lightly prized. Pay, pensions, stipends, presents, and the ‘Ikram’
here, as at Medina, supply the citizen with the means of idleness.
With him everything is on the most expensive scale, his marriage,
his religious ceremonies, and his household expenses. His house is
luxuriously furnished, entertainments are frequent, and the junketings
of the women make up a heavy bill at the end of the year. It is a
common practice for the citizen to anticipate the pilgrimage season by
falling into the hands of the usurer. The most unpleasant peculiarities
of the Meccans are their pride and coarseness of language. They
look upon themselves as the cream of earth’s sons, and resent with
extreme asperity the least slighting word concerning the Holy City and
its denizens. They plume themselves upon their holy descent, their
exclusion of infidels, their strict fastings, their learned men, and
their purity of language. In fact, their pride shows itself at every
moment; but it is not the pride which makes a man too proud to do a
dirty action. The Meccans appeared to me distinguished, even in this
foul-mouthed East, by the superior licentiousness of their language.
Abuse was bad enough in the streets, but in the house it became
intolerable.”[12]
Temporary marriages which are a mere cloak for open prostitution are
common in Mecca and are indeed one of the chief means of livelihood to
the natives[13]. Concubinage and divorce are more universal than in any
other part of the Moslem world;[14] sodomy is practiced in the Sacred
Mosque itself[15] and the suburbs of the city are the scene of nightly
carnivals of iniquity, especially after the pilgrims have left and the
natives are rich with the fresh spoils of the traffic.[16] As might
be expected, superstition grows rife in such a soil and under such
circumstances. All sorts of holy-places, legends, sacred rocks, trees
and houses abound. Every Moslem saint who tarried in the city or died
there has left something to be remembered and honored.
Gross ignorance coupled with equal conceit seems to be the universal
characteristic of the people of Mecca. Modern science is laughed at
and everything turns, on the Ptolemaic system, around the little world
of the Koran. Jinn are exorcised; witches and the evil-eye are avoided
by amulets; in short all the superstitious practices of the Moslem
world are cultivated in this centre of world-wide pilgrimage. Astrology
still usurps the place of astronomy and it is considered blasphemy
to profess to know the hour of an eclipse or the day of the new moon
before it is revealed from heaven. Alchemy is the science that attracts
the Meccan physician more than the marvels of surgery; potions of
holy-writ or talismans are still in use for sprains and dislocations.
Their ignorance of geography and history beyond the confines of the
pilgrim-world is pathetic. One of the chief Mullahs asked Hurgronje
“how many days was the caravan journey from Moskop (Russia) to
Andalusia (Spain)?” A government printing-press has been opened at
Mecca in recent years and an official gazette is published; but even
Turkish civilization and learning are considered far from orthodox for
their ways partake too much of those of the “infidels” of the rest
of Europe. Photography is a forbidden art and money with “images” of
queens and emperors is only used with the prayer _istagfir allah_, “I
ask pardon of God.” On the other hand many old European coins no longer
current are looked upon as being doubly valuable as amulets and charms.
One of these, the _Mishkash_ is supposed to have special virtues for
newly-married women.
“The irony of history,” as Hurgronje remarks, “was not satisfied that
at Medina the grave of Mohammed who cursed saint-worship should become
a centre of pilgrimage, but added the circumstance that at Mecca,
Moslem women, who reject images and Christ-worship, should prize as an
amulet the image of Jesus and an Evangelist.” Of course, the women
themselves are in total ignorance of the inscription and character of
the coin.
[Illustration: A CHRISTIAN COIN USED AS AN AMULET BY MECCAN WOMEN.[17]]
There is a great abundance of schools at Mecca but no education.
Everything is on the old lines, beginning and ending with the Koran,
that Procrustean bed for the human intellect. “The letter killeth.”
And it is the _letter_ first, foremost and always that is the topic
of study. The youth learn to read the Koran not to understand its
meaning, but to drone it out professionally at funerals and feasts, so
many chapters for so many shekels. Modern science or history are not
even mentioned, much less taught, at even the high-schools of Mecca.
Grammar, prosody, caligraphy, Arabian history, and the first elements
of arithmetic, but chiefly the Koran commentaries and traditions,
traditions, traditions, form the curriculum of the Mohammedan college.
