Page:Ossendowski - The Fire of Desert Folk.djvu/47

Rh between the forest-covered rocks of Tlemsen's range. At this little station we came across a whole company of soldiers from the Foreign Legion, who were there repairing the road, the bridges and the concrete drains. Their bodies looked healthy, their faces sunburned and showing no signs of tropical languor, but their eyes were dull and distrustful. In the mixture of languages we heard Russian, German, Greek and Dutch. We asked about Poles but found that there were none in this detachment.

A few minutes later we were in Tlemsen, having come up in our journey of six and a half hours some two thousand five hundred feet. A carriage and an official guide, arranged for by telephone from Oran, awaited us at the station. The guide was a sergeant of the French Army, an Algerian Arab, Mahomet ben M'Hammed ben Mokhtar, a young but very well-educated man.

Mahomet took us directly to tire hotel, a low, one-storied building, rather like a Swiss chalet and smelling of cedar and resin. From the terrace and the windows of our room we looked out upon a forest-covered mountain-chain, a white mosque in the distance, tall, dark cypresses and a large, attractive orchard. Stillness and peace prevailed and combined with the scenery to remind us of Switzerland, of which Zofiette and I are very fond. As a matter of fact, Tlemsen and its surrounding country may well be called the Little Switzerland of Algeria, while the real and more imposing Switzerland of this land is Kabylia with its beautiful Jujura Mountains.

After we had rested, changed and had our dinner, it