138 THE DESICCATION OF LATER GEOLOGICAL TIMES. 



As has been done in the preceding pages for Central Asia, so here only a 

 few references can be made to the writings of scientific travellers who have 

 made mention of fiicts bearing on the question before us ; and, in preference, 

 the most recent authorities will usually be cited. 



Arabia may be first mentioned, as a striking instance of a country greatly 

 dimini.shed in population, and utterly cast down from the high position it 

 once held ; while, at the same time, it presents ample evidences of a great 

 climatic change during the most recent periods. 



Vivien de Saint-Martin says of this country : " There can be no doubt 

 that, since the days of antiquity [les temps antiques] the climate and the 

 physical conditions of a part of Arabia have undergone very great changes, 

 in consequence of the disappearance of the forests on the western coast 

 mountains. M. Fulgence Fresnel, an excellent observer, wrote in 1837 as 

 follows : ' It is a well established fact that the volume of flowing water is 

 constantly diminishing [diminue sans cesse], and has not ceased to diminish, 

 in a country celebrated for its dryness even in the days of Abraham, in a 

 country where Ishraael owed to a miraculous inteqiosition the existence of 

 the spring which saved his life. People still remember that, in the valley 

 of Sapra, there was a time when there was running water in the Bouraikah ; 

 but that stream has now dried np, and Djar, indicated on Niebuhr's map, 

 belongs to ancient geography.' " * 



Noel des Vergers, in his "Description de I'Arabie," says: "Unfortunately 

 the return of the rainy season, which hardly suffices for a few torrents, and is 

 not enough to keep a single stream alive during the whole year, is liable to 

 distressing interruptions. An absolute drought sometimes lasts for two or 

 three years continuously over a portion of some province, rendering the 

 whole region barren, and producing famine and all the accompanying 

 diseases." t 



Lady Anne Blunt says : " The whole of the peninsula, with the excep- 

 tion perhaps of Yemen and certain districts of Hadramaut within the influ- 

 ence of the monsoon winds, is a rainless, Avaterless region, in every sense 

 of the word a desert. The soil is a jioor one, mainly of gravel or of sand, 

 and, except in a few favored spots, unsuited for cultivation; indeed, no cul- 

 tivation is possible at all in Nejd, except with the help of irrigation, and, 

 as there is no water above ground, of irrigation from wells. Even wells are 



* Nouveau Diction naire ile Geograpliie Universelle. Paris, 1877. Article " Arabic." 

 t Quoted by Vivien de Saiiit-Martiu, 1. c, Vol. I. p. 74. 