Those who desire a postgraduate course devote themselves to Mysticism
(_Tassawaf_) or join an order of the Derwishes who all have their
representative sheikhs at Mecca.
The method of teaching in the schools of Mecca, which can be taken as
an example of the best that Arabia affords, is as follows. The child
of intellectual promise is first taught his alphabet from a small
wooden board on which they are written by the teacher; slates are
unknown. Then he learns the _Abjad_ or numerical value of each letter—a
useless proceeding at present as the Arabic notation, originally
from India, is everywhere in use. After this he learns to write down
the ninety-nine names of Allah and to read the first chapter of the
Koran; then he attacks the last two chapters, because they are short.
The teacher next urges him through the book, making the pupil read
at the top of his voice. The greatest strictness is observed as to
pronunciation and pauses but nothing whatever is said to explain the
meaning of the words. Having thus _finished_ the Koran, that is,
read it through once, the pupil takes up the elements of grammar,
learning rules by rote both of _sarf_ (inflection) and _nahw_ (syntax).
Then follow the liberal sciences, _al-mantik_ (logic), _al-hisab_
(arithmetic), _al-jabr_ (algebra), _al-ma’ana wa’l beyan_ (rhetoric
and versification), _al-fikh_ (jurisprudence), _al-akäid_ (scholastic
theology), _at-tafsir_ (exegetics), _ilm ul-usul_ (science of sources
of interpretation) and lastly, the capstone of education, _al-ahadith_
(traditions). Instruction is given by lectures; text-books are seldom
used; lessons begin in the morning and continue for a few hours; in
the afternoon they are interrupted by prayer-time. Even at Mecca the
favorite place for teaching is in the Mosque-court where constant
interruptions and distractions must make it pleasant for a lazy pupil.
[Illustration: A WOMAN OF MECCA]
[Illustration: A MECCAN WOMAN IN HER BRIDAL COSTUME]
IV
THE HOLY LAND OF ARABIA—MEDINA
“Within the sanctuary or bounds of the city all sins are forbidden;
but the several schools advocate different degrees of strictness. The
Imam Malik, for instance, allows no latrinæ nearer to El Medina than
Jebel Ayr, a distance of about three miles. He also forbids slaying
wild animals, but at the same time he specifies no punishment for
the offence. All authors strenuously forbid, within the boundaries,
slaying man, (except invaders, infidels and the sacrilegious) drinking
spirits and leading an immoral life. In regard to the dignity of the
sanctuary there is but one opinion; a number of traditions testify to
its honor, praise its people and threaten dreadful things to those who
injure it or them.”—_Burton_.
About seventy miles southeast of Mecca is the small but pleasant town
of Taif, to which the pashas condemned for the murder of Abdul Aziz
Sultan were banished. It is one of the most interesting and attractive
towns of all Arabia, being surrounded by gardens and vineyards from
which Mecca has been supplied for ages. The tropical rains last
from four to six weeks at Taif, and good wells abound to water the
gardens when the rains cease, so that the place is famous for its
garden-produce. In close proximity to the barren Mecca district Taif
is a paradise for the pilgrim and a health resort for the jaundiced,
fever-emaciated Meccan. At Taif Doughty saw three old stone idols of
“the days of ignorance”; _El Uzza_, a block of granite some twenty feet
long; another called _Hubbal_, with a cleft in the middle, “by our Lord
Aly’s sword-stroke”; and _El Lat_, an unshapely crag of grey granite.
These were earlier stone-gods of the Arab, and now lie forsaken in the
dirt, while their brother-god, the famous Black-Stone, receives the
reverence of millions!
The road from Mecca to El Medina—“_the_ city”—so called because the
prophet chose it as his home in time of persecution—leads nearly due
north. It is an uninteresting, and for the most part, a forsaken
country that separates the rival cities. Burton writes that it reminded
him of the lines,
“Full many a waste I’ve wandered o’er,
Clomb many a crag, crossed, many a shore,
But, by my halidome
A scene so rude, so wild as this,
Yet so sublime in barrenness,
Ne’er did my wandering footsteps press,
Where’er I chanced to roam.”
