communities at its discretion in the kingdom of Mauretania no less than in the province of Numidia. We cannot therefore speak, in the strict sense, of a Roman subjugation of North Africa. The Romans did not conquer it like the Phoenicians or the French; but they ruled over Numidia as over Mauretania, first as suzerains, then as successors of the native governments. It is so much the more a question, whether the notion of frontier admits of application to Africa in the usual sense. The states of Massinissa, of Bocchus, of Bogud, as also the Carthaginian, proceeded from the northern verge, and all the civilisation of North Africa is based pre-eminently on this coast; but, so far as we can discern, they all regarded the tribes settled or roving in the south as subjects, and, if they withdrew themselves from subjection, as insurgents, so far as the distance and the desert did not by doing away with contact do away with control. Neighbouring states, with which relations of right or of treaty might have subsisted, can hardly be pointed out in the south of northern Africa, or where such a one appears, such as, in particular, the kingdom of the Garamantes, its position is not to be strictly distinguished from that of the hereditary principalities within the civilised territory. This was the case also as regards Roman Africa; as for the previous rulers, so also doubtless for Roman civilisation there was to be found a limit to the south, but hardly so for the Roman territorial supremacy. There is never mention of any formal extension or taking back of the frontier in Africa; the insurrections in the Roman territory, and the inroads of the neighbouring peoples, look here all the more similar to each other, as even in the regions undoubtedly in Roman possession, still more than in Syria or Spain, many a remote and impassable district knew nothing of Roman taxation and of Roman recruiting. For that reason it seems appropriate to connect with the view of the several provinces at the same time the slight information which has been left to us in historical tradition, or by means of preserved monuments, respecting the friendly or hostile relations of the Romans with their southern neighbours. [Sidenote: Province of Africa and Numidia.]