Page:Africa by Élisée Reclus, Volume 2.djvu/287

 preserved the national idiom, such as the Kabyles of Jurjura, the Shawlas of Aures, afew groups of the Duhra district and Marocco frontier, have adopted a large number of Arab words and forms of speech. They have also everywhere abandoned the old Tefinagh orthographic system, inscriptions in which still occur in various parts of Algeria. Hence all instruction is conveyed through Arabic, which is at once the religious, polite, and literary tongue, but which no Berber ever succeeds in pronouncing with perfect accuracy.

The patronymic aït (in South Marocco, Ida) is applied exclusively to the Berbers, many of whose tribes have also adopted the Arabic Beni, indicating family relationship; while the term Aulâd, or more commonly Ulâd, Uled, is restricted inUlâd, Uled Algeria almost exclusively to communities of Arab descent. But there is no

absolute rule for the use of these terms, and the Ulâd Abdi of Aures are undoubtedly Berbers. Hence great uncertainty prevails regarding the classification of the Algerian races, and while some writers estimate the Berber population at upwards of two millions, of whom nearly nine hundred thousand still speak a Libyan dialect, others, with Pimel, reduce the whole number to no more than a million, The diversities and contrasts caused by language and pursuits, by voluntary or forced displacements, render any general description impossible, so that each lowland or highland group must be studied apart. Of the thousand or eleven hundred tribes enumerated in Algeria, some comprise distinct racial elements; and even amongst the minor groups of Dwars, Dusheras, Arsh, or Ferkas,