The Southern Low Lands of the Great Continent, with their Secondary Table-Lands and Mountains.

The low lands to the south of the great mountain girdle of the old continent are much broken by its offsets, by separate groups of mountains, and still more by the deep indentation of bays and large seas. Situate in lower latitudes, and sheltered by mountains from the cutting Siberian winds, these plains are of a more tropical character than those to the north; but they are strikingly contrasted in their different parts—either rich in all the exuberance that heat, moisture, and soil can produce, or covered by wastes of bare sand—in the most advanced state of cultivation, or in the wildest garb of nature.

The barren parts of the low lands lying between the eastern shores of China and the Indus bear a small proportion to the riches of a soil vivified by tropical warmth and watered by the periodical inundations of the mighty rivers that burst from the icy caverns of Tibet and the Himalaya. On the contrary, the favoured regions in that part of the low lands lying between the Persian Gulf, the Euphrates, and the Atlas mountains, are small when compared with the immense expanse of the Arabian and African deserts, scorched and calcined by an equatorial sun. The blessing of a mountain-zone, pouring out its everlasting treasures of moisture, the life-blood of the soil, is nowhere more strikingly exhibited than in the contrast formed by these two regions of the globe.

The Tartar country of Mandshur, watered by the river Amour, but little known to Europeans, lies immediately south of the Yablonnoi branch of the AltaÏ chain, and consequently partakes of the desert aspect of Siberia, and, in its northern parts, even of the Great Gobi. It is partly intersected by mountains, and covered by dense forests; nevertheless, oats grow in the plains, and even wheat in sheltered places. Towards Corea the country is more fertile; in that peninsula there are cultivated plains at the base of its central mountain-range.

China is the most productive country on the face of the earth; an alluvial plain of 210,000 square miles, formed by one of the most extensive river systems in the old world, occupies its eastern part. This plain, seven times the size of Lombardy, is no less fertile, and perfectly irrigated by canals. The Great Canal traverses the eastern part of the plain for 700 miles, of which 500 are in a straight line of considerable breadth, with a current in the greater part of it. Most part of the plain is in rice and garden ground, the whole cultivated with the spade. The tea-plant grows on a low range of hills between the 30th and 32d parallels of north latitude, an offset from the Pe-ling chain. The cold in winter is much greater than in the corresponding European latitudes, and the heat in summer is proportionally excessive.

The Indo-Chinese peninsula, lying between China and the river Brahmapootra, has an area of 77,700 square miles, and projects 1500 miles into the ocean. The plains lying between the offsets descending from the east end of the Himalaya, and which divide it longitudinally, as before mentioned, are very extensive. The Birman empire alone, which occupies the valley of the Irrawaddy, is said to be as large as France, and not less fertile, especially its southern part, which is the granary of the empire. Magnificent rivers intersect the alluvial plains, whose soil they have brought down from the table-land of Tibet, and still continue to deposit in great quantities in the deltas at their mouths.

The plains of Hindostan extend 2000 miles along the southern slope of the Himalaya and Hindoo Coosh, between the Brahmapootra and the Indus, and terminate on the south in the Bay of Bengal, the table-land of the Deccan, and the Indian Ocean—a country embracing in its range every variety of climate from tropical heat and moisture to the genial temperature of southern Europe.

The valley of the Ganges is one of the richest on the globe, and contains a greater extent of vegetable mould, and of land under cultivation, than any other country in this continent, except perhaps the Chinese empire. In its upper part, Sirhind and Delhi, the seat of the ancient Mogul empire, still rich in splendid specimens of Indian art, are partly arid, although in the latter there is fertile soil. The country is beautiful where the Jumna and other streams unite to form the Ganges. These rivers are often hemmed in by rocks and high banks, which in a great measure prevent the periodical overflow of the waters; this, however, is compensated by the coolness and moisture of the climate. The land gradually improves towards the east, as it becomes more flat, till at last there is not a stone to be seen for hundreds of miles down to the Gulf of Bengal. Wheat and other European grain are produced in the upper part of this magnificent valley, while in the south every variety of Indian fruit, rice, cotton, indigo, opium, and sugar, are the staple commodities. The ascent of the plain of the Ganges from the Bay of Bengal is so gradual that Saharampore, nearly at the foot of the Himalaya, is only 1100 feet above the level of Calcutta; the consequence of which is that the Ganges and Brahmapootra, with their branches, in the rainy season between June and September, lay Bengal under water for hundreds of miles in every direction, like a great sea. When the water subsides, the plains are verdant with rice and other grain; but when harvest is over, and the heat is intense, the scene is changed—the country, divested of its beauty, becomes parched and dusty everywhere, except in the extensive jungles. It has been estimated that one-third of the British territory in India is covered with these rank marshy tracts. It was estimated by Lord Cornwallis, and confirmed by Mr. Colebrooke, that a third of the East India Company’s territory is jungle.

