Page:The New International Encyclopædia 1st ed. v. 01.djvu/806

ARABIA. Springs are very few, and in the cultivated parts of the country large numbers of wells, cisterns, and reservoirs are prepared for the reception of rain water.

Arabia has, on the whole, an African climate. Though surrounded on three sides by the sea, its chains of hills exclude in a great measure the modifying influence of air currents from the ocean. In several parts of Arabia hardly a refreshing shower falls in the course of tte year, and vegetation is almost unknown; in other torrid districts the date-palm is almost the only sign of vegetable life. Over vast sterile tracts hangs a sk_y of almost eternal serenity. The time and duration of the rainy season varies in the different parts of the coun- try. In Yemen it lasts from .June to September, and is often followed by a shorter rainy season in the spring. In the coast regions of Hadra- maut and Oman it lasts from February to April, while in the highlands of the former it takes place between April and September. Light frosts mark the winters in the centre and northeast. During the hot season the simoom (q.v. ) blows, but only in the northern part of the land. The districts which are not too arid for culture produce wheat, barley, millet, dates, tobacco, indigo, cotton, sugar, tamarinds, coffee, balsam, aloe, mvrrh, frankincense, etc. Arabia has but a small area of forests, but has vast stretclies of desert grass, fragrant with aromatic herbs, and furnishing admirable pasturage for the splendid breed of horses. Coffee, one of the most important exports, is an indigenous product both of Arabia and Africa, as are also the date-palm and banana. The trade in coffee, dates, figs, spices, and drugs, though still considerable, is said to be only a shadow of the old commerce which existed before the circumnavigation of Africa, or when Aden was in its prime and the Ked Sea was the great commercial route to the East. Arabia has few manufactures, but carries on a transit trade in foreign fabrics, besides im- porting these to some extent for its own necessi- ties.

In the animal kingdom, an African character prevails generally. Sheep, goats, and oxen sat- isfy the immediate domestic and personal neces- sities of the inhabitants, to whom the camel and horse are trusty companions in their far wan- derings. Gazelles and ostriches frequent the oases of the deserts, where the lion, ])anther, hyena, and jackal hunt their prej'. Monkeys, pheasants, and doves are found in the fertile districts, where flights of locusts often make sad devastation. Fish and turtle abound on the coast. The noble breed of .rabian horses has been cultivated for several thousand years; but the most characteristic of all animals in the jMiiinsula is the camel (q.v.) which has been both poetically and .justly styled "the ship of the desert." The breed of Oman is celebrated for its beauty and swiftness. Among the min- erals of Arabia may be mentioned iron, copper, lead, coal, basalt, and asphaltum, and the pre- cious stones emerald, carnelian, ngate, and onyx. Pearls are found in the Persian Gulf.

The popul.ation of .Arabia is estimated at between ^..-iOO.OOO and .5,000,000, including about half a million Bedouins. The .Arab is of medium stature, compactly built, and of brown complex- ion. Earnestness and pride are distinctive char- acteristics: by nature he is quick, sharp-witted. lively, and passionately fond of poetry. Cour- age, temperance, hospitality, and good faith are his leading virtues; but these are often marred by it spirit of sangtiinary revenge and rapacity. His wife keeps the hotise and edu- cates the children. Edtieation is widespread and illiteracy is tinknown; even in the desert the children are taught to read, write, and calculate. The Aral) cannot conceive a higher felicity than the birth of a camel or a foal, or that his verses should be honored with the ap- plause of his tril)e. The Arabs are generally monogamists, although frequently the wealthy chiefs have several wives. Matrimonial ties are sever'id at will, and the ill-treated wife can always find refuge in her father's tent. The Arabs are all Mohammedans.

Arabian life is either nomadic or settled. The wandering tribes, or Bedouins, are well known to entertain very loose notions of the rights of property. The located tribes, styled Hadesi and Fellalis, are despised by the Be- dotiin, who scorns to be tied down to the soil, even where sticli bondage might make him ^^•ealthy.

The prehistoric home of the Arabians was in the southern interior of the peninsula nanted after them, thotigh some ethnologists are inclined to assign them an original home with other Semites in Africa. In their own persons, or by their language, etilture, and religion, they have made their infltiencc felt over a great part of Africa, southern Europe, southern atid central Asia, and the Indian Archipelago. They have contributed to the knowledge of the world the psettdo-science of alchemy, a certain numl)er of terms ttsed in the mathematical and physical sciences, and the Araljic numerals, really borrowed from the Hindu. Tlic Arabic alphabet is found among peoples as widely distant as the Vei of West Africa and the Btigis of Celebes. The Arabs fos- tered commerce and geographical exploration in the Middle Ages, created a new order of archi- tectur."?, made the prodtictions of the ancient Greek intellect accessible to European nations, and in the cultivation of the sciences, philosophy, literature, and art were long in advance of the rest of the world. According Co Brinton, the Arab "preserves in his language ihc oldest and ptirest form of Semitic speech, and in mind and body its most pronounced mental and physical ty))e"; but the purity of the Arab type has been exaggerated, for, like the .Jew, he presents exam- ples of the tall and the short type, the long- headed and the broad-headed, the brunette and the blond, the straight-haired and the wavy- haired, evidencing considerable intermixture with Negroid and Aryan elements. As a special branch of the Semitic stock, the Arabians in- clude the Bedouins of northern and central .rabia, as well as those who have wandered into Egypt, other parts of northern Africa, Palestine, and ^Mesopotamia; the tribes dwelling in Hadramaut, Yemen, Hejaz, Oman, and on the shores of the Persian Gulf; the various Arab, rather than Bedouin, comnuuiitics of Asia Minor and other cotnitries to the east. In the Arabian group belong, also, the ancient Hiniyar- ites, or Sab;i?ans (the people of the famous Queen of Sheba), who have left behind them in the southwest of the peninsula many inscriptions and other relics of an important culture de-