“Kiss me. “Forgive me. “Forget me.” . . .[1] The Arab mind had learned nothing more, but he had kept that sentence fixed in his brain to repeat when the opportunity presented itself! They are all children, delightful children who never grow up. Twelve hundred years ago they came to Algeria with their customs and their clothes and their sheep, and they are still in the same place with the same customs and the same clothes and the same breed of sheep. And, _Inch Allah_, they will be there in the same way when Jesus comes to judge the faithful. FOOTNOTES: [Footnote 1: Quotation from _Make Believe_, by Clare Sheridan.] CHAPTER X LIFE AMONG THE ARABS We must now turn our attention to the inner life among the Arabs, to their customs, to their religious observances; and though it is always difficult for a foreigner, and especially a foreigner in a Mohammedan country, really to see the life as lived by its people, it is believed that sufficient intimacy has been developed between the author and the Arabs to give a very accurate picture of what goes on among them. The word “Arab” will be used, as it is not intended in this chapter to touch again on the subject of the pure Berber, mentioned before; neither is it considered necessary to mention the Europeanized natives who have adapted themselves to a great extent to the life of the big commercial towns of the north and who are all in favor of the Young Turk Movement and the modernizing of the excellent systems handed down to them by their ancestors. These pages will be devoted to the average Arab household living either in the native quarters of the smaller _communes mixtes_, in the farms or away in the southern oases and under the tent in the Sahara. The first thing which strikes one very forcibly is the extraordinary respect shown to the head of the family. It is usual for a great many people of one family to live in the same house, but it is only the head who counts. Moreover, among the nomads the _caïd_ of the tribe estimates his people by heads of families. In the home the father reigns supreme; he usually has his meals apart or with his eldest son. In some cases there are three groups of diners, the chief with the older men and the guests, the sons and their friends, and the retainers. The food is brought in and placed before the first group, who eat what they want, then it is passed to the second group, and finally to the third. After dinner the older men talk and laugh and smoke, but the younger men will either sit quiet or, if they want to talk and smoke, they will go outside. In the presence of the head of the family the younger generation show the utmost deference; it is unusual for them to sit down when in conversation with their father, and they never smoke in his presence.