Environmental Economics 8th Edition

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page i
Environmental Economics

An Introduction
page iii
Environmental Economics

An Introduction Eighth Edition

Barry C. Field
Department of Resource
Economics
University of Massachusetts
Amherst

Martha K. Field
Department of Business and
Information Technology
Greenfield Community College
 page iv

ENVIRONMENTAL ECONOMICS: AN INTRODUCTION, EIGHTH

EDITION

Published by McGraw-Hill Education, 2 Penn Plaza, New York, NY

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Title: Environmental economics : an introduction / Barry C. Field,
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Description: Eighth edition. | New York, NY : McGraw-Hill, [2021] |
Includes bibliographical references and index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2019019555 | ISBN 9781260243062 (hardcover) |
ISBN 1260243060 (hardcover) Subjects: LCSH: Environmental
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humanity. Physically and mentally they have many of the
characteristics of man, but by no means all.
 DESERT JOURNEYS.
On the fringe of the desert, under a thick group of palms, a small tent
is pitched. Around it is a motley collection of bales and boxes, built
into a sort of barricade. Outside this some Nubian boys are lounging
or squatting. They are in holiday garb, so to speak, for their glossy
skins have been freshly smeared with grease.
The travellers whom the tent shelters have come so far on a Nile
boat, but as the river now describes a huge curve and abounds in
rocks and rapids, they have decided to cut across the desert.
It is about noon. The sun stands almost vertically above the tent, in a
cloudless deep blue sky, and his scorching rays are but slightly
warded off by the loose open foliage of the date-palms. On the plain
between the river and the desert the heat is oppressive, and the
strata of air above the burning ground are heaving unsteadily, so that
every picture is distorted and blurred.
A troop of horsemen, evidently hailing from the desert, appears on
the horizon. They pay no heed to the village which lies further inland,
but make straight for the tent. The horses are thin, but plainly of no
ignoble breed; the riders are dark brown and poorly clad, with long
loose burnooses more gray than white. Reaching the cluster of
palms they dismount. One of them approaches the tent and enters
with the dignity of a king. He is the chief of the camel-drivers (Sheikh
el Djemali), to whom we, the travellers, had sent a messenger,
asking him to provide us with the necessary guides, drivers, and
camels.
“Peace be with you,” he says on entering, and lays his hand on his
mouth, his forehead, and his heart.
“Peace be with thee, O Sheikh,” we answer, “the mercy of God and
his blessing.”
“Great has been my desire to see you, ye strangers, and to learn
your wishes,” he assures us, as he takes his seat on a cushion in the
place of honour at our right hand.
“May God, the Almighty, reward thy goodness, O Sheikh, and bless
thee,” we answer; and we order our servants to bring him coffee and
a freshly lit pipe before serving ourselves.
With half-shut eyes he comforts his mortal body with the coffee and
his immortal soul with the pipe; and thick clouds of smoke veil his
expressive features. There is almost perfect stillness in the tent,
which is pervaded with the fragrance of the exquisite Djebelit
tobacco and a thin smoke by no means unpleasant. At last we think
that we may venture to begin business without violating any of the
rites of hospitality.
“Is it well with thee, O Sheikh?”
“The Giver of all Good be praised, it is well with your servant. And
how is it with thee?”
“To the Lord of all be honour and glory, it is well with me. Great was
our longing to see thee, O Sheikh.”
“May God in His compassion fulfil your desire and bless you. Are ye
in your state of health well content?”
“Glory be to Allah and to His Prophet, on whom is His grace.”
“Amen, be it as thou hast said.”
Fresh pipes revive the immortal soul; renewed, almost interminable
courtesies are interchanged; and at last the rigid conditions of
etiquette have been fulfilled, and it is permissible to turn to business
matters.
“O Sheikh, with the help of the All-merciful, I would travel through
this stretch of desert.”
“May Allah give thee good speed.”
“Art thou in possession of camels both to run and to carry burdens?”
we ask.
“I am. Is it well with thee, my brother?”
“The Almighty be praised, it is well. How many camels canst thou
provide for me?”
Instead of an answer only countless clouds of smoke issue from the
Sheikh’s mouth, and it is not until we repeat our question that he lays
aside his pipe for some moments and says with dignity, “Sir, the
number of the camels of Beni Said is known to Allah alone; no son of
Adam has ever counted them.”
“Well, then, send me twenty-five beasts, and among them six
trotters. And I have besides need of ten large water-bags.”
The Sheikh smokes afresh without giving answer.
“Wilt thou send the beasts we desire?” we repeat with emphasis.
“I shall do so to serve thee,” he answers, “but their owners require a
high price.”
“How much?”
“At least four times the customary wages and hire will be necessary.”
“But Sheikh, Allah, the Most High, preserve thee: these are demands
which no one will be willing to grant. Praise the Prophet!”
“God, the Preserver of all, be glorified and His messengers blessed!
Thou art in error, my friend: the merchant who has his camp over
there has offered me double what I ask; only my friendship for thee
has allowed me to make so small a demand.”