The peninsula of Hindostan is occupied by the triangular-shaped table-land of the Deccan, which is much lower, and totally unconnected with the table-land of Tibet. It has the primary ranges of the Ghauts on the east and west, and the Vendhya mountains on the north, sloping by successive levels to the plains of Hindostan Proper. A trace of the general equatorial direction of the Asiatic high land is still perceptible in the Vendhya mountains, sometimes called the central chain of India, and in the Saulpoora range to the south, both being nearly parallel to the Himalaya.^[34] The surface of the Deccan between 3000 and 4000 feet above the sea is a combination of plains, ridges of rock, and insulated flat-topped hills, which are numerous, especially in its north-eastern parts. These solitary and almost inaccessible heights rise abruptly from the plains, with all but perpendicular sides, which can only be scaled by steps cut in the rock, or by very dangerous paths. Many are fortified, and were the strongholds of the natives, but they never have withstood the determined intrepidity of British soldiers.

The peninsula terminates with the table-land of the Mysore, 7000 feet above the sea, surrounded by the Nilgherry or Blue Mountains, which rise 2941 feet higher.

The base of this plateau, and indeed of all the Deccan is granite, and there are also many syenitic and trap rocks, with abundance of primary and secondary fossiliferous strata. Though possessing the diamond-mines of Golconda, the true riches of the country consist in its vegetable mould, which in the Mysore is 100 feet thick, an inexhaustible source of fertility. The sea-coasts on the two sides of the peninsula are essentially different: that of Malabar on the western side is rocky, but in many parts well cultivated, and its mountains covered with forests form a continuous wall of very simple structure, 510 miles long, and rather more than 5000 feet high. On the coast of Coromandel the mountains are bare, lower, frequently interrupted, and the wide maritime plains are for the most part parched.

The island of Ceylon, nearly equal in extent to Ireland, is almost joined to the southern extremity of the peninsula by sandbanks and small islands, between which the water is only six feet deep in spring tides. The Sanscrit name of the “Resplendent” may convey some idea of this island, rich and fertile in soil, adorned by lofty mountains, numerous streams, and primeval forests; in addition to which it is rich in precious stones, and has the pearl oyster on its coast.

The Asiatic low lands are continued westward from the Indian peninsula by the Punjab and the great Indian desert. “The Punjab, or country of the five rivers,” lies at the base of the Hindoo Coosh. Its most northern part consists of fertile terraces highly cultivated, and valleys at the foot of the mountains. It is very productive in the plain within the limits of the periodical inundations of the rivers, and where it is watered by canals; in other parts it is pastoral. Lahore occupies the chief part of the Punjab, and the city of that name on the Indus, once the rival of Delhi, lies on the high road from Persia to India, and was made the capital of the kingdom by Runjeet Sing. The valley of the Indus throughout partakes of the character of the Punjab; it is fertile only where it is within reach of water; much of it is delta, which is occupied by rice-grounds; the rest is pasture, or sterile salt marshes.

South of the Punjab, and between the fertile plains of Hindostan and the left bank of the Indus, lies the great Indian desert, which is about 400 miles broad, and becomes more and more arid as it approaches the river. It consists of a hard clay, covered with shifting sand, driven into high waves by the wind, with some parts that are verdant after the rains. In the province of Cutch, south of the desert, a space of 7000 square miles, known as the Run of Cutch, is alternately a sandy desert and an inland sea. In April the waves of the sea are driven over it by the prevailing winds, leaving only a few grassy eminences, the resort of wild asses. The desert of Mekram, an equally barren tract, extends along the Gulf of Oman from the mouths of the Indus to the Persian Gulf: in some places, however, it produces the Indian palm and the aromatic shrubs of Arabia Felix. It was the line followed by Alexander the Great returning with his army from India.

