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CHAP. ing the banks of the Nile, and the villages of Syria and Palestine. The life of a wandering Arab is a life of danger and distress; and though sometimes, by rapine or exchange, he may appropriate the fruits of industry, a private citizen in Europe is in the possession of more solid and pleasing luxury than the proudest emir, who marches in the field at the head of ten thousand horse.

Cities of
Arabia.

Yet an essential difference may be found between the hords of Scythia and the Arabian tribes, since many of the latter were collected into towns, and employed in the labours of trade and agriculture. A part of their time and industry was still devoted to the management of their cattle they mingled, in peace and war, with their brethren of the desert; and the Bedoweens derived from their useful intercourse, some supply of their wants, and some rudiments of art and knowledge. Among the forty-two cities of Arabia', enumerated by Abulfeda, the most ancient and populous were situate in the happy Yemen ; the towers of Saana's, and the marvellous reservoir of Merab, were constructed by the kings of the Homerites; but their profane lustre was eclipsed by the prophetic Mecca; glories of MEDINA" and MECCA, near the Red Sea,

14 Yet Marcian of Heraclea (in Periplo, p. 16. in tom. i. Hudson, Minor. Geograph.), reckons one hundred and sixty-four towns in Arabia Fœlix. The size of the towns might be small-the faith of the writer might be large.

15 It is compared by Abulfeda (in Hudson, tom. iii. p. 54), to Damascus, and is still the residence of the Iman of Yemen (Voyages de Niebuhr, tom. i. p. 331-342.) Saana is twenty-four parasangs from Dafar (Abulfeda, p. 51), and sixty-eight from Aden (p. 53.)

16 Pocock, Specimen, p. 57. Geograph. Nubiensis, p. 52. Meriaba, or Merab, six miles in circumference, was destroyed by the legions of Augustus (Plin. Hist. Nat. vi. 32), and had not revived in the fourteenth century (Abulfed. Descript. Arab. p. 58.)

17 The name of city, Medina, was appropriated, xar' xv, to Yatreb (the Iatrippa of the Greeks), the seat of the prophet. The distances from Medina are reckoned by Abulfeda in stations, or day's journey of a caravan (p. 15): to Bahrein, xv; to Bassora, xviii; to Cusah, xx; to Damascus or Palestine xx; to Cairo, xxv; to Mecca, x; from Mecca to Saana (p. 52.) or Aden, xxx; to Cairo, xxxi days, or 412 hours (Shaw's Travels, p. 477); which, according to the estimate of d'Anville (Mesures Itineraires, p. 99), allows about twenty-five English miles for a day's journey. From the land of frankincense (Hadramant, in Yemen, between Eden and Cape Fartasch) to Gaza, in Syria, Pliny (Hist. Nat. xii. 32.) computes sixty five mansions of camels. These measures may assist fancy and elucidate facts.

18 Our notions of Mecca must be drawn from the Arabians (d'Herbelot, Bibliotheque Orientale, p. 368–371. Pocock, Specimen, p. 125–128. Abulfeda, p. 11-40.) As no unbeliever is permitted to enter the city, our travellers are silent; and the short hints of Thevenot (Voyages du Levant, part i. p. 490), are taken from the suspicious mouth of an African renegado. Some Persians counted 6000 houses (Chardin, tom. iv. p. 167.)

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and at the distance from each other of two hundred and CHAP. seventy miles. The last of these holy places was known to the Greeks under the name of Macoraba; and the termination of the word is expressive of its greatness, which has not indeed, in the most flourishing period, exceeded the size and populousness of Marseilles. Some latent motive, perhaps of superstition, must have impelled the founders, in the choice of a most unpromising situation. They erected their habitations of mud or stone, in a plain about two miles long and one mile broad, at the foot of three barren mountains: the soil is a rock; the water even of the holy well of Zemzem is bitter or brackish; the pastures are remote from the city; and grapes are transported above seventy miles from the gardens of Tayef. The fame and spirit of the Koreishites, who reigned in Mecca, were conspicuous among the Arabian tribes; but their ungrateful soil refused the labours of agriculture, and their position was favourable to the enterprises of trade. By the sea-port of Gedda, at her trade. the distance only of forty miles, they maintained an easy correspondence with Abyssinia; and that Christian kingdom afforded the first refuge to the disciples of Mahomet. The treasures of Africa were conveyed over the peninsula to Gerrha or Katif, in the province of Bahrein, a city built, as it is said, of rock-salt, by the Chaldean exiles: and from thence, with the native pearls of the Persian gulf, they were floated on rafts to the mouth of the Euphrates. Mecca is placed almost at an equal distance, a month's journey, between Yemen on the right, and Syria on the left, hand. The former was the winter, the latter the summer, station of her caravans; and their seasonable arrival relieved the ships of India from the tedious and troublesome navigation of the Red Sea. In the markets of Saana and Merab, in the harbours of Oman and Aden, the camels of the Koreishites were laden with a precious cargo of aromatics; a supply of corn and manufactures was purchased in the fairs of Bostra and Damascus ; the lucrative exchange diffused plenty and riches in the streets of Mecca; and the noblest of her sons united the love of arms with the profession of merchandise20.

