SOCIAL STATE OF THE ARABS. 307 



first of these causes may be ascribed many of the 

 social virtues for which the natives have been always 

 distinguished ; while most of the crimes, vices, and 

 prejudices by which they are degraded are the 

 natural fruits of the two latter. On the seacoasts 

 and in the towns, their manners have been corrupted 

 by commerce and a free intercourse with foreigners. 

 Travellers, who have formed their opinions from 

 mixing exclusively with those classes, have drawn a 

 very unfavourable picture of the inhalDitants in gen- 

 eral, as a nation of tyrants, hypocrites, and deceiv- 

 ers, plunged in a lower state of ignorance and de- 

 bauchery than the most barbarous islanders of the 

 South Seas, These representations are no doubt 

 partially true, but they are far from being universally 

 just, A longer residence among them and better 

 opportunities of judging have contributed to remove 

 niany erroneous impressions as to their social and 

 domestic habits. 



No people are more remarkable than the Arabs 

 for their spirit of nationality and family pride. The 

 poorest of them glory in their birth, and look with 

 disdain on the natives of other countries. They 

 boast of the accuracy with which they have pre- 

 served their genealogies ; yet the lower, and most 

 even of the middle classes, keep no register of their 

 parentage, and would often be at a loss to know their 

 fathers or grandfathers were it not regidated by 

 custom that the son frequently joins their names to 

 his own. The sheiks and sheriffs are the true aris- 

 tocracy of Arabia ; and these have reason to be vain 

 of their ancestry, which some of them can trace in 

 regular descent from the days of Mohammed or 

 Moses. The oldest nobility in Europe are but of 

 yesterday compared to these petty princes of the 

 desert. 



Though the title of sheik is the most ancient and 

 most common in use among the Arabian grandees, 

 the sheriffs, being the descendants of Mohammed, 



