Page:Journal of the Royal Geographical Society of London, Volume 1 (2nd edition).djvu/167

Rh

These two languages cannot be very dissimilar, in fact I have little doubt that they are dialects of the same; further examination is necessary, and a knowledge of the circumstances under which the translation was formed; but if, as I strongly suspect to be the case, a vocabulary derived from a native of one of the Kabyles or clans, which inhabit Atlas south-east of Algiers, and that from a native of the mountains south of Marocco, prove to be the same, we shall have obtained a key to a language spoken throughout the mighty range of Atlas, and extending from Baheereh on the banks of the Nile, to Cape Noon on the Atlantic Ocean, a distance of more than two thousand miles; nay more, there is every reason to believe that the Berēber is the native idiom of all northern Africa, it is the language of the Mozabies; the Wadrēgans; the Wurgelans; the Tuaryks; and Berēber words may be traced on the confines of Egypt and Abyssinia.

Jews are in this country, as elsewhere, a living proof of the literal fulfilment of that prophecy delivered more than three thousand years ago,—'Lo, the people shall dwell alone, and shall not be reckoned among the nations.'—Numbers xxiii. 9; and although ignorant of the existence of such a command, the Moors have strictly and literally complied with it, obliging them to live in a particular quarter of their cities. The Jews are a very numerous and serviceable body; they are the chief mechanics, interpreters, &c., and the medium through which all commercial business is carried on with Europeans; they are also obliged to submit to the most menial offices, as servants, porters, scavengers, &c. Despised and insulted by the Moors, whom they cheat on all occasions, they have no redress, but must submit to be abused, struck, nay, to be stoned by a Mussulman child, against whom, if a Jew lift up his hand, he will infallibly lose it; if passing a mosque, he must take off his slippers; if he meet any of the emperor's household, even the old