19 Strabo, l. xvi. p. 1110. See one of these salt houses near Bassora, in d'Herbelot, Bibliot. Orient. p. 6.

20 Mirum dictû ex innumeris populis pars æqua in commerciis aut in latro

CHAP.

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The perpetual independence of the Arabs has been the theme of praise among strangers and natives; and National the arts of controversy transform this singular event inindepend- to a prophesy and a miracle, in favour of the posterity ence of the of Ismael". Some exceptions, that can neither be dis

Arabs.

sembled nor eluded, render this mode of reasoning as indiscreet as it is superfluous: the kingdom of Yemen has been successively subdued by the Abyssinians, the Persians, the sultans of Egypt, and the Turks23: The holy cities of Mecca and Medina have repeatedly bowed under a Scythian tyrant; and the Roman province of Arabia24 embraced the peculiar wilderness in which Ismael and his sons must have pitched their tents in the face of their brethren. Yet these exceptions are temporary or local; the body of the nation has escaped the yoke of the most powerful monarchies: the arms of Sesostris and Cyrus, of Pompey and Trajan, could never achieve the conquest of Arabia; the present sovereign of the Turks may exercise a shadow of jurisdiction,

ciniis degit (Plin. Hist. Nat. vi. 32). See Sale's Koran, Sural, cvi. p. 503. Pocock, Specimen, p. 2. D'Herbelot, Bibliot. Orient. p. 361. Prideaux's Life of Mahomet, p. 5. Gagnier, Vie de Mahomet, tom. i. p. 72. 120. 126, &c.

21 A nameless doctor (Universal Hist. vol. xx. octavo edition) has formally demonstrated the truth of Christianity by the independence of the Arabs A critic, besides the exceptions of fact, might dispute the meaning of the text (Genes. xvi. 12.) the extent of the application, and the foundation of the pedigree.

22 It was subdued, A. D 1173, by a brother of the great Saladin, who founded a dynasty of Curds or Ayoubites (Guignes, Hist. des Huns, tom. i. p. 425. D'Herbelot, p. 477).

23 By the lieutenant of Soliman I. (A. D. 1538) and Selim II. (1568). See Cantemir's Hist. of the Othman Empire, p. 201. 221. The Pasha, who resided at Saana, commanded twenty-one Beys, but no revenue was ever remitted to the Porte (Marsigli, Stato Militare dell' Imperio Ottomanno, p. 124), and the Turks were expelled about the year 1630 (Niebuhr, p. 167, 168).

24 Of the Roman province, under the name of Arabia and the third Palestine, the principal cities were Bostra and Petra, which dated their æra from the year 105, when they were subdued by Palma, a lieutenant of Trajan (Dion. Cassius, 1. lxviii). Petra was the capital of the Nabathæans; whose name is derived from the eldest of the sons of Ismael (Genes. xxv. 12, &c. with the Commentaries of Jerom, Le Clerc, and Calmet). Justinian relinquished a palm country of ten day's journey to the south of Ælah (Procop. de Bell. Persic. I. i. c. 19), and the Romans maintained a centurion and a custom-house (Arrian in Periplo Maris Erythræi, p. 11. in Hudson, tom. i), at a place (Asuan xan, Pagus Albus Hawara) in the territory of Medina (d'Anville Memoire sur l'Egypte, p. 243). These real possessions, and some naval inroads of Trajan (Peripl. p. 14, 15), are magnified by history and medals into the Roman conquest of Arabia.

25 Niebuhr (Description de l'Arabie, p. 302, 303. 329-331.) affords the most recent and authentic intelligence of the Turkish empire in Arabia.

