THE HABITABLE EARTH ORIGINALLY WOODED. fk 
terior of the crater was covered with vegetation. George 
Sandys, who visited Vesuvius in 1611, after it had reposed for 
several centuries, found the throat of the voleano at the bot- 
tom of the crater “ almost choked with broken rocks and frees 
that are falne therein.’ ‘ Next to this,” he continues, “the 
matter thrown up is ruddy, light, and soft: more removed, 
blacke and ponderous: the uttermost brow, that declineth like 
the seates in a theater, flourishing with trees and excellent pas- 
turage. The midst of the hill is shaded with chestnut trees, 
and others bearing sundry fruits.” * 
IT am convinced that forests would soon cover many parts of 
the Arabian and African deserts, if man and domestic animals, 
especially the goat and the camel, were banished from them. 
The hard palate and tongue and strong teeth and jaws of this 
latter quadruped enable him to break off and masticate tough 
and thorny branches as large as the finger. He is particularly 
fond of the smaller twigs, leaves, and seed-pods of the sont and 
other acacias, which, like the American Robinia, thrive well 
on dry and sandy soils, and he spares no tree the branches of 
which are within his reach, except, if I remember right, the 
tamarisk that produces manna. Young trees sprout plenti- 
fully around the springs and along the winter water-courses 
of the desert, and these are just the halting stations of the 
caravans and their routes of travel. In the shade of these 
trees, annual grasses and perennial shrubs shoot up, but are 
mown down by the hungry cattle of the Bedonin, as fast as 
they grow. A few years of undisturbed vegetation would 
suffice to cover such points with groves, and these would grad- 
* A Relation of a Journey Begun An. Dom. 1610, lib. 4, p. 260, edition of 
1615. The testimony of Sandys on this point is confirmed by that of Pighio, 
Braccini, Magliocco, Salimbeni, and Nicola di Rubeo, all cited by Rorn, Der 
Vesuv., p. 9. There is some uncertainty about the date of the last eruption 
previous to the great one of 1631. Ashes, though not lava, appear to have 
been thrown out about the year 1509, and some chroniclers have recorded an 
eruption in the year 1305; but this seems to be an error for 1036, when a 
great quantity of lava was ejected. In 1159, ashes were thrown out for many 
days. Itake these dates from the work of Roth just cited. 
