84 PRIMITJIVE INHABITANTS OF ARABIA 



desert, though invisible.* The whole fuble seems 

 a confused tradition of Belus and the ancient Baby- 

 lon ; or rather, as the name would import, of Ben- 

 hadad, mentioned in Scripture as one of the most 

 famous of the Syrian kings, and who, we are told, 

 was worshipped by his subjects. 



Of the Adites and their succeeding princes nothing 

 certain is knowni, except that they were dispersed 

 or destroyed in course of a few centuries by the 

 sovereigns of Yemen. 



The tribe of Thamud tirst settled in Happy Ara- 

 bia ; and on their expulsion they repaired to Hajir 

 (Petraea) on the confines of Syria. Like the Adites, 

 they are reported to have been of a most gigantic 

 stature, the tallest being a hundred cubits high, and 

 the least sixty. And such was their muscular power, 

 that, with a stamp of the foot in the driest soil, they 

 could plant themselves knee-deep in the earth. 

 They dwelt, the Koran informs us, " in the caves 

 of the rocks, and cut the mountains into houses, 

 which remain unto this day." In this tribe it is 



* Southey, in his Thalaba, has viewed this, and many other 

 of the fables and superstitions of the Arabs, with the eye of a 

 poet, a philosopher, and an antiquary. According to Tabiri, 

 this legendary palace was discovered in the time of Moawiyah, 

 the tirst caliph of Damascus, by a person in search of a stray 

 camel. To sum up the marvellous, a fanciful tradition adds, 

 that the Angel of Death, on being asked whether, in the dis 

 charge of his inexorable duties, an instance had ever occurred 

 in which he had not felt some compassion towards his wretched 

 victims, admitted that only twice had his sympathies been 

 awakened,— once towards a shipwrecked infant, exposed on a 

 solitary plank, to struggle for existence with the winds and 

 waves ; and, a second time, in cutting off the unhappy Sheddad 

 at the moment when almost within view of the glorious fabric 

 which he had erected at so much expense. No sooner had the 

 angel spoken than a voice from heaven was heard to declare 

 that the helpless innocent on the plank was no other than Shed- 

 dad himself; and that his punishment was a just retribution 

 for his ingratitude to a merciful and kmd Providence, which 

 had not only saved his hfe, but raised him to unrivalled wealth 

 and splendour. — Price's Essay, p. 40. 