In vain seems all haggling, all further business. Fresh pipes are
brought and are smoked; renewed courtesies are exchanged; the
names of Allah and His Prophet are freely misused on both sides;
most precise inquiries after health and comfort are made mutually;
until at length the studied courtesy of the native begins to waver and
the traveller from the North loses patience.
“Then know, Sheikh, that I am in possession of a letter authorizing a
demand for means of convoy from the Khedive and likewise one
from the Sheikh Soliman; here are both of them, what dost thou
demand now?”
“But, sir, if thou holdest a safe-conduct from his high majesty, why
dost thou not demand the head of thy slave? It is at thy service, on
his orders. I take thy wishes on my eyes and on my head. Command
and thy servant obeys. Thou knowest the government prices. Allah
protect thee; in the morning I shall send thee men, beasts, and
water-skins.”
If any one imagines that all the preparations for the desert journey
were thus brought to a satisfactory conclusion, he is indeed totally
ignorant of the manners and customs of the people. In the morning
none of the promised drivers or beasts had put in their appearance;
only by afternoon did they begin to come in; not even on the
following morning, but at soonest about the time of afternoon prayer,
could one think of starting. “Bukra inshallah—to-morrow, if God
will”—is their motto, and it baffles all commands. Indeed, there is
much to do, much to arrange, and much to be planned before the
journey can be undertaken.
In course of time the tent is the centre of a gay and lively picture.
The sunburnt children of the desert bustle about among the
baggage. Their activity is unbusiness-like to a degree, but they seem
to try to make up for this by incredible noisiness. The baggage,
which had been arranged in a sort of barricade, is scattered about;
individual pieces are lifted and tested as regards both weight and
bulk; one package is compared with another, selected and then
rejected, strapped together and then pulled apart again. Each driver
tries to outwit his neighbour, each endeavouring to secure the
lightest load for his own beast; each one rushes about in opposition
to the rest, and all are shouting and roaring, screaming and scolding,
swearing and cursing, entreating and execrating. In anticipation of
what is coming the camels also add to the noise right lustily, and if,
instead of roaring, and growling and grumbling, they should keep
silence for a while, that only means: Our time has not yet come, but
it is coming! Anyhow, with or without the camels’ accompaniment,
the stranger’s ear is harassed, literally tortured, by all the medley of
sounds which fall upon it at once. For hours together the bustle, the
racket, the uproar continues; the men scold and quarrel over the
loads until they have had enough or more than enough; and at last
the prelude comes to an end.
After peace is concluded they begin to twist the bast fibres of the
date-palm into cords and ropes. With these they sling the bales and
boxes cleverly together; they make hooks and eyes so that the two
bundles may be fastened quickly to the saddle and as quickly
loosened; they mend the ready-made nets which they have brought
to hold the smaller packages; and they test the large and small skin
bags, patching them where need be, and finally smearing them with
ill-smelling varnish of colocynth. Lastly, they examine the sun-dried
flesh, fill several bast bags with Kaffir-millet or dhurra, others with
wood-charcoal, and some perhaps with camels’ dung, rinse out the
skin-bags and fill them with water fresh from the stream. As the
tedious business is brought to a close one hears each utter a hearty
“Thank God”—“El hamdu lillahi”.
To look after all these preparations is the duty of the Chabir or leader
of the caravan. According to its importance is his rank, but in all
cases he must be what his title signifies—one who knows the way
and the existing conditions. Experience, honesty, cleverness, mettle,
and bravery are the requirements of his difficult, and not rarely
dangerous office. He knows the desert as a mariner the sea, he can
read the stars, he is familiar with every oasis and every spring on the
course of the journey, he is welcome to the tent of every Bedouin or
nomad chief, he understands all sort of precautions against break-
down or peril by the way, he can cure snake-bite and scorpion-sting,
or at least alleviate the sufferings of the injured, he wields the
weapons of the warrior and of the huntsman with equal skill, he has
the word of the Prophet not only on his lips but in his heart, he utters
the “Fatiha” at starting, and discharges the obligations of Mueddin
and Iman at the appointed times; in a word, he is the head of the
many-membered body which travels through the desert. In the
solitudes where nothing seems to point the way which other
caravans have taken, where the wind obliterates every track almost
as soon as the last camel has passed, he finds signs unseen by
others which guide him aright. When the dry, ill-boding dust of the
desert hides the everlasting heavens, his genius is his guiding star;
he tests the drifting sand, measures its waves, and estimates their
direction; he reads the points of the compass on a stem of grass. On
him every caravan, every traveller depends without mistrust. Ancient
and in part most remarkable laws, inscribed in no charter, yet known
to all, make him responsible for the welfare of the journey and for the
life of each traveller, except in so far as any inevitable dispensation
of the Ordainer of destiny may decree otherwise.
 Fig. 49.—Caravan in the African Desert.