There are two caravan-routes, both of which are used by the pilgrims,
but the eastern road is used most frequently.[18]
The region between Mecca and Medina is the home of the ancient poets of
Arabia and is classic ground. The seven Moallakat or suspended poems
find their scene in this region. Lebid wrote:
“Deserted is the village—waste the halting place and home,
At Mina, o’er Rijam and Ghul wild beasts unheeded roam,
On Rayyan hill the channel lines have left their naked trace,
Time-worn as primal writ that dints the mountain face.”
El Medina, formerly called _Yathrib_, is now also called _El Munowera_,
the “illuminated,” and devout Moslems commonly claim to see, on
approaching the city, a luminous haze hanging over its mosques and
houses. The legends and superstitions that cluster around the last
resting-place of the Prophet are not less in number nor less credible
than those that glorify the place of his birth, although the town is
only about half the size and contains 16,000 inhabitants. It consists
of three principal divisions: the town proper, the fort and the
suburbs. It is surrounded by a wall forty feet high; the streets are
narrow and unpaved; the houses are flat-roofed and double-stoned.
The current dispute, however, for many centuries has been regarding
the relative sanctity and importance of the two cities, Mecca and
Medina. A visit to Medina is called _Ziyarat_, as that to Mecca is
called _Haj_; the latter is obligatory by order of the Koran, while
the former is meritorious on the authority of tradition. The orthodox
further stipulate, that circumambulation around the prophet’s tomb at
Medina is not allowed as around the Kaaba at Mecca nor should men wear
the _ihram_, nor kiss the tomb. On the other hand, to spit upon it or
treat it with contempt, as the Wahabees did, is held to be the act of
an infidel. To quote again from Burton: “The general consensus of Islam
admits the superiority of the Beit Allah at Mecca to the whole world;
and declares Medina to be more venerable than every part of Mecca, and
consequently all the earth, except only the Beit Allah. This last is a
_juste milieu_ view by no means in favor with the inhabitants of either
place.”
The one thing that gives Medina claim to sanctity is the prophet’s
tomb, and yet there is some doubt as to whether he is really buried
in the mosque raised to his honor; of course every Moslem, learned
or ignorant, believes it, but there are many arguments against the
supposition.[19] One of these arguments alone would have little value
against so old a tradition and practice, but their cumulative force
cannot be denied, and throws serious doubt on the question whether the
present mosque of the prophet contains any trace of his remains. On the
other hand pious Moslems affirm that the prophet is not really dead,
but “eats and drinks in the tomb until the day of resurrection,” and is
as much alive as he ever was.
[Illustration: REPORTED ARRANGEMENT OF THE INTERIOR OF THE HUJRAH.]
The Mesjid-el-Nebi or prophet’s mosque at Medina is about 420 feet
long by 340 broad. It is built nearly north and south and has a large
interior courtyard, surrounded by porticoes. From the western side we
enter the _Rauzah_ or prophet’s garden. On the north and west it is
not divided from the rest of the portico; on the south side runs a
dwarf wall and on the east it is bounded by the lattice-work of the
_Hujrah_. This is an irregular square of about fifty feet separated
on all sides from the walls of the Mosque by a broad passage. Inside
there are said to be three tombs carefully concealed inside the iron
railing by a heavy curtain arranged like a four-post bed. The Hujrah
has four gates, all kept locked except the fourth which admits only the
officers in charge of the treasure, the eunuchs who sweep the floor,
light the lamps and carry away the presents thrown into the enclosure
by devotees. It is commonly asserted that many early Moslem saints
and warriors desired the remaining space for their grave, but that by
Mohammed’s wish it is reserved for ’Isa on his second coming and death.
The story of a coffin suspended by magnets has of course no foundation
in fact and may have arisen from the crude drawings of the tombs.
The _ziyarah_ at the Mosque consists in prayers and alms-giving with
silent contemplation on the sacred character of Mohammed. The following
sample “prayer” offered at the shrine of Fatima, gives some idea of
what is to Christian ears a blasphemous service: “Peace be upon thee,
O daughter of the apostle of Allah! Thou mother of the excellent seed.
Peace be upon thee thou Lady amongst women. Peace be upon thee, O Fifth
of the people of the Prophet’s garment! A pure one, O virgin! Peace be
on thee, O spouse of our Lord, Ali el Murtaza, O mother of Hasan and
Hussein, the two Moons, the two Lights, the two Pearls, the two princes
of the youth of Heaven, the Coolness of the eyes of true believers!
etc., etc.” The prayers offered at the prophet’s grave are more fulsome
in their praise and of much greater length. What would the camel-driver
of Mecca say if he heard them?
