124 6TEPPES AND DESERTS. 



( 21 ) p. 32. " A connected sea of sand." 



As the Heaths formed of socially growing Ericeae, which stretch 

 from the mouth of the Scheldt to that of the Elbe, and from the 

 point of Jutland to the Harz, may be regarded as one connected 

 tract of vegetation so the seas of sand may be traced through 

 Africa and Asia, from Cape Blanco to beyond the Indus, or through 

 an extent of 5600 geographical miles. Herodotus's Sandy Re- 

 gion interrupted by Oases, called by the Arabs the Desert of Sahara, 

 traverses almost the whole of Africa, which it intersects like a dried- 

 up arm of the sea. The valley of the Nile is the eastern limit of 

 the Lybian Desert. Beyond the Isthmus of Suez, beyond the por- 

 phyritio, syenitic, and basaltic rocks of Sinai, begins the Desert 

 mountain plateau of Nedjid, which occupies the whole of the inte- 

 rior of the Arabian Peninsula, and is bounded to the west and south 

 by the fertile and happier coast lands of Hedjaz and Hadhramaut. 

 The Euphrates bounds the Arabian and Syrian Deserts towards the 

 east. Immense seas of sand (bejaban) cross Persia from the Cas- 

 pian to the Indian Sea. Among them are the salt and soda Deserts 

 of Kerman, Seistan, Beloochistan, and Mekran. The latter is sepa- 

 rated from the Desert of Moultan by the Indus. 



(a*) p. 32." The western part of the Atlas." 

 The question respecting the position of the ancient Atlas has 

 been much discussed in modern times, but the oldest Pho3nician 

 legends have been confounded in this discussion with the later fables 

 of the Greeks and the Romans. A man who combined deep philo- 

 logical with thorough mathematical and astronomical knowledge, 

 Professor Ideler, (the father,) was the first person who explained and 

 dispelled the confusion of ideas which had previously existed on this 

 subject. I permit myself to introduce here the remarks that clear- 

 sighted and highly-informed writer has communicated to me on this 

 important subject. 



" At a very early period of the world, the Phoenicians ventured 

 beyond the Straits of Gibraltar. They built Gades and Tartessus 

 on the Spanish, and Lixus and several other towns on the Mauri ta- 

 nian coasts of the Atlantic. They sailed along those coasts north- 



