The Existence Of Such A Spot
In Arabia Would Have Altered Every Page Of Her History; She Would Then
Have Become A Centre, Not A Source, Of Civilisation.
Strabo's Malothes
river in Al-Yaman is therefore a myth.
As it is, the immense population
of the peninsula-still thick, even in the deserts-has, from the
earliest ages, been impelled by drought, famine, or desire of conquest,
to emigrate into happier regions. All history mentions two main streams
which took their rise in the wilds. The first set to the North-East,
through Persia, Mekran, Baluchistan, Sind, and the Afghan Mountains, as
far as Samarkand, Bokhara, and Tibet; the other, flowing towards the
North-West, passed through Egypt and Barbary into Etruria, Spain, the
Isles of the Mediterranean, and Southern France. There are two minor
emigrations chronicled in history, and written in the indelible
characters of physiognomy and philology. One of these set in an
exiguous but perennial stream towards India, especially Malabar, where,
mixing with the people of the country, the Arab merchants became the
progenitors of the Moplah race. The other was a partial emigration,
also for commercial purposes, to the coast of Berberah, in Eastern
Africa, where, mixing with the Galla tribes, the people of Hazramaut
became the sires of the extensive Somali and Sawahil nations. Thus we
have from Arabia four different lines of emigration, tending N.E. and
S.E., N.W. and S.W. At some future time I hope to develop this curious
but somewhat obscure portion of Arabian history.
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