The only drawback is that
there are no "colons" in the district.
While waiting for a conveyance to take me to the industrial settlement, I
strolled about and found my way across a sad stretch of ground littered
with tin cans, bottles, and other refuse, to a slight eminence whereon lay
a cemetery. In this forlorn square are about twenty tombs, already
crumbling to dust, although not one of those I saw was five years old.
Humble victims for the most part--Italians in the prime of life who had
come to these regions to gain a little money; or little children, carried
off by the harsh climate (yet the climate of this place is preferred to
that of Gafsa). The enclosure is filling up with drift-sand; the
inscriptions on the tombs, often a mere charcoal scrawl of some unlettered
friend or parent, is soon effaced by winds and rain.
One is wholly unprepared for the appearance of Metlaoui proper. In ten
years' time a village has sprung up here, partly of factories and smoky
chimneys, but chiefly of trim bungalows, with white walls and red roofs,
that are dotted over the uneven surface of the ground.
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