All The Way As They Retreat They Continue
Petitioning, Holding Up Their Hands, With Their Eyes Fixed Upon The
Beat, Till They Are Out Of Sight Of It; And So Go To Their Lodgings
Weeping.
“Ere I leave Mecca, I shall acquaint you with a passage of a Turk to me
in the temple cloyster, in the night time, between Acsham-nomas, and
Gega-nomas, i.e., between the evening and the night services.
The
Hagges do usually spend that time, or good part of it (which is about
an hour and half), at Towoaf, and then sit down on the mats and rest
themselves. This I did, and after I had sat a while, and for my more
ease at last was lying on my back, with my feet towards the Beat, but
at a distance as many others did, a Turk which sat by me, asked me what
countryman I was; ‘A Mogrebee’ (said I), i.e. one of the West. ‘Pray,’ quoth
he, ‘how far west did you come?’ I told him from Gazair, i.e. Algier. ‘Ah!’
replied he, ‘have you taken so much
[p.380] pains, and been at so much cost, and now be guilty of this
irreverent posture before the Beat Allah?’
“Here are many Moors, who get a beggarly livelihood by selling models of
the temple unto strangers, and in being serviceable to the Pilgrims.
Here are also several Effendies, or masters of learning, who daily
expound out of the Alcoran, sitting in high chairs, and some of the
learned Pilgrims, whilst they are here, do undertake the same.
“Under the room of the Hanifees (which I mentioned before), people do
usually gather together (between the hours of devotion), and sitting
round cross-legged, it may be, twenty or thirty of them, they have a
very large pair of Tessbeehs, or beads, each bead near as big as a man’s
fist, which they keep passing round, bead after bead, one to the other,
all the time, using some devout expressions. I myself was once got in
amongst them, and methought it was a pretty play enough for
children,—however, I was to appearance very devout.
“There are likewise some dervises that get money here, as well as at
other places, by burning of incense, swinging their censers as they go
along before the people that are sitting; as this they do commonly on
Friday, their Sabbath. In all other Gamiler or Mosques, when the Hattib
is preaching, and the people all sitting still at their devotion, they
are all in ranks, so that the dervise, without the least disturbance to
any, walks between every rank, with his censer in one hand, and with
the other takes his powdered incense out of a little pouch that hangs
by his side.[FN#41]
“But though this place, Mecca, is esteemed so very holy, yet it comes
short of none for lewdness and debauchery. As for uncleanness, it is
equal to Grand Cairo; and they will steal even in the temple itself.
[p.381] “CHAPTER VIII.— Of the Pilgrims’ return from Mecca: their visit made
at Medina to Mahomet’s tomb there.
“Having thus given you an account of the Turks’ pilgrimage to Mecca, and of
their worship there (the manner and circumstances of which I have
faithfully and punctually related, and may challenge the world to
convict me of a known falsehood), I now come to take leave of the
temple and town of Mecca.
“Having hired camels of the carriers, we set out, but we give as much
for the hire of one from Mecca to Egypt, which is about forty days’
journey, as the real worth of it is, (viz.) about five or six pounds
sterling. If it happen that the camel dies by the way, the carrier is
to supply us with another; and therefore, those carriers[FN#42] who
come from Egypt to Mecca with the Caravan, bring with them several
spare camels; for there is hardly a night passeth but many die upon the
road, for if a camel should chance to fall, it is seldom known that it
is able to rise again; and if it should, they despair of its being
capable of performing the journey, or ever being useful more. It is a
common thing, therefore, when a camel once falls, to take off its
burden and put it on another, and then kill it; which the poorer sort
of the company eat. I myself have eaten of camel’s flesh, and it is very
sweet and nourishing. If a camel tires, they even leave him upon the
place.
“The first day we set out from Mecca, it was without any order at all,
all hurly burly; but the next day every one laboured to get forward;
and in order to it, there was many time much quarrelling and fighting.
But after every one had taken his place in the Caravan, they orderly
and peaceably kept the same place till they came to Grand Cairo. They
travel four camels in a breast,
[p.382] which are all tied one after the other, like as in
teams.[FN#43] The whole body is called a Caravan, which is divided into
several cottors, or companies, each of which hath its name, and
consists, it may be, of several thousand camels; and they move one
cottor after another, like distinct troops. In the head of each cottor
is some great gentleman or officer, who is carried in a thing like a
horse-litter, borne by two camels, one before and the other behind,
which is covered all over with sear-cloth, and over that again with
green broad cloth, and set forth very handsomely. If the said great
person hath a wife with him, she is carried in another of the
same.[FN#44] In the head of every cottor there goes, likewise, a
sumpter camel which carries his treasures, &c. This camel hath two
bells, about the bigness of our market-bells, having one on each side,
the sound of which may be heard a great way off.
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