90 H. S. Jarre tt — Customs among t7ie Bedouins of the Haurdn. [No. 2, 



of the horsemen, " A share of the plunder, a share of the plunder ; " upon 

 which the leader will order a portion of the booty to he given him, 

 whether of camels or of sheep. Sometimes the man's portion may be 

 from one to ten camels, according as the plunder was much or little, 

 and so likewise of the sheep. Another custom is this : should the 

 expedition be successful in the capture of booty and carry it away, 

 and the herds l that are harried belong to one or two individuals and 

 not to the tribe in general, the whole tribe assemble and ascertain 

 the number of camels that have been taken and collect of their own a 

 number equal to that plundered, and give it to them in place of their 

 camels. The share of the leader of the foray is customarily five times 

 the amount allotted to individual horsemen. The remainder is divided 

 equally between the cavalry and the camel riders without distinction 

 of persons. 



These customs are common to all the tribes. 



Some Usages of Law. 

 The Judges among the Arabs are plain, blunt men, unable to read 

 and write, inheriting the office from father to son. They settle the 

 claims of litigants with prompt decision, giving to each one his due ; 

 and in my opinion the regular judges versed in the science of juris- 

 prudence, fail in effecting what is accomplished by these uncivilised 

 tribunals. 2 And here I will cite some instances of their decisions, 

 arrived at by the exercise of common sense and not by the aid of 

 treatises on law. Two married brothers in poor circumstances once 

 lived in the same house, and it happened that both their wives were 

 delivered on the same day, one giving birth to a boy, the other to 

 a girl. While the mother of the boy was asleep, her sister-in-law, 

 the mother of the girl, arose, and going to her bed took the child from 

 her side and placed her own girl in its place. Now it is a custom 

 among the Arabs to swathe their infants for some days and not to remove 

 their bands. In the evening of the same day, when their husbands 

 returned from pasturing their herds, each of the wives said to her hus- 

 band : — " Good tidings, husband, I have been given a boy." Now the boy's 

 real mother was aware that her sister-in-law had been delivered of a 

 girl, and straight-way unswathing the child by her side, she discovered 



1 ^jj&z plur. of t^p, literally, a shepherd's staff, and derivatively a flock of 

 sheep (generally 400), committed to his charge, v. Dozy. Art, ~ae. Here it is 

 used synonymously with &xej, a herd of grazing camels. 



2 The Kazi el Arab observes Burton, was almost always some sharp-witted 

 grey-beard, with a minute knowledge of genealogy and precedents, a retentive 

 memory and an eloquent tongue. Mecca, iii. 45, 



