ABSTRACT
All over North Africa are to be found colonies of West Africans, living their lives more or less apart, and speaking their own languages. They are apart in a metaphorical sense—one can be very lonely in a strange gay city—for they have never been allowed to intermarry with the Arabs, although they are forced to live in their houses. Most of them were taken in slavery some thirty to fifty years ago, and although no longer slaves, they have no status. Speaking generally, they are not allowed to congregate and build houses of their own pattern, the round hut for which their hearts yearn, but must rent rooms from their former masters. It is no wonder, therefore, that they are downtrodden and suspicious, and that their pleasures are characterised more by fanaticism than by the childish light-heartedness shown in their old countiy. All are steeped in magic, and no event happens to them which has not been caused by a spirit in answer to their own prayer or to that of an enemy.