At the sacred hour, the time of afternoon prayer, the leader

announces to travellers and drivers that all is ready for the start. The
brown men rush around, catching, leading, saddling, and loading the
camels. Resisting to the utmost the beasts are forced to obey; they
seem to have a vivid foreboding of a stretch of toilsome days. Their
time has now come. Roaring, screaming, snarling, and grumbling, in
obedience to the inimitable guttural commands of their masters and
sundry gentle hints from the whips, they sink down on their bended
knees; bellowing they adjust themselves to receive the unwelcome
burden on their humped backs, and still bellowing they rise with their
load. Not a few kick and bite in their efforts to resist being loaded,
and it indeed requires all the inexhaustible patience of the drivers to
subdue the obstinate creatures. But patience and tact master even
camels. As soon as the rebellious beast has consented to kneel, one
of the drivers stands up on its bent fore-legs, and with a quick grip
seizes the upper part of the muzzle so that by pressing the nose he
can stop the camel’s breathing; meanwhile two others from opposite
sides lift the equally poised burden on to the saddle; a fourth runs
fastening pegs through the loops of the ropes; and the fractious
camel is loaded before he has quite regained his senses. As soon as
all are loaded, the march begins.
It is now the turn of the well-saddled trotting camels. Each traveller
fastens his weapons and indispensable personal luggage to the
high, trough-shaped saddle fixed over the hump. He then proceeds
to mount his steed. For the novice this is usually a critical business.
With a bold spring he must leap into the saddle, and, as soon as he
touches this, the camel bolts up. He rises backwards, first on his
fore-knees, immediately afterwards on his long hind-legs, and finally
on his fore-legs. To the second jerk the novice in camel-riding usually
falls a victim, he is hurled out of the saddle and either kisses mother
earth or falls on the beast’s neck and holds on tightly. The camel is
much too ill-humoured to treat this as a joke or an accident. An angry
cry bursts from its ugly lips; it flies into a passion with the poor
traveller, hanging in a most unenviable position on its neck, and
proceeds to shake itself free both of him and his baggage. It takes
some time before the traveller from the North learns to bend his body
forwards and backwards at the right moment so as to keep his seat
as the camel springs up.
For our own part, we swing ourselves into the saddle with the agility
of natives. Urging on our steed with a few strokes of the whip, and
keeping it in due check by means of a fine nose-rein, we hasten after
the leader. Our camel, a lank, loosely-built, long-legged creature,
falls at once into that uniform, persistent, long-stepping, and most
effective trot, to which it is trained from earliest youth, and which
raises it high above all beasts of burden, and closely follows the
leaders. The small head is stretched far in front; the long legs swing
quickly backwards and forwards; behind them sand and small stones
rise into the air. The burnooses of the riders flutter in the wind;
weapons and utensils clatter together; with loud calls we spur on the
beasts; the joy of travel seems to give our spirits wings. Soon we
overtake the caravan of baggage-camels which had preceded us;
soon every trace of human settlement disappears; and on all sides
there stretches in apparent infinitude—the desert.
Sharply defined all around, this immense and unique region covers
the greater part of North Africa, from the Red Sea to the Atlantic,
from the Mediterranean to the Soudan, including whole countries in
its range, embracing tracts of fertile land; presenting a thousand
varieties, and yet always and everywhere the same in its essential
features. In area, this wonderful region is nine or ten times larger
than the whole of the German Empire, and three or four times larger
than the Mediterranean. No mortal has thoroughly explored or even
traversed it; but every son of earth who has set foot on it and
crossed some part of it, is in his inmost heart impressed with its size
and grandeur, its charm and its horror. Even on the most matter-of-
fact Northerner who sojourns in the desert a lasting, ineffaceable
impression is left by the glowing splendour of the sunlight and the
parching heat of its days, by the heavenly peacefulness and the
magical phantoms of its nights, by the witchery of the radiant
atmosphere, by the dreadfulness of its mountain-moving storms; and
many a one may have experienced, what the children of the desert
so acutely feel—a longing to return, to breathe its air for a day, an
hour, to see its pictures again with the bodily eye, to experience
again that “unutterable harmony” whose echoes the desert awakens
in the poetic soul. In short, there is a home-sickness for the desert.
It is literally and truly “El Bahhr bela maa”—the sea without water—
the sea’s antithesis. To the sea the desert is not subject as are other
parts of the earth; the might of the vitalizing and sustaining element
is here annulled. “Water silently embraces all things”—the desert
alone excepted. Over the whole earth the winds bear the clouds, the
sea’s messengers, but these fade away before the glow of the
desert. It is rarely that one sees there even a thin, hardly perceptible
vapour; rarely can one detect on a leaf in the morning the damp
breath of the night. The flush of dawn and the red glow of sunset are
indeed seen, but only, as it were, in a breath which is scarce formed
when it passes away. Wherever water gains the mastery, the desert
changes into fertile land, which may, indeed, be poor enough, but the
limits between them are always sharply defined. Where the last
wave of the sacred Nile, raised above its level by man’s ingenuity,
loses itself in the sand, the contrast is seen; the traveller, whose way
lies from the river to the hills adjacent, may stand with one foot on a
field of sprouting grain, and with the other touch the desert. It is not
the sand itself which hinders the growth of plants, but solely the
scorching heat which radiates through it. For, wherever it is irrigated
or periodically watered, there, amid the otherwise plantless desert, a
green carpet of vegetation is spread, and even shrubs and trees may
grow.
 Fig. 50.—An Encampment in the Sahara.

