Page:The journal of the Royal Geographic Society of London. Volume 34, 1864. (IA s572id13663720).pdf/323

Rh such an idea, as applied to the greater part of the Peninsula, is far from correct. Desert does, indeed, occupy a certain portion of it; but that is just the very portion with which the greater number of European travellers are almost exclusively acquainted—I mean the outskirts. There are, indeed, certain patches of desert, of whose nature and extent I shall say more hereafter, even in the very centre; and again the outlying circle of desolation itself does, in a southerly direction, assume extraordinary breadth and depth, thus encroaching over a large space towards the interior, but these are rather exceptions than the general rule. The real character of Arabia is that of a large table-land, naturally fertile, and which is either cultivated or at least susceptible of cultivation; whose valleys are well watered, and whose steppes are far from arid,—a land full of towns and villages, of life and habitation; and next, encircling all this, a ring of desert, sometimes very narrow, not indeed exceeding 50 or 60 miles in breadth, but sometimes of considerable width, especially to the north and to the south; and, lastly, surrounding all, a chain of mountains, varying in character and elevation, but generally low, stony and barren, bordered by a line of coast often arid; though here again the Yemen as well as the shores of ’Oman and Hasa, present exceptions of remarkable fertility.

Again, the desert itself may be distinguished into two kinds: namely, desert which is such merely because no one at the present day occupies or cultivates it, and which would be accordingly better styled “deserted; ” and, secondly, desert in the full sense of the term—hopeless, irremediable sterility and desolation.

The former description of, desert, or rather of deserted land, prevails towards the northern and western frontiers, the latter on the eastern and southern.

And, to speak first of the desert that borders the north and west. Here a substratum of rock, generally granite, is overlaid by gravelly or sandy soil, presenting in a greater or lesser degree those conditions which allow a possibility of life and vegetation, but never wholly destitute of them. This degree will of course vary in proportion to the quantity of water to be found at the surface, or at least at no great distance from it. It is, however, an unfortunate but a most characteristic feature of Arabia, that, through the whole of its vast extent, no single flowing river worthy of the name is to be found. I am aware that some compassionate geographers supply a few, but I regret to say that they have been in this respect more liberal than Nature. Nay, very few running streams even are to be met with, unless it be in the lowlands near the eastern coast and among the mountains of ’Oman, as we shall afterwards see.