was dethroned in the year 637. His
capital was Bosra, on the road between the Persian Gulf and the
Mediterranean. Nowadays the district is chiefly occupied by
nomads; to the Hebrews it was known as Bashan, famous for its
flocks and oak plantations. We can still discern the traces of
troglodyte dwellings of this epoch. The afore-mentioned Jabalah
was a convert to Islam, but, being insulted by a Mahometan, he
returned to Christianity and betook himself to Constantinople,
where he died. But in the time of Abu'l-Ala, the Ghassanites were
again in the exercise of authority. "These were the kings of
Ghassan," says Abu'l-Ala, "who followed the course of the dead;
each of them is now but a tale that is told, and God knows who is
good." A poet is a liar, say the Arabs, and the greatest poet is
the greatest liar. But in this case Abu'l-Ala in prose was not so
truthful as in poetry; for if Jabalah's house had vanished, the
Ghassanites were still a power. The poet, for our consolation,
has a simile (_quatrain_ 77) that may be put against a passage of
Homer:

As with autumnal harvests cover'd o'er,
And thick bestrown, lies Ceres' sacred floor,
When round and round, with never-weary'd pain
The trampling steers beat out th' unnumber'd grain:
So the fierce coursers, as the chariot rolls,
Tread down whole ranks, and crush out heroes' souls.[16]

For everything there is decay, and (_quatrain_ 78) for the
striped garment of a long cut which now we are unable to
identify.

We read in the Wisdom of Solomon: "As when an arrow is shot at a
mark, it parteth the air which immediately cometh together again,
so that a man cannot know where it went through." In this place
(_quatrain_ 84), if the weapon's road of air is not in vain it
will discover justice in the sky. How much the Arabs were averse
from frigid justice is to be observed in the matter of recompense
for slaying. There existed a regular tariff--so many camels or
dates--but they looked askance upon the person who was willing to
accept this and forgo his vengeance. If a man was anxious to
accept a gift as satisfaction and at the same time to escape
reproach, he shot an arrow into the air. Should it come down
unspotted, he was able to accept the gift; if it was bloody, then
he was obliged to seek for blood. The Arabs, by the way, had been
addicted to an ancient game, but Islam tried to stamp this out,
like other joys of life. The players had ten arrows, which they
shot