As at Mecca so at Medina the townspeople, one and all, live on the
pilgrims. The keeper of the Mosque is a Turkish Pasha with a large
salary and many perquisites; there are treasurers and professors and
clerks and sheikhs of these eunuchs kept on salary. Sweepers and
porters, all eunuchs, and guides as at Mecca who live by backsheesh or
extortion. Water-carriers here too peddle about the brackish fluid by
the cupful to thirsty pilgrims. Those who are not in the service of the
Mosque usually keep boarding-houses, or sell prayers which are to be
made once a year at the prophet’s tomb, for the absent pilgrim. Most of
the officials receive their salaries from Constantinople and Cairo.
The population of Medina is not less a mixed multitude than that of
Mecca; here also the observation of Zehm holds true, “every pilgrimage
brings new fathers.” Burton testifies, “It is not to be believed that
in a town garrisoned by Turkish troops, full of travelled traders,
and which supports itself by plundering _Hajis_ the primitive virtues
of the Arab could exist. The Meccans, a dark people, say of the
Madani, that their hearts are as black as their skins are white. This
is of course exaggerated; but it is not too much to assert that
pride, pugnacity, a peculiar point of honor, and a vindictiveness of
wonderful force and patience, are the only characteristic traits of
Arab character which the citizens of El Medina habitually display.”
Intoxicating liquors are made at Medina and sold, although not openly.
There are two colleges with “libraries” at Medina and many
mosque-schools. In Burckhardt’s day he charged the town with utter
ignorance and illiteracy, but now they devote themselves apparently to
literature, at least in a measure.
The climate of Medina is better than that of Mecca and the winters are
cold and rigorous. Mohammed is reputed to have said, “he who patiently
endures the cold of El Medina and the heat of Mecca, merits a reward in
paradise.”
Returning from the lesser pilgrimage to Medina the traveller can
retrace his steps to Mecca, and thence to Jiddah, or go to the
nearer port of Yanbo (Yembo) and thence return home by steamer or
sailing-vessel. The distance by camels’ route, between Medina and the
port is 132 miles, six stages, although a good dromedary can make it
in two days. At Yanbo the sultan’s dominions in Arabia begin, for
the coast northward pertains to Egypt. The town resembles Jiddah in
outward appearance, has 400 or 500 houses built of white coral rock,
dirty streets and a precarious water supply. Sadlier, (1820) after his
journey across the peninsula, visited Yanbo, and describes it as “a
miserable Arab seaport surrounded by a wall”; Yanbo has, however, a
good harbor, and was in earlier days, a large and important place; it
has been identified with Iambia village on Ptolemy’s map a harbor of
the old Nabateans.
Thus ends our pilgrimage through the Holy Land of Arabia. Let us in
conclusion ponder the words of Stanley Lane Poole as to the place which
Mecca and the pilgrimage holds in the Mohammedan religion. “It is asked
how the destroyer of idols could have reconciled his conscience to the
circuits of the Kaaba and the veneration of the Black-Stone covered
with adoring kisses. The rites of the pilgrimage cannot certainly be
defended against the charge of superstition; but it is easy to see
why Mohammed enjoined them.... He well knew the consolidating effect
of forming a centre to which his followers should gather, and hence
he reasserted the sanctity of the Black-Stone that ‘came down from
heaven’; he ordained that everywhere throughout the world the Moslem
should pray looking toward the Kaaba, and enjoined him to make the
pilgrimage thither. Mecca is to the Moslem what Jerusalem is to the
Jew. It bears with it all the influence of centuries of associations.
It carries the Moslem back to the cradle of his faith and the childhood
of his prophet.... And, most of all, it bids him remember that all his
brother Moslems are worshipping toward the same sacred spot; that he is
one of a great company of believers united by one faith, filled with
the same hopes, reverencing the same thing, worshipping the same God.”
V
ADEN AND AN INLAND JOURNEY
“Aden is a valley surrounded by the sea; its climate is so bad that it
turns wine into vinegar in the space of ten days. The water is derived
from cisterns and is also brought in by an aqueduct two farsongs long.”
