306 MAMMALS. 



but especially the former, have a large admixture of that iron fibre which renders the European, 

 and above all the Saxon machine (to borrow Hamlet's phrase), so remarkably independent of 

 impressions from without. Hence among the Arabs of Shomer, and even of Nejid, Negroes, 

 whatever their number, hardly weigh for more in the scale of national habits and feelings than 

 they would in Norfolk or Yorkshire. But in Oman the case is very different."* 



Then, monkeys are nimierous in some of the southern portions of Arabia, and the species so 

 far as kno^^^l are the same as those found in Abyssinia and Nubia, such as Cynocephalus hama- 

 DRYAS. "What the exact extent of their range may be we do not know, but they are found abim- 

 dantly in the south-west corner. Niebuhr tells us that in the woods of Yemen they occur in great 

 numbers, although he somewhat laughingly treats as exaggerated the statement of a former English 

 traveller that he had seen them in tens of thousands. 



Next, great nimibers of gazelles and antelopes are foimd in Arabia. Niebuhr speaks of their 

 nuDibers in Yemen, and Palgrave bears testimony to their abundance in Central Arabia as an 

 article of food ; any species which have been recorded from Arabia are also found in Nubia and 

 Abyssinia. 



Ostriches range over almost the whole of the plains of Arabia, at least as far north as almost 

 30° N.L. This, however, is less significant, for they formerly ranged through countries still fiu'ther 

 to the north. It is mentioned by old travellers as common on the Isthmus of Siiez down to the 

 middle of the seventeenth century, and appears to have frequented Syria and Asia Minor, &c., at 

 earlier periods. 



Palgrave mentions a locust in Central Arabia from a gastronomical point of view, which so 

 far as can be judged from the description of a non-entomological writer,! is of an African type, 

 while the kinds he speaks of as found more to the north, are clearly of the northern type. 



In the face of such instances it is impossible to dispute that an African element does exist 

 in Ai'abia, and everj^thing — geographical j)osition, geological structure, and dispersion of the 

 animals — goes to show that it has proceeded from the south. The question then comes to be, 

 how far it extends north ? Schmarda, in his map, includes almost the whole coimtry south of 

 the Pcninsida of Sinai, along with Nubia, Abyssinia, and South Africa, as one region. This, 

 I think, takes the line too far to the north. If it were taken as at the time when the present 

 Rhoba el Khali desert ceased to be sea ; then, I apprehend, the true limit of the African region 

 woidd be a line along the southern margin of that desert, that is, along the north of Hadramaut, 

 leaving only a narrow strip of land next the Arabian Sea ; and if the elevation of the desert had 

 talcen place in consequence of the rise of land in the north, then it would still have been the proj)er 

 limit ; for a rise from the north would produce a repetition of what we find in the Sahara, viz. 

 that the desert had been peopled on the side which first emerged, in its case the north. But it 

 is not so clear that it was so in the present instance. The Kahtanee Arabs are no doubt confined 

 to the Hadramaut, but the monkeys extend at least considerably to the north in Yemen, and the 

 antelopes and locusts go as far north as Central Arabia and the ostriches beyond it. I am 

 inclined to think that this implies that the invasion of the new territory disclosed on the raising 

 of the beds of the deserts, took place from the direction of Africa (that is, the south-east) viz. by 



* Palgrave's ".Journey through Central and Eastern that he is innocent of entomology. My opinion is formed 

 Arabia," p. 272. from his reporting, and apparently believing, that like 



t I trust I do Jlr. Palgrave no wiong in assuming bees, these locusts have queens. 



