Into This Persons Are Apt To Gaze.
A Small Distance From It, On The Left-Hand, Is A Well, Which They Call
Beer El Zem Zem, The Water Whereof They Call Holy Water ; And As
Superstitiously Esteem It As The Papists Do Theirs.
In the month of
Ramadan they will be sure to break their fast with it.
They report that
it is as sweet as milk; but for my part I could perceive no other taste
in it than in common water, except that it was somewhat brackish. The
Hagges, when they come first to Mecca, drink of it unreasonably; by
which means they are not only much purged, but their flesh breaks out
all in pimples; and this they call the purging of their spiritual
corruptions. There are hundreds of pitchers belonging to the temple,
which in the month of Ramadan are filled with the said water and placed
all along before the people (with cups to drink) as they are kneeling
and waiting for Acsham-nomas, or evening service; and as soon as the
Mezzins or clerks on the tops of the minarets began their bawling to
call them to nomas, they fall a drinking thereof before they begin
their devotions. This Beer or well of Zem Zem is in the midst of one of
the little rooms before mentioned, at each square of the Beat, distant
about twelve or fourteen paces from it, out of which four men are
employed to draw water, without any pay or reward, for any that shall
desire it.
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