His wife and a few other immediate relatives were the prophet’s first
disciples, and these did not increase very rapidly. The people of Mecca
denounced him as a madman or an impostor, and in a little time he was
forced to flee from Mecca to save his life. He betook himself, with his
disciples, to what is now Medina. The date of this flight, or _Hegira_,
as the Arabians call it,--July 15, 622 A.D.,--has been adopted ever
since as the chronological era in Mohammedan countries. At Medina he was
received with open arms,--his doctrines having already made a number of
converts in that place; and here he built his first mosque.