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but his pride is reduced to solicit the friendship of a CHAP.
people, whom it is dangerous to provoke and fruitless to
attack. The obvious causes of their freedom are in-
scribed on the character and country of the Arabs. Many
ages before Mahomet, their intrepid valour had been
severely felt by their neighbours in offensive and defen-
sive war. The patient and active virtues of a soldier are
insensibly nursed in the habits and discipline of a pas-
toral life. The care of the sheep and camels is abandon-
ed to the women of the tribe; but the martial youth un-
der the banner of the emir, is ever on horseback, and in
the field, to practise the exercise of the bow, the javelin,
and the scymetar. The long memory of their independ
ence is the firmest pledge of its perpetuity, and succeed-
ing generations are animated to prove their descent and
to maintain their inheritance. Their domestic feuds are
suspended on the approach of a common enemy; and in
their last hostilities against the Turks, the caravan of
Mecca was attacked and pillaged by fourscore thousand
of the confederates. When they advance to battle, the
hope of victory is in the front; in the rear, the assurance
of a retreat. Their horses and camels, who in eight or
ten days can perform a mareh of four or five hundred
miles, disappear before the conqueror; the secret waters
of the desert elude his search; and his victorious troops
are consumed with thirst, hunger, and fatigue, in the
pursuit of an invisible foe, who scorns his efforts, and
safely reposes in the heart of the burning solitude. The
arms and deserts of the Bedoweens are not only the safe-
guards of their own freedom, but the barriers also of
the happy Arabia, whose inhabitants, remote from war,
are enervated by the luxury of the soil and climate. The
legions of Augustus melted away in disease and lassi-
tude; and it is only by a naval power that the reduc-
tion of Yemen has been successfully attempted. When
Mahomet erected his holy standard, that kingdom was

26 Diodorus Siculus (tom. ii. 1. xix. p. 390–393. edit. Wesseling) has clearly exposed the freedom of the Nabathæan Arabs, who resisted the arms of Antigonus and his son.

27 Strabo, I. xvi. p. 1127-1129. Plin. Hist. Natur. vi. 32. Elius Gallus landed near Medina, and marched near a thousand miles into the part of Yemen between Mareb and the Ocean. The non ante devictis Sabeæ regibus (Od. i. p. 29), and the intacti Arabum thesauri (Od. iii. p. 24). of Horace, attest the virgin purity of Arabia.

28 See the imperfect history of Yemen in Pocock, Specimen, p. 55–56. of

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CHAP. a province of the Persian empire; yet seven princes of the Homerites still reigned in the mountains; and the vicegerent of Chosroes was tempted to forget his distant country and his unfortunate master. The historians of the age of Justinian represent the state of the independent Arabs, who were divided by interest or affection in the long quarrel of the East: the tribe of Gassan was allowed to encamp on the Syrian territory: the princes of Hira were permitted to form a city about forty miles to the southward of the ruins of Babylon. Their service in the field was speedy and vigorous; but their friendship was venal, their faith inconstant, their enmity capricious: it was an easier task to excite than to disarm these roving Barbarians; and, in the familiar intercourse of war, they learned to see, and to despise, the splendid weakness both of Rome and of Persia. From Mecca to the Euphrates, the Arabian tribes" were confounded by the Greeks and Latins, under the general appellation of SARACENS30, a name which every Christian mouth has been taught to pronounce with terror and abhorrence.

Their domestic freedom

racter.

The slaves of domestic tyranny may vainly exult in their national independence; but the Arab is personally and cha- free; and he enjoys, in some degree, the benefits of society, without forfeiting the prerogatives of nature. In every tribe, superstition, or gratitude, or fortune, has exalted a particular family above the heads of their equals. The dignities of sheich and emir invariably descend in this chosen race; but the order of succession is loose and

Hira, p. 66–74. of Gassan, p. 75–78. as far as it could be known or preserved in the time of ignorance.

29 The Σαρακηνικά φύλα, μυριάδες ταυτα και το πλείσον αυτων ερημονομοι, Hai adiσoтol are described by Menander (Excerpt. Legation, p. 149), Procopius de Bell. Persic. 1. i. c. 17. 19. 1. ii. c. 10); and, in the most lively colours, by Ammianus Marcellinus (1. xiv. c. 4), who had spoken of them as early as the reign of Marcus.

30 The name which, used by Ptolemy and Pliny in a more confined, by Ammianus and Procopius, in a larger, sense, has been derived, ridiculously, from Sarah, the wife of Abraham, obscurely from the village of Saraka μera Naßarais. (Stephan. de Urbibus), more plausibly from the Arabic words, which signify a thievish character, or Oriental situation (Holtinger, Hist. Oriental I. i. c. i. p. 7, 8. Pocock, Specimen, p. 33-35. Asseman. Bibliot. Orient. tom. iv. p. 567). Yet the last and most popular of these etymologies, is refuted by Ptolemy (Arabia, p. 2. 18. in Hudson, tom iv.), who expressly remarks the western and southern position of the Saracens, then an obscure tribe on the borders of Egypt. The appellation cannot therefore allude to any national character; and, since it was imposed by strangers, it must be found, not in the Arabic, but in a foreign language.