Barren, pitifully barren is the desert, but it is not dead—not, at least,

to those who have eyes to see its life. Whoever looks with a dull eye
sees nothing but sandy plains and rocky cones, bare low grounds
and naked hills, may even overlook the sparse reed-like grasses and
shrubby trees of the deeper hollows, and the few animals which
occur here and there. But he who really wishes to see can discover
infinitely more. To the dull-eyed the desert is a land of horrors; they
allow themselves to be so depressed by the glowing heat of the day
that the blissfulness of the night brings them no comfort or strength;
they ride into the desert trembling, and leave it shuddering; their
sensations are all for the terrible, their feelings for the annoyances
attendant on the journey; for the infinite sublimity of the desert such
hearts are too small. But those who have really learned to know the
desert judge otherwise.
Barren the desert is, we confess, but it is not dead. Thus, although
the general aspect is uniform, the nature of the surface varies
greatly. For wide stretches the desert is like a rocky sea, with
strangely-shaped cones, abrupt precipitous walls, deeply-riven
gorges, sharp-angled ridges, and wondrous towering domes. Over
these the ceaselessly-blowing wind drifts the sand, now filling up
hollows, now emptying them again, but always grinding, polishing,
hollowing out, sharpening, and pointing. Black masses of sandstone,
granite, or syenite, more rarely of limestone or slate, and here and
there of volcanic rock glow in the sun, and rise in expressively-
outlined ranges. On one side the wind robs these of every covering,
driving the fine sand uninterruptedly over their summits, completely
enveloping them in a veil in times of storm, and leaving no particle of
sand at rest until it has been blown across the ridge. On the lee side,
protected from the wind, lie golden yellow beds of the finest rolled
sand, which form terraces one above another, each about a yard in
height. But they also are in ceaseless movement, continually
displacing one another from above downwards, and being renewed
from the other side of the range. Strikingly contrasted with the black
walls of the exposed side, these terraces of sand are visible from
afar, and in certain lights they sparkle like broad golden ribbons on
the hills. We may venture to call such ranges the regalia of the
desert. No one unacquainted with the glowing South can picture the
marvellous wealth of colour, the splendour and glamour, and the
infinite charm which the overflowing sunlight can create on the
dreariest and wildest mountains of the desert. Their sides are never
clothed with the welcome green of woodland, at most the highest
peaks bear a scant covering of bushes, to which the precipitation of
vapour at this height allows a bare subsistence and a stunted
growth. One misses the whispering of the beeches, and the rustling
of the firs and pines; there is none of the familiar murmuring, or
joyous chatter, or echoing roar of running water, which lays silver
ribbons on our mountains at home, fringing them here with verdure,
while in another place the sun shining upon rushing waterfall and
whirlpool enhaloes them with rainbow colours; there is no mantle of
ice and snow which the sun can transfigure into purple at dawn and
sunset, or into glowing brightness at noon; and there is no fresh
green from any mead. In short, all the witchery and charm of
Northern mountain scenery is absent; and yet the desert mountains
are not deficient in wealth of colour, and certainly not in majesty.
Every individual layer and its own peculiar colour comes into
prominence and has its effect. And yet, brilliant as may be the
brightly-coloured and sometimes sharply-contrasted strata, it is on
the continuously sand-polished, grandly-sculptured cones, peaks,
gullies, and gorges that the light of heaven produces the finest play
of colour. The alternations of light and shade are so frequent, the
flushing and fading of colours so continuous, that a very intoxication