The scathed shores of the Arabian Gulf, where not a blade of grass freshens the arid sands, and the uncultivated valleys of the Euphrates and Tigris, separate Asia from Arabia and Africa, the most desert regions in the old world.

The peninsula of Arabia, divided into two parts by the Tropic of Cancer, is about four times the size of France. No rivers, and few streams or springs nourish the thirsty land, whose barren sands are scorched by a fierce sun. The central part is a table-land of moderate height, which, however, is said to have an elevation of 8000 feet in the province of Haudramaut. To the south of the tropic it is an almost interminable ocean of drifting sand, wafted in clouds by the gale, and dreaded even by the wandering Bedouin. At wide intervals, long narrow depressions cheer the eye with brushwood and verdure. More to the north, mountains and hills cross the peninsula from S.E. to N.W., enclosing cultivated and fine pastoral valleys adorned by grooves of the date-palm and aromatic shrubs. Desolation once more resumes its domain where the table-land sinks into the Syrian desert, and throughout the rest of its circumference it descends in terraces or parallel ranges of mountains and hills to a flat sandy coast from 30 to 100 miles wide, which surrounds the greater part of the peninsula, from the mouths of the Euphrates to the Isthmus of Suez. The hills come close to the beach in the province of Oman, which is traversed by chains, and broken into piles of arid mountains not more than 3500 feet high, with the exception of the Jebel Okkdar, which is 6000 feet above the sea, and is cleft by temporary streams and fertile valleys. Here the ground is cultivated and covered with verdure, and still farther south there is a line of oases fed by subterraneous springs, where the fruits common to Persia, India and Arabia, are produced.

The south-eastern coast is scarcely known, except towards the provinces of Haudramaut and Yemen or Arabia Felix, where ranges of mountains, some above 5000 feet high, line the coast, and in many places project into the ocean, sometimes forming excellent harbours, as that of Aden, which is protected by projecting rocks. In the intervals there are towns and villages, cotton-plantations, date-groves, and cultivated ground.

On the northern side of these granite ranges, where the table-land is 8000 feet above the sea, and along the edge of the desert of El Aklaj in Haudramaut, there is a tract of land so loose and so very fine, that a plummet was sunk in it by Baron Wrede to the depth of 360 feet without reaching the bottom. There is a tradition in the country that the SabÆan army of King Suffi perished in attempting to cross this desert. Arabia Felix, which merits its name, is the only part of that country with permanent streams, though they are small. Here also the mountains and fertile ground run far inland, producing grain, pasture, coffee, odoriferous plants, and gums. High cliffs line the shores of the Indian Ocean and the Strait of Bab-el-man-deb—“the Gate of Tears.” The fertile country is continued a considerable way along the coast of the Red Sea, but the character of barrenness is resumed by degrees, till at length the hills and intervening terraces, on which Mecca and Medina, the holy cities of the Mahomedans, stand, are sterile wastes wherever springs do not water them. The blast of the desert, loaded with burning sand, sweeps over these parched regions. Mountains skirt the table-land to the north; and the peninsula, between the Gulfs of Akabah and Suez on the Red Sea, the Eliath of Scripture, is filled by the mountain-group of Sinai and Horeb. Jebel Houra, Mount Sinai, on which Moses received the Ten Commandments, is 9000 feet high, surrounded by higher mountains, which are covered with snow in winter. The group of Sinai abounds in springs and verdure. At its northern extremity lies the desert of El-Teh, 70 miles long and 30 broad, in which the Israelites wandered forty years. It is covered with long ranges of high rocks, of most repulsive aspect, rent into deep clefts only a few feet wide, hemmed in by walls of rock sometimes 1000 feet high, like the deserted streets of a Cyclopean town. The journey from Sinai to Akabah, by the Wadee-el-Ain or Valley of the Spring, is perfectly magnificent, and the site of Petra itself is a tremendous confusion of black and brown mountains. It is a considerable basin closed in by rocks, with chasms and defiles in the precipices. The main street is 2 miles long, and not more than from 10 to 30 feet wide, enclosed between perpendicular rocks from 100 to 700 feet high, which so nearly meet as to leave only a strip of sky. A stream runs through the street which must once have been a considerable torrent, and the precipitous rocks are excavated into thousands of caverns once inhabited—into conduits, cisterns, flights of steps, theatres, and temples, forming altogether one of the most wonderful remains of antiquity. The whole of Arabia Petrea, Edom of the sacred writers, presents a scene of appalling desolation, completely fulfilling the denunciation of prophecy.^[35]

