Bedouin Tribes of the Euphrates Vol 2 - The Search For Mecca

cn.xxiii.] Summer Qiuirtcrs of the Anazeh. id
is a good type.
The varieties of these are numerous,
but their value as pasture is very unequal, some
being excellent for camels, others for sheep, and
not a few being absolutely worthless. On the better
soils, too, after rain many kinds of grasses and
flowering plants are found, while in the Northern
j)arts of Mesopotamia and the Upper "Syrian"
Desert the country is not very different to look at
in spring-time from the great rolling downs of AViltsliire,
where these have not been ploughed up.
Only
the resemblance is superficial, for there is no permanent
turf in any part of the desert. It is in
these
upper plains that the Bedouins congregate in
the spring, shear their flocks, and hold commercial
intercourse with the towns ; for here, even during
the extreme heats of summer, sufficient pasture of
one sort or other is found for their cattle. When
in June the grass " turns white " and is withered,
new leaves appear on the wild lavender and its
kindred shrubs; and the first autumn rains bring
back a fresh growth of greener food. Nor is water
ever wanting. In seasons of great drought the
Euphrates and Tigris valleys are always open, and
then receive the whole population, whose camels
find pasture in the great
tamarisk l^eds fringing the
rivers.
With the first frosts the Anazeh move southwards,
and by December not a camel is to be found
north of the hill rano^e. The reason of this is not
entirely nor directly due to the cold. Camels will