—_Ibn-el-Mojawir._ (A.D. 1200)
Arabia is unfortunate because, like a chestnut-burr, its exterior is
rough and uninviting. In scenery and climate, Yemen fares worst of all
the provinces. The two gateways to Arabia Felix are very _infelix_.
What could be more dreary and dull and depressing than the “gloomy
hills of darkness” that form the background to Aden as seen from the
harbor? There is no verdure, no vegetation visible; everywhere there
is the same appearance of a cinder heap. And where can one find a more
filthy, hot, sweltering, odorous native town than Hodeidah? Yet these
two places are the gateways to the most beautiful, fertile, populous
and healthful region of all Arabia.
Yemen is best known of all the provinces, and has been quite thoroughly
explored by a score of intrepid travellers.[20] Most people, however,
travelling in a P. and O. Steamer, calling at Aden for coal, remain in
total ignorance of the fair highlands just beyond the dark hills that
hide the horizon Yemen extends from Aden to Asir on the north and
eastward into Hadramaut for an indefinite distance. On the earlier maps
Arabia Felix stretched as far as Oman—a great mountainous region with a
temperate climate. An Arabian author, describing Yemen as it was before
the time of Mohammed, wrote: “Its inhabitants are all hale and strong,
sickness is unknown, nor are there poisonous plants or animals; nor
fools, nor blind people, and the women are ever young; the climate is
like paradise and one wears the same garment summer and winter.”
The massive rock promontory of volcanic basalt called Aden, has from
time immemorial been the gateway and the stronghold for all Yemen. It
is generally agreed that Ezekiel, the prophet, referred to Aden when he
wrote. “Haran and Canneh and _Eden_, the merchants of Sheba, Asshur and
Chilmad, were thy merchants.” The place was fortified and its wonderful
rock cisterns were probably first constructed by the early Himyarites.
A Christian church was erected at Aden by the embassy of the Emperor
Constantius, A.D. 342, and Aden was for a long time in the hands of
the Christian kings of Yemen. Then it fell a prey to the Abyssinians
and next to the Persians, about the time when Mohammed was born.
Albuquerque in 1513 with his Portuguese warriors laid siege to Aden for
four days, but in spite of scaling-ladders and gunpowder could not take
the town. The Mameluke Sultans of Egypt also failed to capture this
fortress. In 1838 the English took it by storm and have held the place
ever since.
Aden is now a British settlement, a commercial-centre, a
coaling-station and a fortress; the last most emphatically. All the
latest improvements in engineering and artillery have been put to use
in fortifying the place. The ride from Steamer-Point to “the crater”
or from the telegraph-station to the “Crescent” gives one some idea of
the vast amount of money and labor expended to shape this Gibraltar
and make it impregnable from land and sea. The isthmus is guarded by
massive lines of defence, strengthened by a broad ditch cut out of the
solid rock; bastions, casements and tunnels all serve one purpose;
batteries, towers, arsenals, magazines, barracks; mole-batteries
toward the sea, mines in the harbor, obstruction piers and subservient
works;—everything tells of military strength, and the town has always a
warlike aspect in perfect accord with its forbidding physical geography.
The inhabited peninsula is an irregular oval about fifteen miles in
circumference; it is in reality a large extinct crater formed of lofty
precipitous hills the highest peak of which, Shem Shem, has an altitude
of nearly 1,800 feet. The varieties of rock are numerous, and vary
in color from light brown to dark green. Pumice and tufas are very
common, the former is an article of export. Water is very scarce, and
there is almost no rainfall during some years. When there is a shower,
the nature of the soil and the immense watershed for so small an area
cause heavy torrents to pour down the valleys. These rare occasions are
utilized to fill the huge tanks near Aden camp. The tanks were built
as early as 600 A.D. by the Yemenites who built besides the celebrated
dam at Marib, and the many similar structures in various parts of
Yemen. Water is also brought by an aqueduct from Sheikh Othman, seven
miles distant, but the majority of the population is supplied from
the government condensers. In spite of the desert character of the
soil and the aridity of the climate Aden is not entirely without
natural vegetation. Thomas Anderson of the Bengal Medical Service
enumerates ninety-four species of plants found on the Aden peninsula,
some of which are entirely unique. Most of the plants, however, are
desert-dwellers with sharp thorns, an aromatic odor, and yield gums and
resins.