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 TIMGAD

ONCE A BUSY ROMAN CROSS-ROADS

river, the highway, and the railroad, turning, twisting, and crossing one another in their haste to reach that patch of green, the first oasis of the Algerian Sahara. We dash between the two great cliffs, and as the train circles around the verdure-hidden village of El Kantara, we feast our eyes on the welcome freshness of the palms, above whose wavy tops tower the mighty pillars of the desert's portal. There stand at the very entrance to the burning region fifteen thousand date-palms, as if to reassure the traveler, to tell him of the other tiny dots of fertility far out across the sands, to as