402 NATURAL HISTORY OF ARABIA. 



drive away birds and granivorous animals. In the high- 

 lands of Yemen the cornherd seats himself on a tree ; in 

 Tehama a sort of scaffold is raised, having a roof or awn- 

 ing spread over it. They are not, however, all equally 

 careful ; and Niebuhr remarks, that he passed fields be- 

 tween Mof hak and Sanaa very irregularly sown, and over- 

 run with cockle- weeds. 



In Nejed reaping is performed with the sickle; but in 

 Yemen the ripe grain is pulled up by the roots ; the in- 

 strument being only used in cutting grass or other forage for 

 cattle. Like the Indians the Arabs have a simple method 

 of sharpening this implement by rubbing the blade with 

 moistened sand. In thrashing their corn they have made 

 no advance beyond the ancient and patriarchal fashion of 

 which we read in the books of Moses. The sheaves are 

 laid down on the floor in a certain order, and over them 

 eight or ten oxen, fastened to an upright post in the cen- 

 tre, are driven, until the grain is completely separated from 

 the ear. The straw is removed with pitchforks, and pre- 

 served as food for horses and cattle. In Yemen this ope- 

 ration is performed by two oxen dragging a large stone 

 over the sheaves ; and in the Hauran a heavy plank is 

 used for the same purpose. Corn of all kinds is cleared 

 from the chaff by being thrown up against the wind with 

 a shovel (the fan of the sacred writers), and then passed 

 through a sieve j after which it is ready for the process of 

 grinding. 



Travellers have remarked a very great difference with 

 regard to the comparative increase of certain crops, and 

 the productive powers of the soil. In Oman, accord- 

 ing to Niebuhr, wheat yields ten to one ; while in the 

 best-cultivated lands of Yemen it gives a return of fifty 

 fold. In the vicinity of Bussora and Bagdad the increase 

 seldom exceeds twenty to one ; at Mosul it varies from 

 ten to fifteen ; and in Diarbekir the ordinary wheat-crop 

 produces from four to fifteen fold. I n the Hauran this grain 

 yields in middling years twenty-five, and in good seasons 

 one hundred and twenty fold ; while barley gives fifty, 

 and in some instances eighty fold. But the corn of those 

 districts which are watered solely from the clouds is of 

 better quality, and produces more flour than what is 

 grown on fields irrigated by artificial means : hence a re- 

 turn of fifteen in Syria is reckoned more than equivalent 

 to twenty fold in Mesopotamia. A government-tax of 



