DISCOVERY 



23 



laborious lifting of water from rivers or wells, the 

 levelling of fields, the terracing of hillsides, lengthy 

 canals and multitudinous distribution channels. 



(3) The desert stage, when rains, rivers, and wells 

 gradually diminish, crops are increasingly uncertain, 

 and the countr}^ becomes derelict. 



Practically the whole of the lands covered bj^ the 

 ancient empires come now under the last two headings. 

 They are deserts or require irrigation, but when they 

 were first settled they were no doubt in the primary 

 stage of ample rainfall, for with the whole world open 

 to him, man naturally would first choose the best 

 places. 



The centres of our modern civilisations are situated 

 in countries in the first stage. They have sufficient 

 rain, and irrigation is only resorted to locallj^ and 

 on a small scale. Is it not probable that no countr\- 

 which does not also come under that category can 

 stand in the forefront of civilisation ? Unless it is 

 sure of ample rains and certain crops, such as those 

 obtainable in North Africa, parts of Arabia, Syria, 

 Asia Minor, Mesopotamia, and Persia ? 



There are many lands where the soil has gone out 

 of cultivation. We blame the inhabitants for neglect, 

 as in the old Turkish Empire. But are we right ? 

 Is it not possibly the want of sufficient rainfall which 

 interferes with cultivation ? The Turks are often 

 accused of causing the decay of Mesopotamia and 

 Asia Minor, which were so fertile that their rulers 

 became the richest of men, like Crcesus, or the most 

 gorgeous, like SardanapaJus and Mahomet the Mag- 

 nificent. For centuries after the Turk had made 

 himself master of these then most desirable territories, 

 he lived in wealthy splendour as Caliph at Baghdad. 



What is the reason for the decay of the Mohammedan 

 power ? Is it not at least possible that the region 

 from which it drew its wealth, food, and human 

 material gradually dried and slipped out of the first 

 stage into the second ? His energies were not equal 

 to fighting drought and famine as well as human 

 enemies, his base failed, his wealth disappeared in a 

 few hundred years, and he fell from his high estate 

 to make waj- for those in the north whose base was 

 more secure. 



RoM.w Cities in the S.\h.-\r.\ 

 The evidence that our deserts were not always the 

 barren wildernesses which they now are is over- 

 whelming, especially so in the case of the Sahara, 

 which has been much explored by the French since 

 they assumed a protectorate over it. A few years 

 ago a traveller called Fisher, an official of the Niger 

 Protectorate, crossed it from Tripoli to Lake Tchad, 

 a distance of 1,100 miles, along an old abandoned 

 caravan route. He very nearly died of thirst, but 



won through with the greatest difficulty. He states in 

 his book that at every halting-place he found stone 

 buildings, wells, walls, and paved roads, some of 

 which were undoubtedly of Roman origin. He 

 climbed over mountains 4,000 and 5,000 feet high, 

 snow-covered in the winter, and his camels ploughed 

 through mUes and miles of sand-dunes that " were 

 only the dried alluvium of vanished rivers, accumu- 

 lated in places by the prevailing winds." The country 

 passed over was sand here and there, but most of it 

 consisted of a network of water-worn valleys, some 

 of immense size and length, in the hollows of which 

 were the scarce cases and wells which enabled him 

 to live. 



In Roman days North Africa was a vast granary, 

 divided into provinces such as Cyrene, Carthage, 

 Numidia, Mauritania, etc., all of which possessed 

 numerous large wealthy cities. Gibbon says that 

 there were three hundred such cities in the district 

 of Carthage alone. To-daj^ all have disappeared, but 

 scores of ruins of towns and vast aqueducts with 

 forests of broken arches dot the plain, and rear their 

 lofty walls as though they were the huge graves of a 

 \-anished civilisation. At one site all has been covered 

 by sand except an enormous amphitheatre, towering 

 alone in the hot shimmering desert air, which once 

 vibrated with the groans of gladiators and the applause 

 of the crowded arena. Now it is only the haunt of 

 the lizard and the scorpion. ^ 



There is an old Arab saying that " once you were 

 able to walk from Mecca to Morocco in the shade." 

 Those trees are now represented by fossils, which are 

 still to be seen in Egypt standing or lying in their 

 natural positions, but turned into stone. 



Decline of Rainfall in Southern Europe 



The danger zone has already spread to the countries 

 near the Sahara. Spain, it cannot be denied, has 

 suffered from the vicinity of her dangerous neighbour 

 She was one of the richest provinces of Carthage and 

 later of the Roman Empire. She was most prosperous 

 in the Jliddle Ages under the Moors, and in the palmy 

 days of Ferdinand and Isabella. Now she has reached 

 the second stage. Most of her forests have dis- 

 appeared — the effect, or it may be the cause, of the 

 drought which necessitates irrigation of her parched 

 slopes to produce good returns. A trifling fact wOl 

 illustrate the change. The Mediterranean coast of 

 Spain is believed to have been the original home of 

 the rabbit, which was brought to England by the 

 Romans. We know how it flourishes in Britain to-day, 

 but its ancient habitat no longer produces enough 



1 See Gibbon's Decline and Fall .of the Roman Empire, 

 chaoter li. 



