MAMMALIAN REGIONS. 305 



the south to enter it, too ; but they would find the ground occupied by other animals fitted for 

 the conditions of life of the desert, and in the struggle for life would be defeated. 



The attempt to refer Arabia to its proper place is attended with peculiar dilEculty, partly on 

 account of its relations both to the Mediterranean district and Africa, and still more from the 

 insufficiency of our information regarding its geological structure, its mammalian inhabitants, 

 and the limits of their range; in fact, there are few countries of which we have scantier details, 

 or as to which we more require information, than Arabia and Beloochistan. 



From the imperfect notices which we possess, we know that a double element is present in 

 Arabia. To the north, the animals are of the Mediterranean tj'pe. To the south, the African 

 element prevails. 



The conclusion to which I have arrived is, that in Arabia there has been a repetition or 

 extension of the same phenomenon which occurs in Africa, viz., that until the recent epoch, the 

 south has been separated from the north by a great sea, similarly situated to the Sahara, and that 

 while this subsisted the southern part was united to Africa. 



The features of the country harmonize with this view. Palgrave describes the whole of it 

 as consisting of a central district, siuTounded on every side by deserts, of which that Ij'ing to 

 the south (Rhoba el Khali) is much the largest. It is this which I think formed the original 

 boundary between the northern regions and the Africano-Indian continent now submerged. It sweeps 

 round the south of Central or Inner Arabia in an immense semi-circle, reaching almost to the 

 sea-shore, except on the south-east and south-west corners, that is, Oman and Yemen. This great 

 desert is obviously a prolongation of the old Saharan sea, interrupted b}- the raised land of Xubia, 

 Abyssinia, and Yemen, and the part lying to the soutli of it (Hadramaut) must have had its lot 

 thrown in with the Africano-Indian continent ; for it, or at least that portion of it which has 

 been examined, must have been above water since the early tertiary ejooch, for its geological form- 

 ation is nummulitic and eocene. How far this formation extends into Oman and northwards 

 from Aden through Yemen, is not, I beKeve, yet kno-\vn. 



That there is a considerable amount of African element of life in Arabia is shown by the 

 following facts. The whole of the district of Hadramaut is inhabited by a race which is distinct 

 from the northern Arabs, and more nearly allied to the Negro than they are. " The Kahtanee 

 race," saj-^s Mr. Palgrave, "furnishes the link between the Arab and the Abyssinian." . . . "They 

 ai-e, so to speak, nearer related to the Negro than the IsmaeKtic tribes, and hence more readily 

 admit Africans to fellowshii?, intermarriage, and civil rights, nay even to government — a fact 

 which has. not escaped the discerning eye of Nicbuhr."* lie adds that "Kahtan, or in the 

 Hebrew orthography Jektan, is acknowledged by all Ai-abs for the first founder and author of their 

 race and nationality, while his residence is no less unanimously fixed in Yemen." f 



To this I attach no weight, further than as an indication that this, perhaps, may have been 

 the first district peopled ; but the idiosyncratical facts mentioned by him are cf more importance. 

 " The influence, the black slave population imporlcd from Africa exerts on this part of Arifbia, 

 (Oman at the mouth of the Persian Gulf) is hardly to be imdorstood by unamalgamating Anglo- 

 Saxons ; but deeply felt and indeed extended among the more impressible Kahtanee popidation. 

 I say Kahtanee, not Arab, in contradistinction in the northern and central races, both of which, 



* P.lLUUAVE, '• Journey in (V'ut,i-iil anil F,;i.sl:crn Anibia,'' 1SG5, p. 453. 

 t PalouavIi, lip. oil. p. i'j5. 



11 R 



