The neighbourhood of Biskra is rich in memories of Sidi Okba, the barber of the Prophet, and the first of the Arab conquerors. It was he who pushed westward from Kairouan through Barbary to the Atlantic, having defeated the Berbers under Koceïla and other chieftains. Arrived at the shore of the ocean he raised the standard of the Prophet crowned with the crescent, and indicating with it the course of the sun from its rising to its setting, dashed forward and breasted the waves with his horse, crying, “God of Mahomet, were I not stopped by the waves of this sea, I would go to the ends of the earth to carry the glory of thy name, to fight for thy religion and to destroy those who will not believe on thee!” On his return journey he was attacked by a force of Berbers under Koceïla near Biskra and killed with three hundred of his followers. He was buried in the oasis which bears his name, and his tomb is an object of pilgrimage and veneration. But the Berbers, if they had killed one leader, did not succeed in maintaining their independence. That they adopted the invaders’ religion is not very surprising. Their previous religions seem to have sat lightly on them: idolaters, pagans, converted in numbers to Judaism, orthodox Christians, Donatists,—they had been all in turn. The dogmatic simplicity of Islam is summed up in the words, “There is no God but God, and Mohammed is the Prophet of God.” It only demands a belief in this one God and the veneration of Mahomet, last of the prophets, invested by God with the mission to bring back men to the religion of the ancient patriarchs and to the acknowledgment of the Unity of the Godhead. It is completed by belief in three revealed books, the Bible, the Gospel, and the Koran. It denies the Trinity and the divinity of Jesus Christ, who is regarded only as a prophet, but allowed to have possessed a special nature.