of delight besets the soul. Nor do the first and last rays of the sun fail
to clothe the desert mountains in purple; and distance sheds over
them its blue ethereal haze. They, too, live, for the light gives them
life.
In other regions the desert is for wide stretches either flat or gently
undulating. For miles it is covered with fine-grained, golden-yellow
sand, into which man and beast sink for several centimetres. Here
one often sees not a single stem of grass nor living creature of any
kind. The uniformly blue sky roofs in this golden surface, and
contributes not a little to suggest the sea. In such places the track of
the “ship of the desert” is lost as it is made; they are pathless as the
sea; for them as for the ocean was the compass discovered. Less
monotonous, but not more pleasant, are those regions on which
loose, earthy, or dusty sand forms a soil for poisonous colocynth-
gourds and the wholesome senna. Long low hills alternate with
shallow and narrow hollows, and a carpet of the above-named
plants, which from a distance seems green and fresh, covers both
alike. Such places are avoided by both man and beast, for the camel
and his driver often sink a foot deep into the loose surface-soil. Other
tracts are covered with coarse gravel or flints, and others with hollow
sand-filled balls, rich in iron, which look almost as if they had been
made by human hands, and whose origin has not yet been very
satisfactorily explained.[75] On such stretches, where the camel-
paths are almost like definite highways, thousands of quartz crystals
are sometimes exposed, either singly or in groups, like clusters of
diamonds set by an artist hand. With these the sun plays magically,
and such stretches gleam and sparkle till the dazzled eye is forced to
turn away from them. In the deepest hollows, finally, the dust forms a
soil, and there one is sure to find the reed-like, but very hard, dry,
sharp, dark-green alfa, umbrella-shaped mimosas, and perhaps
even tom-palms, pleasant assurances of life.
But of animal life also there is distinct evidence. To think of the
desert as a dead solitude is as erroneous as to call it the home of
lions. It is too poor to support lions, but it is rich enough for
thousands of other animals. And all these are in a high degree
remarkable, for in every respect they prove themselves the true
children of the desert.
It is not merely that their colouring is always most precisely
congruent with the dominant colour of the ground, that is generally
tawny, but the desert animals are marked by their light and delicate
build, by their strikingly large and unusually acute eyes and ears,
and by a behaviour which is as unassuming as it is self-possessed. It
is the lot of all creatures born in the desert to be restless wanderers,
for sufficient food cannot be found all the year round at one place,
and the children of the desert are endowed with incomparable agility,
indefatigable endurance, untiring persistence; their senses are
sharpened so that the pittance which is offered is never overlooked,
and their clothing is adapted to conceal them alike in flight or in
attack. If their life is perhaps somewhat hard, it is certainly not
joyless.
The fact that almost all the desert animals agree in colouring with
their surroundings explains why the traveller, who is not an
experienced observer, often sees, at first at least, but little of the
animal life. Moreover, the desert seems far poorer than it is, since it
is not till dusk that most of its tenants leave their places of rest and
concealment and begin to be lively. Some, however, force
themselves on the attention of the least observant. Even though the
traveller may fail to notice the various species of desert-lark which
cross his path everywhere, and are noteworthy for their likeness to
the ground and for their extraordinarily developed powers of flight, he
cannot possibly overlook the sand-grouse; and though he may ride
unobserving over the burrows of the jerboas, he is sure to observe a
gazelle feeding not far from his path.

