We are not to wonder, if the prodigious hurry and flow of business, and the immensely valuable transactions they had with each other, had greatly familiarized the Tyrians and Jews, with their correspondents the Cushites and Shepherds on the coast of Africa. This had gone so far, as very naturally to have created a desire in the queen of Azab, the sovereign of that country, to go herself and see the application of such immense treasures that had been exported from her country for a series of years, and the prince who so magnificently employed them. There can be no doubt of this expedition, as Pagan, Arab, Moor, Abyssinian, and all the countries round, vouch it pretty much in the terms of scripture. Many[321] have thought this queen was an Arab. But Saba was a separate state, and the Sabeans a distinct people from the Ethiopians and the Arabs, and have continued so till very lately. We know, from history, that it was a custom among these Sabeans, to have women for their sovereigns in preference to men, a custom which still subsists among their descendents. ---- _Medis levibusque Sabæis, Imperat hie sexus Reginarumque sub armis, Barbariæ[322], pars magna jacet._ CLAUDIAN. Her name, the Arabs say, was _Belkis_; the Abyssìnians, _Maqueda_. Our Saviour calls her _Queen of the South_, without mentioning any other name, but gives his sanction to the truth of the voyage. “The Queen of the South (or Saba, or Azab) shall rise up in the judgment with this generation, and shall condemn it; for she came from the uttermost parts of the earth to hear the wisdom of Solomon; and, behold, a greater than Solomon is here[323].” No other particulars, however, are mentioned about her in scripture; and it is not probable our Saviour would say she came from the uttermost parts of the earth, if she had been an Arab, and had near 50° of the Continent behind her. The gold, the myrrh, cassia, and frankincense, were all the produce of her own country; and the many reasons Pineda[324] gives to shew she was an Arab, more than convince me that she was an Ethiopian or Cushite shepherd. A strong objection to her being an Arab, is, that the Sabean Arabs, or Homerites, the people that lived opposite to Azab on the Arabian shore, had kings instead of queens, which latter the Shepherds had, and still have. Moreover, the kings of the Homerites were never seen abroad, and were stoned to death if they appeared in public; subjects of this stamp would not very readily suffer their queen to go to Jerusalem, even supposing they had a queen, which they had not.