The Arabs are capable of real patriotic feeling, quite apart from religious enthusiasm. A year ago the very existence of a community of Arab sentiment was treated as a myth. Europe is almost convinced now that there is some kind of understanding rife amongst them from Tangiers to Cairo. They appear to have combined to make a last stand against extinction or extermination. It was to a very great extent the sending of letters written in blood by the surviving Sheikhs of the Chiaïa tribe to all the great clans in the Regency, immediately after the regrettable occurrences of the 30th March 1881, which provoked the general rising that very soon afterwards took place. In considering the question of the capability of the Arab tribes to participate in a general and concentrated movement, an important element in the discussion is almost invariably omitted. I allude to the growing power of the _Khouan_, or semi-political semi-religious confraternities, which seem destined to cover the whole of North Africa with a web of Moslem freemasonry. At the head of the associations are the Senoussia, the avowed opponents of the French “mission of civilisation,” of whom I shall speak at length in a future chapter. This powerful brotherhood has sprung into existence during the last thirty years, but it now threatens to overshadow if not absorb the older but less militant corporations. Thirty-five years ago a remarkable report was addressed to the Duc d’Aumale upon this subject by M. De Neveu, chef du Service Géodésique de l’Algérie. Even then the author wrote that “it is absolutely necessary to ascertain the political object of those confraternities, which have undoubtedly produced a remarkable power of combination amongst individuals, have furnished the means for an almost incredible rapidity of communication, and seem destined to play an important part in the affairs of West and Central Algeria.”[10] These various orders differ chiefly in form, but they are all ostensibly based on the pure tenets of Islamism as expounded in the Koran. Each confraternity claims to have had its origin in a dream of its founder, who is supposed to have received a revelation from the Prophet as to the _thrik_, or most acceptable way of salvation. The associations having sway in Algeria, Tunis, and Tripoli at the present time are seven in number, viz.:— 1. The Senoussia, or followers of Muhamed es Senoussi, having their headquarters at Djárdúb or Djaghdúb in the Libyan desert, twenty-two days’ journey from Ben Ghazi in Tripoli. 2. The confraternity of Moulai Taïb, to which Muhamed es Senoussi originally belonged. 3. The Aissaoua. 4. The Kaderia, or disciples of Sidi Abd-el-Kadir el Djelani. 5. The Rahmania, founded by Abd-er-Rahman Bon Kobarín. 6. The Hausalia (a brotherhood of little practical importance). 7. The Tijania, or confraternity of Sidi Ahmed Tijáni.