Page:Africa by Élisée Reclus, Volume 2.djvu/289

 foundation of towns and villages, the construction of roads and railways. He gradually becomes an alien in the land conquered by his forefathers, and in many districts he pines and perishes, making room for men of other races. It may be stated in a general way that the Arabs resist these adverse influences best on the boundless upland plateaux, where but few French civil and military stations have yet been founded. But in the towns and urban districts they tend gradually to

disappear, killed off by vice, misery, lack of confidence m the future, and the exactions of their chiefs.

The same fate is overtaking the so-called Moors, or "Hadri," that is, the more civilised Mussulmans dwelling in the coast towns, under the very eyes of their foreign masters. But their rapid disappearance may be partly due to the instability of a heterogeneous race comprising the most diverse elements introduced