658 Natural History of Nova Scotia. 



counts that historians have given of their population in former 

 ages. A few small insulated spots remain as examples of 

 their former fertility. The plains of Jericho and Hauran 

 still produce " an hundred fold ; " but the foot of man has not 

 passed over what was once the kingdom of Idumea for ages. 

 A few fishermen's huts are all that remain of ancient Tyre ; 

 and large districts, once thickly inhabited, present an ap- 

 pearance which seems to say, they will be cultivated no more. 

 The discoveries of modern chemistry render it probable that 

 a portion of the fertilising principles of the soil of these dis- 

 tricts may have been removed to more highly cultivated re- 

 gions, or to those which are still covered by forests, and are 

 in a state of nature. While the once fertile territories which 

 surround it have become deserts, Lebanon, it is well known, 

 has literally become " a fruitful field," and more populous 

 than any similar district in Europe ; the mountainous situation 

 having enabled the Druzes to preserve their liberty, and repel 

 the rapacious Turk. If a country were cultivated for such a 

 length of time, that the seeds of the plants which it produced 

 when in a state of nature had all perished, and were then 

 deserted by the cultivators, it must soon become very bare ; 

 for the weeds that flourish in cultivated ground require cul- 

 tivation; and, when it ceased, would either perish or dwindle 

 to a small size, not sufficient to supply the insects who [that] 

 live upon plants. In such a state, it is certain that a portion 

 of the fertile mould could, by the influence of the heat and 

 light to which the surface was exposed, be changed into aerial 

 fluids, which might be borne by winds to regions where they 

 would be absorbed by the foliage of a forest or cultivated dis- 

 trict. It is very probable that the unusual proportion of 

 carbonic acid and hydrogen gases, which must be necessarily 

 mixed in the common air where the soil is suddenly aban- 

 doned, may have had a share in increasing the malignity of 

 those pestilential diseases, which have so often been observed 

 to follow in the track of " desolating war." 



Very large fertile districts have generally been found un- 

 healthy ; and it is doubtless necessary to the health of the 

 whole animal creation, that the barren lands should bear to 

 them that large proportion which is every where to be ob- 

 served. The superior healthiness of. the first occupiers of 

 new land in America, has proved that the abundant foliage of 

 a forest renders the air remarkably salubrious. Without 

 entering into the minutiae of chemical detail, it may be ob- 

 served, that it has been found that animals constantly emit 

 from their lungs, and the surface of their bodies, an aerial fluid 

 which is unfit for respiration ; that this aerial fluid is absorbed 



