all beryls of a hexagonal form, because the color, which is deadened by a dull uniformity of the surface, is heightened by the reflection from the angles. If they are cut in any other way, these stones have no bril- liancy whatever.” (The crystals are naturally hexahedral. ) ‘“The most esteemed beryls are those which in color resemble the pure green of the sea. ”

“ They, however, often take a foremost part in tribal administration, and are frequently called upon to perform the office of arbitrators in questions of disputed policy, &c. In the Jemáa, too, the Marabout at times takes the place of honour and keeps order. The Berbers, if irreligious, are very superstitious, never leaving their homes without exorcizing evil spirits, and have a good and evil interpretation for every day of the week. Many Berbers still retain certain Christian and Jewish usages, relics of the pre-Islamitic days in North Africa, but of their primitive religion there is no trace. ”

“ Remarks on Genera and Species. As only one genus of Berberideae has yet been met with in India, it affords no room for remark, I may however observe, that, I think there is a new species of Berberis on the Pulney mountains, referable to the section Mahonea, with pinnated leaves. I speak doubtfully, because J did not find flowers or fruit, and judge from habit alone: the Pulney plant being a diffuse shrub, with long, somewhat scandent branches, and the Neilgherry one an erect, sparingly branched tree. ”

“ The Berbers of the mountains seldom wear turbans or anything but a string tied round their foreheads. Generally they have a linen shirt to-day, but often wear the tunic as Leo Africanus says, and now and then one sees them with the twisted leg bandages like Pifferari. ”

“ It is difficult to perceive how it could have sprung up, as it seems to hint at an entirely different origin to that which history, and even other traditions of their own, has set down to them. It runs as follows. A certain maiden of the original Berber people, at the time when the race lived in a far-away country swept by strong east winds, once, in passing a strange king, had the misfortune to expose more of her person than was decent, owing to her attire having been raised by the gale. ”

“ The Berias of Central India differ in many respects from those of Bengal. Here Sir H. Risley considers Beria to be ‘the generic name of a number of vagrant, gipsy-like groups’; and a full description of them has been given by Bābu Rājendra Lāl Mitra, who considers them to resemble the gipsies of Europe. “They are noted for a light, elastic, wiry make, very uncommon in the people of this country. In agility and hardness they stand unrivalled. The men are of a brownish colour, like the bulk of Bengalis, but never black. The women are of lighter complexion and generally well-formed ”

“ Let it be known by this that our Sharifian Majesty, considering the dahir of our August father, H.M. the Sultan Moulay Yusef, on the day of the 11th September, 1914, has prescribed in the interest of many of our subjects and of the tranquility of the State to respect the traditional status of the Berbers. It is now appropriate to clarify the conditions in which justice will be done in the same tribes. ”

“ The caravan route to the Red Sea was superseded in 1906 by a railway, which leaves the Wadi Halfa-Khartum line at the mouth of the Atbara. Berber thus lost the Red Sea trade. It remains the centre and market-place for the produce of the Nile valley for a considerable distance. East of the town is an immense plain, which, if irrigated, would yield abundant crops.
Berber, or El Mekerif, is a town of considerable antiquity. Before its conquest by the Egyptians in 1820 its ruler owed allegiance to the kings of Sennar. ”

“ The inhabitants of Berber are Arabs of the tribe of Meyrefab (ميريفاب) . In common with all the different Arab tribes who inhabit the Nile valley, from Upper Egypt to Sennaar, they report that their origin is from the Sherk, or east (من الشرق) , meaning Arabia. The name of Meyrefab however does not appear to be from an Arabic root, and bears more resemblance to the Bisharein language. None of the tribes who live on the banks of the Nile are large, and each district is seldom more than one day’s march in length. The territory of the Arabs Sheygyai [11] is the largest. ”