h, cushions, long pipes, and two braziers.... This is where
Sid'Omar gives his audiences and dispenses justice. Hey! Solomon in a
shop.

* * * * *

Today is Sunday and there is a good turn out. A dozen leaders, each in
their burnous, are squatting all around the room, a large pipe and
small fine filigreed eggcup full of coffee to hand. I go in; nobody
moves.... From where he is, Sid'Omar gives me his most charming smile
by way of a greeting and beckons me to sit next to him on a large
yellow silk cushion. He puts a finger to his mouth to indicate that I
should listen.

The case is between the leader of the Beni-Zougzougs and a Jew from
Milianah, who are having a dispute about a plot of land. The two
parties had agreed to put their differences to Sid'Omar and to abide by
his judgement. The meeting is set for this very day, and the witnesses
are assembled. Surprisingly, it is my Jew, and he is having second
thoughts and has come alone, without witnesses, declaring that he would
prefer to rely on the judgement of a French Justice of the Peace than
on Sid'Omar's.... That was where things stood when I arrived.

The Jew--old, greying beard, brown jacket, blue stockings, and velvet
cap--raises his eyes to the sky and rolls them, kisses Sid'Omar's silk
slippers, bows his head, kneels down, and clasps his hands together,
pleadingly.... I have no Arabic, but from the Jew's miming and from the
words _Joustees of the peace, Joustees of the peace_, which he keeps
repeating, I get the gist of what he is saying.

--I have no doubts about Sid'Omar, Sid'Omar is wise, Sid'Omar is
just.... But, the Joustees of the Peace would be more suitable for our
business.

The audience is indignant, and yet remains impassive as Arabs do....
Stretched out on his cushion, his eyes blurred, the amber book to his
lips, Sid'Omar--that master of irony--smiles as he listens. Suddenly,
at the height of his pleas, the Jew is interrupted by an energetic
_caramba!_ which stops him. Dead. The voice belongs to a Spanish
colonial, who has come as a witness for the leader, and who then leaves
his place and approaches the Judas Jew, and pours a bucketful of
imprecations in all tongues and shades of blue over his head--mixed
with other French expressions too gross to repeat.... Sid'Omar's son,
who understands French, reddened on hearing such words in front of his
father and leaves--keeping up an Arabic tradition. The audience is
still imp