Fig. 51.—Gazelles lying near a Mimosa.

This antelope may be regarded as typically a desert animal.
Although it is proportionate in all its parts, the head and sense-
organs seem almost too large, and the limbs too delicate, in fact
almost fragile. But this head carries a brain of unusual cleverness for
a ruminant, and those limbs are as if made of steel, exceedingly
strong and elastic, admirably suited for agility and untiring
endurance. One must not judge the gazelle of the desert from its
appearance in captivity, cooped up in a narrow space. What activity,
adroitness, suppleness, grace, and spirit, it displays in its native
haunts! How well it deserves to have been chosen alike by the
Oriental and by the native of the desert as the image of feminine
beauty. Trusting to its tawny coat, as well as to its incomparable
agility and speed, it gazes with clear, untroubled eyes at the camels
and their riders. Without seeming to be disturbed by the approaching
caravan, it continues to browse. From the blossoming mimosa it
takes a bud or a juicy shoot; between the sharp alfa leaves it finds a
delicate young stem. Nearer and nearer comes the caravan. The
creature raises its head, listens, sniffs the air, gazes round again,
moves a few steps, and browses as before. But suddenly the elastic
hoofs strike the ground, and the gazelle is off, quickly, lightly, and
nimbly, as if its almost unexcelled speed were but play. Over the
sandy plain it skims, quick as thought, leaping over the larger stones
and tamarisk bushes as if it had wings. It seems almost to have left
the earth, so surprisingly beautiful is its flight; it seems as if a poem
of the desert were embodied in it, so fascinating is its beauty and
swiftness. A few minutes of persistent flight carry it out of reach of
any danger with which the travellers can threaten it, for the best
trotter would pursue in vain, and not even a greyhound could
overtake it. Soon it slackens its speed, and in a few moments it is
browsing as before. And if the bloodthirsty traveller begins the chase
in earnest, the sly creature has a tantalizing way of allowing him to
get near it again; a second and a third time it cleverly gets out of
range of his murderous weapons, until at length, becoming scared, it
leaves all danger far behind. The further it gallops the more slender
seem its body and limbs; its outline begins to swim before the eyes;
at length it disappears on the sandy flat, merging into it and seeming
to melt away like a breath of vapour. Its home has received and
concealed the fugitive, removed it, as if magically, from vision, and
left not a trace behind. But if the vision is lost to the eye it remains in
the heart, and even the Western can now understand why the
gazelle has become such a richly-flowering bud in the poesy of the
East, why the Oriental gives it so high a rank among beasts, why he
compares the eyes which kindle fires in his heart to those of the
gazelle, why he likens the neck around which he throws his arms in
love’s secret hour to that of the swiftest of the desert’s children, why
the nomad brings a tame gazelle to the tent of his gladly-expectant
spouse, that she may gaze into its tender eyes and reflect their
beauty on the hoped-for pledge of their wedlock, and why even the
sacred poet finds in the fair creature a visible emblem of his longing
after the Most High. For even he, removed from the world, must
have felt a breath of the passion which has purified the words and
made smooth the verses and rhymes of the fiery songs in praise of
the gazelle.
Less attractive, but by no means less interesting, are some other
desert animals. Among the sparsely sprouting alfa there is a
numerous flock of birds about the size of pigeons. Tripping hither
and thither, scratching and scraping with their bills, they seek for
food. Without anxiety they allow the rider to approach within a
distance of a hundred paces. A good field-glass enables one to see
not only every movement, but also the more prominent colours of
their plumage. With depressed head, retracted neck, and body held
almost horizontally, they run about in search of seeds, the few grains
which the desert grasses bear, freshly unfolded panicles, and
insects. Some stretch out their necks from time to time and peer
circumspectly around, others, quite careless, paddle in the sand,
preening their feathers, or lie at ease, half sideways, in the sun. All
this one can distinctly see, and one can count that there are over
fifty, perhaps nearly a hundred. What sportsman would their
presence not excite? Sure of his booty, the inexperienced traveller
shuts up his field-glass, gets hold of his gun, and slowly approaches
the gay company. But the birds disappear before his eyes. None has
run or flown, yet none is to be seen. It seems as if the earth had
swallowed them. The fact is that, trusting to the likeness between
