The Birmingham age-herald., 1907-02-24

just below them, and of the foothills run ming down to the Sahara. The country is just about as long from east to west as from Philadelphia to Cleveland, and wide as from Washington to Boston by way of New York; 1t contains alto gether as much land as all New England added to New York, Pennsylvania, New Jersey and Louisiana.
 It is divided into three provinces, each beginning at the Mediterranean and cut ting across to the Sahara. The largest of these is at the east and is known as Constantine. II is almost as big as Mime sota, and it has several hundred thousand more people. The next is Alsiers, which is not far from the size of Missouri, with a population of 1,600000, and the other is the western province of Gran, where l am writing. Gran is just about the size of Pennsylvania and it's population Is more than 1000 600.
 The total population of the whole coun- try now approXimates five millions. and of these almost 100000 are French There are also several hundred thousand other Europeans, made up of Spaniards, Ital- ians, Maltese and Jews. The rest of the Algerians are Mohammedans, Africans, and three out of eversa five of them is an Arab. There are also about 100000 white Africans known as Kabyles and about 53,000 Jews
 Negroes and Ex-SlaveS.
 Here in Gran there are a large number of Spaniards and many negroes who were originally brought across the Sahara as slaves and sold in the market of Algiers. In some of the Algerian oases the peoplr are about all negroes. and I see many here in the town. The negro women often act as shampooers in the Moorish bath houses, and many of the men are beggars who dance about singing wierd songs to the clashing of queer iron cym- bals. One such followed my carriage to- day and l made a photograph of him. His dance was a sort of a Nautch dance, consisting of continuous contortion of the hips and a twisting of the waist
 Port of Gran.
 But let me give you a picture of this town of Gran. It is the chief seaport of Western Algeria. and is the second city of the whole country in size It contains about 100000 people, and it is more French than Algiers itself. It is situated not far from the borders of Morocco, and almost directly south of Cartagina in Spain The Strait of Gibraltar is about as far away as the distance between New York and Boston, and it takes about two days to go by ship from here to Mar seiles. The port has a fine harbor, con sisting of a beautiful bay with a high, ragged mountain looking down upon 1t. East of the mountain there is a gulley or canyon with low hills extending off to the eastward, and in and on the sides of this is the town of Gran. There is some flat ground for the wharves, but back of them the buildings of the city climb the hills, in three great terraces, giving every house an outlook over the Mediterranean sea.
 Down near the port are great ware houses filled with alfa grass, bags of wheat and oats, great hogsheads of wine and other stuff ready for export The wharves are piled high with such wares; and immense drays, each carrying four or five tons, are hauled up and down the hills by mules. I have seen here seven huge hogsheads of wine on one dray drawn by four mules hitched up tandem and other drays carrying loads that would seem an impossibility in the United States