of the place prevented his plan from taking effect; so he at last
commanded a large fragment of rock to be rolled to the mouth of the
cavern, adding another as a support, and having thus effectually
barred their exit, he cruelly abandoned them to their fate. Of course
the whole party suffered a miserable death, and it is perhaps the
spirits of the murdered men that, wandering about and haunting it,
have given a suspicious character to the place; but," concluded he,
rather dogmatically, "the devil _does not_ live there now--it is too
cold!!"[*]

[* Note: Those who have been familiarized to the atrocities
perpetrated by the French in Algeria will not feel the horror that the
moollah's tale would otherwise have excited; the similarity of these
outrages to humanity is so striking, that I quote a passage extracted
from the French paper, "The National," which will speak for itself.

"The National gives a frightful picture of Marshal Bugeaud's doings
in Africa. According to the accounts published by this paper,
fifty prisoners were one day shot in cold blood--thirteen villages
burned--the Dahra massacre acted over again, for it appears that a
portion of a tribe having hid themselves in a cave, the same means
were resorted to exactly as those employed by Colonel Pelissier, and
all smoked and baked to death. The Marshal himself is the author of
all these horrors--his last triumph was a monster razzia--he has
ordered the most strict secresy as to his barbarous proceedings; and
the writer of the accounts calls him a second Attila, for he puts all
to the sword and fire, sparing only women and children."]

After scrambling over loose stones, climbing up precipices, and
crawling round the projecting rocks, which consumed an hour, we found