33 iNTRODtTCTlOJJ. 



It is but of late that feelings of ancient prejudice 

 have ceased to haunt the imagination of European 

 travellers. The Chevalier D'Arvieux, French con- 

 sul in Syria from 1682 to 1G88, visited the camp of 

 an Arabian emir, and mentions his surprise at the 

 polite civility of these Eastern savages, whom the 

 people of France had been taught to consider as 

 having nothing human about them but the shape ; 

 while the prince of the desert and his courtiers were 

 equally astonished to find that the Franks, whose 

 names they used to frighten their children, were not 

 cannibals, nor quite so barbarous as had been repre- 

 sented.* Niebuhr and Burckhardt, who have earned 

 such an honourable distinction in this interesting 

 field of research, concur in their admission that the 

 pictures drawn of Arab ferocity, and the dangers to 

 be apprehended from it, have been greatly over- 

 charged ; and that travellers, when they meet with 

 incivilities or injuries, have usually themselves to 

 blame, either by affecting an ostentation of wealth 

 and consequence, Avhich acts as an incitement to 

 plunder; or by expecting such luxuries and con- 

 veniences as are utterly incompatible with the sim- 

 ple habits and resources of the country. 



But with all this laudable and successful enter- 

 prise, the labour of Arabian discovery is far from 

 being completed. There is yet scope for exertion. 

 The prying eye of observation, which has made 

 important disclosures in several of its unfrequented 

 provinces, has left various central districts nearly 

 unexplored, and as little knoM^n as they were in the 

 days of Alexander the Great. There is, however, 

 small reason to doubt but that this obscurity will 

 gradually disappear. Though there are few allure- 

 ments to tempt the literary adventurer, compared 

 with the dangers he runs, and the necessary quahfi- 

 cations of mind and body ; still there is enough of 



* Voyagee de 1' Arable Deseite, Pub. par M, De la Roque. 