their plumage and the ground, they have simply squatted. In a
moment they have become stones and little heaps of sand. Ignorant
of this, the sportsman rides in upon them, and is startled when they
rise with simultaneous suddenness, and loudly calling and scolding,
take wing and fly noisily away. But if he should succeed in bringing
one down, he will not fail to be struck by their colouring and marking,
which is as remarkable as their behaviour. The sand-coloured upper
surface, shading sometimes into gray, sometimes towards bright
yellow, is broken and adorned by broad bands, narrower bars,
delicate lines, by dots, spots, points, streaks, and blurs, so that one
might fancy at first sight that birds so marked must be conspicuous
from a distance. But all this colour-medley is simply the most precise
copy of the ground; every dark and light spot, every little stone, every
grain of sand seems to have its counterpart on the plumage. It is no
wonder then that the earth can, as it were, make the bird part of
itself, and secure its safety, which is further assured by the creature’s
strong wings, which are capable of incomparably swift flight. And so
it is that the poetic feeling of the Arabs has idealized these sand-
grouse in luxuriant fancy and flowery words, for their beauty
fascinates the eye, and their marvellous swiftness awakens longing
in the heart of mortals who are bound to the earth.
All other desert animals display characters like the two which we
have described. Thus there is a lynx, the caracal, leaner and lanker,
with longer ears and larger eyes than the rest of his race, moreover
not striped nor spotted, but sand-coloured all except his black ear-
tips, eye-stripes, and lip-spots. His hue varies slightly, being lighter
or darker, and with more or less red, according to the locality in
which he lives. There is also a desert fox, the fenec, the dwarf of the
dog family, with dun-yellow fur, and extraordinarily large ears. The
desert also harbours a small rodent, the so-called jumping-mouse,
the jerboa: he suggests a miniature kangaroo, and has exceedingly
long hind-legs, diminutive fore-legs, and a tail longer than the body
with hairs in two rows. He is more harmless and good-natured, but
also swifter and more agile than any other rodent.
The birds, the reptiles, and even the insects show the same stamp,
though form and colouring may vary greatly. When any other colour
besides sandy-yellow becomes prominent, if hair, feather, or scale
be marked with black or white, ashy-gray or brown, red or blue, such
decorations occur only in places where they are not noticeable when
looked at from above or from the side. But where a mountain rises in
the midst of the desert, it shows its varied character also in the
animal life. On the gray rocks of the mountains in Arabia the steinbok
clambers, the hyrax has its home, the bearded vultures nest, and not
a few other birds are to be found on the peaks and cliffs, in the
chasms and valleys. But from the dark rocks of more low-lying
deserts the only sound one hears is the loud but tuneful song of the
deep-black wheatear.
Thus the desert exhibits harmony in all its parts and in every one of
its creatures, and this fact goes far to strengthen the impression
made on every thoughtful, sensitive, and healthy mind—an
impression received on the first day in the desert, and confirmed on
every succeeding one.
If one would really know the desert and become in any measure at
home there, one must have a vigorous constitution, a receptive
mind, and some poetic feeling. Whoever shrinks from enduring the
discomforts of the journey, whoever fears either sun or sand, should
avoid the desert altogether. Even if the sky be clear, and the
atmosphere pure and bright, even if a cooling breeze come from the
north, the day in the desert is hard to bear. Almost suddenly, with
scarce any dawn, the sun begins to exert his masterful power. It is
only near the sea or large rivers that the dawn is heralded by a
purple flush on the eastern horizon; amid the vast sand-plains the
sun appears with the first reddening in the east. It rises over the flats
like a ball of fire, which seems as if it would burst forth on all sides.
The coolness of the morning is at once past. Directly after sunrise
the glowing beams beat down as if it were already noon. And though
the north wind, which may blow for months at a time and is often
refreshing, may prevent the unequally expanded layers of air from
shaping themselves into a mirage, yet it does not bring sufficient
cooling to annul the peculiar heaving and quivering of the
atmosphere which is seen over the sand. Heaven and earth seem to
float in a flood of light, and an indescribable heat streams from the
sun, and is reflected again from the sand. With each hour the light
and heat increase, and from neither is there any escape.