872 NATURAL HISTORY OF 



into Papua Negroes, in proportion to their intermixture 

 towards the tropics, or brighten as they pass on to the border 

 of this first distribution ; for, on the line of contact, the conquer- 

 • «• has nearly retained its whole integrity, whilst on the 

 north of that line, a melanic shade in the skin, with very dark 

 eyes, and black curly hair, leaves in the first, and perhaps 

 oldest civilized nations, an evidence of some pollution with 

 their vanquished slaves, and makes the question of local 

 hybridism incontestable ; for, notwithstanding the distinction 

 drawn by the nations themselves, the facts remain unaltered. 

 And we shall now proceed to notice a second wave of more 

 pure Caucasian Arabians, who left but slender record of their 

 predecessors, and became united with the rejected descendants 

 of the family of Heber. They appear to have been herdsmen 

 of the southern desert, wandering with their goats and sheep, 

 perhaps with camels, onwards towards the west, beneath the 

 Gedrosian high lands, till they crossed the Shat-ul-Arab. 



THE ARABS. 



The original tribes of Arabia, already in possession of the 

 land at the time of the departure of Israel, were of the same 

 race as some of the first invaders of India. They mixed with 

 the Papuas, and, formed the Ethiopian stem, which possessed 

 the peninsula of Arabia, as far eastward as the lower 

 Euphrates, expanding more and more over the desert of Syria, 

 where the true Bedoween, the swarthy JEnese clans, chiefly 

 resided ; but here they were encountered by the giant race 

 from the north-east, who reached Syria or Shams, and soon 

 appear to have established themselves as masters among them, 

 in like manner as they effected the same revolution in Egypt, 

 and Palestine or Canaan; continuing to press southward, they 

 mixed with the possessors of Yemen, retaining, in some cases 

 only, a separate nationality; such, for example, as the Rus- 



