d nations that have taken this one step in
the advance toward civilization, but have gone no farther. They live,
not, like the Indians in North America, by hunting wild beasts, but by
rearing and pasturing flocks and herds of animals that they have
tamed. These animals feed, of course, on grass and herbage; and, as
grass and herbage can only grow on open ground, the forests have
gradually disappeared, and the country has for ages consisted of great
grassy plains, or of smooth hill-sides covered with verdure. Over
these plains, or along the river valleys, wander the different tribes
of which these pastoral nations are composed, living in tents, or in
frail huts almost equally movable, and driving their flocks and herds
before them from one pasture-ground to another, according as the
condition of the grass, or that of the springs and streams of water,
may require.

We obtain a pretty distinct idea of the nature of this pastoral life,
and of the manners and customs, and the domestic constitution to which
it gives rise, in the accounts given us in the Old Testament of
Abraham and Lot, and of their wanderings with their flocks and herds
over the country lying between the Euphrates and the Mediterranean
Sea. They lived in tents, in order that they might remove their
habitations the more easily from place to place in following their
flocks and herds to different pasture-grounds. Their wealth consisted
almost wholly in these flocks and herds, the land being almost every
where common. Sometimes, when two parties traveling together came to a
fertile and well-watered district, their herdsmen and followers were
disposed to contend for the privilege of feeding their flocks upon it,
and the contention would often lead to a quarrel and combat, if it had
not been settled by an amicable agreement on the part of the
chieftains.

[Illustration: ENCAMPMENT OF A PATRIARCH.]

The father of a family was the legislator and ruler of it, and his
sons, with their wives, and his son's sons, remained with him,
sometimes for many years, sharing his means of subsistence, submitting
to his authority, and going with him from place to place, with all his
flocks and herds. They employed, too, so many herdsmen, and other
servants and followers, as to form, in many cases, quite an extended
community, and sometimes, in case of hostilities with any other
wandering tribe, a single patriarch could send forth from his own
domestic circle a force of several