THE BEDOUIN OF THE DESERT 



look, perhaps at some inadvertent remark you 

 may have made ; maybe a gesture, slight in it- 

 self, but full of significance, changes the en- 

 tire aspect. The whole thing is undefinable, 

 but as you look through the flaps of the goat- 

 hair tent under which you are sitting and out 

 on the desert you realize that the warrior 

 Bedouin is in his right place. In a fertile 

 country, clothed with verdure, he would be out 

 of place; trees and buildings would spoil the 

 picture of which he is the central figure. 

 There is that about him which needs for its 

 existence the great expanse of sterile nature 

 you see around him. Elsewhere he would 

 shrink into a mere curiosity. He would pass 

 into the type you are apt to see at Coney 

 Island. 



The Anezeh are the most powerful of all 

 the Bedouins; they are the greatest in war 

 and therefore they rank the highest. They 

 are a migrating tribe, circling the desert an- 

 nually. In winter they keep near Nejd in 

 Central Arabia, where it is warm and where 

 the feed is better. As spring approaches they 

 start north along the Euphrates, passing 

 Bagdad and Deyr where they sell some of their 

 colts and then keep on into the northern part 



[237] 



