I. ARABIA FELIX (in Gr. 'Apagla bl EiZaip.wp, the Arabia Eudanzon of Pliny), i. e., Happy Arabia. The name has commonly been supposed to owe its origin to the variety and richness of the natural productions of this portion of the country, compared with those of the other two divisions. Some, however, regard the epithet `happy' as a translation of its Arabic name Yemen, which, though primarily denoting the land of the right hand, or south,* also bears the secondary sense of happy, prosperous.' This part of Arabia lies between the Red Sea on the west and the Per sian Gulf on the east, the boundary to the north being an imaginary line drawn between their re spective northern extremities, Akaba and Basra or Bussora. It thus embraces by far the greater por tion of the country known to us as Arabia, which, however, is very much a terra incognita ; for the accessible districts have been but imperfectly ex plored, and but little of the interior has been as yet visited by any European traveller.
Arabia may be described generally as an elevated table-land, the mountain ranges of which are by some regarded as a continuation of those of Syria, but Ritter (Erdkuna'e, th. i. p. 172) views them as forming a distinct and independent plateau, peculiar to the country. In Arabia Felix the ridges, which are very high in the interior, slope gently on the east towards the Persian Gulf; and on the north east towards the vast plains of the desert. On the west the declivities are steeper, and on the north west the chains are connected with those of Arabia Petrma. Commencing our survey at the north end of the Red Sea, the first province which lies along its shore is the Hedjaz, which Niebuhr and others reckon as belonging to Arabia Petrxa, but which the editor of Burckhardt's Travels in Arabia has shewn to belong properly to Arabia Felix. This was the cradle of Mohammedan superstition, con taining both Mecca, where the prophet was born, and Medina, where he was buried ; and hence it became the Holy Land of the Moslem, whither they resort in pilgrimage from all parts of the East. It is on the whole a barren tract, consisting chiefly of rugged mountains and sandy plains. Still more unproductive, however, is the long, flat, dreary belt, of varying width, called Tehdnia, which runs along the coast to the south of Hedjaz, and was at no distant period covered by the sea. But next to this comes Yemen (the name of a particular pro vince, as well as of the whole country), the true Arabia Felix of the ancients, Araby the Blest' of modern poets, and doubtless the finest portion of the peninsula. Yet if it be disting,ushed for fer
tility and beauty, it is chiefly in the way of contrast, for it is far from coming up to the expectations which travellers had formed of it. Here is Sanaa (supposed to be the Uzal of Scripture), the seat of an imaum ; Mareb, which some identify with Sheba ; Mocha, the chief mart for coffee ; and Aden, a place rapidly increasing in importance since taken possession of by Britain, with a view to secure her navigation of the Red Sea. Turnint from the west to the south coast of the peninsula, we next come to the extensive province of Hhadramaut (the Hazarmaveth of the Bible), a region not unlike Yemen in its general features, with the exception of the tracts called Mahhrah and Sahar, which are dreary deserts. The south- east corner of the peninsula, between IIhadramaut and the Persian Gulf, is occupied by the important district of Oman, which has recently become better known to us than most other parts of Arabia Felix by the travels and researches of Lieut. \Vellsted (Travels in Arabia, London, 183S, 2 vols. Svo). Oman has been in all ages famous for its trade ; and the pre sent imaum of Muscat, a politic and enterprising prince, has greatly extended it, and thereby in creased and consolidated his own power by forming commercial alliances with Great Britain, the United States, and other foreign nations. Along the Per sian Gulf northward stretches the province of Lahsa, or rather El Massa, to which belong the Bahrein Islands, famous for their pearls. The districts we have enumerated all lie along the coasts, but be yond them in the south stretches the vast desert of Akhaf, or Roba-el-Khali, i. e., the empty abode,' a desolate and dreary unexplored waste of sand. To the north of this extends the great central pro vince of Nedsched or Nejd. Ritter regards it as forming nearly a half of the entire peninsula. It may be described as having been the great offcina gentium of the south, as were Scandinavia and Tartary of the north ; for it is the region whence there issued at different periods those countless hordes of Arabs which overran a great part of Asia and Africa. Here, too, was the origin and the seat of the Wahabees (so formidable until sub dued in 1818 by Mehemet Ali, pasha of Egypt), their chief town being Dereyeh.