(c) Wilderness. To the west of ldumwa ex tends the 'great and terrible wilderness' of Et Tih, the Wandering, so called from being the scene of the wanderings of the children of Israel. It consists of vast interminable plains, a hard gravelly soil, and irregular ridges of limestone hills. The researches of Robinson and Smith furnish new and important information respecting the geography of this part of Arabia and the adja cent peninsula of Sinai. It appears that the middle of this desert is occupied by a long central basin, extending from Jebel-et-Tih, the mountain of the wandering, a chain pretty far south, to the shores of the Mediterranean. This basin descends towards the north with a rapid slope, and is drained through all its length by Wady-el-Arish, which enters the sea near the place of the same name, on the borders of Egypt. 'West of this basin other 1.vadys run by themselves down to the sea. On the east of the same central basin is another similar and parallel one between it and the Arabah. North of this last basin the tract between the Arabah and the basin of the Arish is filled up by ranges or clusters of mountains, from which, on the east, short wadys run to the Arabah, and on the west longer ones to Wady el-Arish, until, farther north, these latter con tinue by themselves to the sea nearer Gaza.' (d) Sinai. This description of the formation of the northern desert will enable us to form a more distinct conception of the general features of the peninsula of Sinai, which lies south of it, being formed by the two arms of the Red Sea, the Gulfs of Akaba and Suez. If the parallel of the north coast of Egypt be extended eastward to the great Wady-el-Arabah, it appears that the desert, south of this parallel, rises gradually towards the south, until on the summit of the ridge Et-Tih. between the two gulfs, it attains, according to Russcgger, the elevation of 4,322 feet. The waters of all this great tract flow off north ward either to the Mediterranean or the Dead Sea. The Tih forms a sort of offset, and along its southern base the surface sinks at once to the height of only about 3,00o feet, forming the sandy plain which extends nearly across the peninsula. After this the mountains of the peninsula proper commence, and rise rapidly through the forma tions of sandstone, grianstein, porphyry, and granite, into the lofty masses of St. Catherine and Um Shaumer, the former of which, according to Rucsegger, has an elevation of S,t68 Paris feet, or nearly double that of the Till. Here the waters all run eastward or westward to the Gulfs of Akaba and Suez.
8. The People. Having now taken a rapid survey of this extensive region in its three divi sions, let us advert to the people by whom it was at first settled, and by whose descendants it is still inhabited. There is a prevalent notion that the Arabs, both of the south and north, are de scended from Ishmael ; but the idea of the south ern Arabs being of the posterity of Ishmael is en tirely without foundation, and seems to have originated in the tradition invented by Arab vanity, that they, as well as the Jews. are of the seed of Abraham—a vanity which. besides dis figuring and falsifying the whole history of the patriarch and his son Ishmael, has transferred the scene of it from Palestine to Mecca. If we go to the most authentic source of ancient ethnography, the book of Genesis, we there find that the vast tracts of country known to us under the name of Arabia gradually became peopled by a variety of i tribes of different lineage, though it is now m possible to determine the precise limits within which they fixed their permanent or nomadic abode. We shall here exhibit a tabular view
of these races in chronological order, i. e.. accord ing to the successive eras of their respective progenitors: (I) Hamites. The posterity of Cush, Ham's eldest son, whose descendants appear to have settled in the south of Arabia, and to have sent colonies across the Red Sea to the opposite coast of Africa; and hence Cush became a general name for 'the south,' and specially for Arabian and African Ethiopia. The sons of Cush (Gen.
x :7) were Seba, Havilah, Sabtali, Raamah or Ragma (his sons, Sheba and Dedan), and Sab theca.
The three most illustrious Hamite nations were the Cushites, the Phcenicians and the Egyptians; but all were greatly mixed with foreign peoples. 1 heir architecture has a solid grandeur that we look in vain for elsewhere, and they possess other characteristics that distinguish them from the descendants of Shem and Japheth.
(2) Shemites. The descendants of Shem, the eldest son of Noah (Gen. v:32). whose land intersected the portions of I lam and Japheth and extended from the Indian Ocean to the Mediter ranean. It embraced the countries of Syria (Aram), Chaldzca (Arphaxed), parts of Assyria (Ascher), or l'ersia (Elam), and of the Arabian Peninsula (Joktan).
(3) Joktanites. These were the descendants of Joktan, called by the Arabs ka, hian,the second of Eber, Shem's great-grandson (Gen. x :25, 26). According to Arab tradition Kachtan (whom also regard ac a son of Mier). after the confusion of tongues and dispersion at Babel. settled in Yemen, where he reigned as king. Ptolemy speaks of an Arab tribe called Kataniles, who may have derived their name from him; and the richest Bedouins of the southern plains arc the Kahlan tribe oil the frontiers of Yemen. Joktan had thirteen sons, Some of whose names may be obscurely traced in the designations of certain districts in Arabia Felix. Their names were Almodad, Shaleph, Ilhazarmaveth (pre served in the name of the province of Hhadramaut, the Hebrew and Arabic letters being the same) ; Jarach, Hadoram, Uzal (believed by the Arabs to have been the founder of Sanaa in Yemen) ; Dilka, Obal, Abimael, Sheba (father of the Sabccans, whose chief town was Mariaba or Mareb; their queen Balkis, supposed to be the queen who visited Solomon) ; Ophir (who gave name to the district that became so famous for its gold) ; Havilah, and Jobab.
(4) Abrahamites. Abrahamites arc divided into:— (a) Hagarcnes or Ilagariles, so called from Hagar the mother ; otherwise termed Ishmaclitcs from her son; and yet in course of time these names appear to have been applied to ditl2rent tribes, for in Ps. lxxxiii :6, the Hagarenes are expressly distinguished from the Ishmaelites (Comp. 1 Chron. v:io, 19, 20, and the apocryphal book of Baruch i :35 ; iii :23). The twelve sons of Ishmael (Gen. xxv:13-t5), who gave names to separate tribes, were Nebaioth (the Nabath mans in Arabia Petr:ea), Kcdar (the Kedarenes, sometimes also used as a designation of the Be douins generally, and hence the Jewish rabbins call the Arabic language 'the Kcdarenc'), Abdeel, NIibsam. Mishma, Dumah, Massa, Hadad or Hadar, Thema, Jetur, Naphish (the humans and Naphishzeans near the tribe of Gad (1 Chron. v: 20), and Kedmah. They appear to have been for the most part located near to Palestine on the cast and southeast.