A sandy desert, crossed by low limestone ridges, separates the table-land of Arabia from the habitable part of Syria, which the mountains of Lebanon divide into two narrow plains. These mountains may almost be considered offsets from the Taurus chain; at least they are joined to it by the wooded range of Gawoor, the ancient Amanus, impassable except by two defiles, celebrated in history as the Amanic and Syrian Gates. The group of Lebanon begins with Mount Casius, which rises abruptly from the sea in a single peak to the height of 7000 feet, near the mouth of the Orontes. From thence the chain runs south, at a distance of about twenty miles from the shores of the Mediterranean, in a continuous line of peaks to the sources of the Jordan, where it splits into two nearly parallel naked branches, enclosing the wide and fertile plain of Beka or Ghor, the ancient Coelo-Syria, in which are the ruins of Balbec.

The Lebanon branch terminates at the sea near the mouth of the river Leontes, a few miles north of the city of Old Tyre; while the Anti-Libanus, which begins at Mount Hermon, 9000 feet high, runs west of the Jordan through Palestine in a winding line, till its last spurs, south of the Dead Sea, sink into rocky ridges on the desert of Sinai.

The tops of all these mountains, from Scanderoon to Jerusalem, are covered with snow in winter; it is permanent on Lebanon only, whose absolute elevation is 9300 feet. The precipices are terrific, the springs abundant, and the spurs of the mountains are studded with villages and convents; there are forests in the higher grounds, and, lower down, vineyards and gardens. Many offsets from the Anti-Libanus end in precipices on the coast between Tripoli and Beyrout, among which the scenery is superb.

The valleys and plains of Syria are full of rich vegetable mould, particularly the plain of Damascus, which is brilliantly verdant, though surrounded by deserts, the barren uniformity of which is relieved on the east by the broken columns and ruined temples of Palmyra (Tadmor). The Assyrian wilderness, however, is not everywhere absolutely barren. In the spring-time it is covered with a thin but vivid verdure, mixed with fragrant aromatic herbs, of very short duration. When these are burnt up, the unbounded plains resume their wonted dreariness. The country, high and low, becomes more barren towards the Holy Land, yet even here some of the mountains—as Carmel, Bashan, and Tabor—are luxuriantly wooded, and many of the valleys are fertile, especially the valley of the Jordan, which has the appearance of pleasure-grounds with groves of wood and aromatic plants, but almost in a state of nature. One side of the Lake of Tiberias in Galilee is savage; on the other there are gentle hills and wild romantic vales, adorned with palm-trees, olives, and sycamores—a scene of calm solitude and pastoral beauty. Jerusalem stands on a declivity encompassed by severe stony mountains, wild and desolate. The greater part of Syria is a desert compared with what it formerly was. Mussulman rule has blighted this fair region, once flowing with milk and honey—the Land of Promise.

Farther south, desolation increases; the valleys become narrower, the hills more denuded and rugged, till, south of the Dead Sea, their dreary aspect announces the approach of the desert.

The valley of the Jordan affords the most remarkable instance known of the depression of the land below the general surface of the globe. This hollow, which extends from the Gulf of Akabah on the Red Sea to the bifurcation of Lebanon, is 620 feet below the Mediterranean at the Sea of Galilee, and the acrid waters of the Dead Sea have a depression of 1300 feet.^[36] The lowness of the valley had been observed by the ancients, who gave it the descriptive name of Coelo-Syria, “Hollow Syria.” It is absolutely walled in by mountains between the Dead Sea and Lebanon, where it is from ten to fifteen miles wide.^[37]

A shrinking of the strata must have taken place along this coast of the Mediterranean, from a sudden change of temperature in the earth’s crust, or perhaps in consequence of some of the internal props giving way, for the valley of the Jordan is not the only instance of a dip of the soil below the sea-level: the small bitter lakes on the Isthmus of Suez are cavities of the same kind, as well as the Natron lakes on the Libyan desert, west from the delta of the Nile.