Chapter III: Appendix: I—chronological Table 409 (2)

“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.

]

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.

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.

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.

The Aden settlement has four centres of population; Steamer-Point, the Crescent, the town of Maala and the “Camp” or Aden proper. A road, the only road in fact, extends from Steamer-Point on the west to Aden proper on the east, and no one can boast of having seen Aden who has not taken the ride in a _geri_ from the landing-pier to the tanks. The Aden horses are of all creatures most miserable for the geri-drivers whip their horses much, but feed them little. The Crescent is a semi-circular range of houses and shops crowded against the mountain side; with a Hotel de l’Univers and a Hotel de l’Europe (both equally “Grand”); cafés, shops, banks, and offices. The post office, hospital, churches and barracks are further west toward the telegraph-station. A drive of about two miles brings us to the native town of Maala. Here the road forks, the lower one leading to the barrier-gate and Sheikh Othman, and the upper ascending the mountain through the gate of the fortifications and by a sharp declivity leading down to the town of Aden. It is not an Oriental town in its administration, but it has all the motley character of Port Said on its streets. Europeans, Americans, Africans, Asiatics and mixed races are all represented in the crowd of the market or the loungers in the streets. The total population is 30,000, including Chinese, Persians, Turks, Egyptians, Somalis, Hindus, Parsees, Jews and Arabs from every part of the peninsula. Aden is a great centre for native shipping, and the dhows and buggalows that sail every year from the Persian Gulf to Yemen and Jiddah alway call at Aden _en route_. Also from Oman and Hadramaut the modern Sinbads run their craft into Aden to exchange produce or to lay in supplies for their voyages to the coast of Africa.

The distance from Aden to Yemen’s old capital, Sana is nearly 200 miles in a direct line, but on my second journey thither, in 1894, I was obliged to take a roundabout journey to Taiz, because of an Arab uprising. This and the mountainous character of the country made the distance over 250 miles. This route passes through, or near, all the important towns of Yemen south of Sana.

With my Bedouin companion, Nasir, I left Sheikh Othman early on the second morning of July. We reached a small

village, Wahat, at noon, the thermometer registering 96° in the shade. After a short rest we mounted the camels at seven o’clock in the evening for an all-night journey. Our course was through a barren region, and at daylight we entered Wady Mergia, with scanty vegetation, resting at a village of the same name under a huge acacia tree. The next day we entered the mountains, where rich vegetation showed a cooler climate. We passed several villages, Dar El Kadim, Khoteibah, Suk-el-Juma and others. As this was said to be a dangerous part of the road all the caravan, which we joined at Wahat, was on the lookout, with lighted rope-wicks for their flint-locks swinging from their shoulders and looking in the dark like so many fireflies. At three A.M. we had ascended to the head of the wady and rested for the day at Mabek. All the houses here are of stone, the booths of date-mats and twigs being only found on the maritime plain of Yemen. During the night there had been talk among the wild Arabs of the village of holding me as a hostage to obtain money from the English at Aden! But Nasir quieted them with a threefold Bedouin oath that I was not a government official nor an Englishman, but an American traveller.

The day after leaving Mabek brought us to the beginning of the happy valleys of Yemen, very different from the torrid coast. A country where the orange, lemon, quince, grape, mango, plum, apricot, peach, apple, pomegranate, fig, date, plantain and mulberry, each yield their fruit in season; where wheat, barley, maize, millet and coffee are staple products and where there is a glorious profusion of wild flowers—called “grass” by the unpoetic camel-drivers. A land whose mountains lift up their heads over 9,000 feet, terraced from chilly top to warm valley with agricultural amphitheatres, irrigated by a thousand rills and rivulets, some of them perennial, flowing along artificial channels or leaping down the rocks in miniature falls. A land where the oriole hangs her nest on the dark acacia, the wild doves hide in clefts of the rock and the chameleon sports his colors by the wayside under the tall flowering cactus. Such is Yemen. The vegetation of Arabia Felix begins just before reaching Mufallis, on this route, where a Turkish castle and custom-house proclaim the boundary of Ottoman aggression.

Beautiful was the air and scenery on our march. Arab peasants were at work in the fields, plowing[21] with oxen, repairing the walls of the terraces and opening the watercourses. The women were all unveiled and had the picturesque costume universal in southern Yemen; their narrow trousers were fastened at the waist and ankles, while over their shoulders hung long mantle-like garments, low in the neck, girded, and fringed at the bottom with embroidered cloth of green or red. Here they wear a kind of light turban, but on the Hodeidah coast broad-brimmed straw hats cover the heads of the Yemen belles as they urge their donkeys to market.

At sunrise we were in sight of the highest peaks to the left of the wady-bed. One of them is crowned by a _walli_ or saint’s tomb of Saled bin Taka. These tombs are common in Yemen and thousands of people visit them annually to ask intercession, each saint having a special day in the Moslem calendar. At Mocha the grave of the Arab sheikh Abu-el-Hassan Shadeli, who first discovered the use of coffee, is highly honored by distant pilgrims.

At eight o’clock on the morning of July fourth we reached the _burj_ called Mufallis and had our first experience of Turkish rule in Yemen. Unexpectedly we here stumbled upon a Turkish custom-house, which I had thought was located at Taiz, as the boundary of Turkish Yemen on my maps did not extend further south. An unmannerly negro, calling himself Mudeer of Customs, looked out of a port-hole and demanded my ascent. Through dirt and up darkness I reached his little room and stated my errand and purpose. No kind words or offered backsheesh would avail; “_all_ the baggage must be opened and _all_ books were forbidden entrance into Yemen by a recent order,” so he affirmed. First, therefore, I unscrewed the covers of the two boxes with an old bowie-knife. The books, after having been critically examined by eyes that could not read, were seized; next my saddle-bags were searched, and every book and map was also confiscated. I was refused even a receipt for the books taken, and to every plea or question the only reply was, to go on to Taiz and appeal to the Governor.

Despoiled of our goods, we left the “custom-house” at eleven A.M., taking an old man on a donkey armed with a spear, as guide and defence, because Nasir heard that there was disturbance in this quarter. At two o’clock we rested for half an hour under the shade of a huge rock in the bed of the wady, and then warned by peals of thunder, we hastened on, hoping to reach Hirwa before dark. In less than an hour, however, the sky was black, rain fell in torrents, and we found it hopeless to attempt to urge the slow camels on through the wady. There was no shelter in sight, so we crouched under a small tree halfway up the mud bank. The rain turned to hail—large stones that frightened the camels so that they stampeded—and we became thoroughly chilled.

When the storm ceased, our donkey man came with looks of horror to tell us that his poor beast had fallen down the slope and was being swept away by the torrent! What had been a dry river bed half an hour before, was now a rushing rapids. We decided to climb up the terraces to a house which we saw on the mountain side. The camels had preceded us, and after a vigorous climb over mud-fields and up the rocks we reached the house and hospitality of Sheikh Ali. Over the charcoal fire, after drinking plenty of _kishr_, (made from the _shell_ of the coffee bean,) we had to listen to a long discussion concerning the lost donkey. Finally, matters were smoothed over by my offering to pay one-half the price of the animal on condition that our guide should proceed with us to _Hirwa_.

The next day we were off early. Because of the steep ascents I was obliged to walk most of the way, and I sprained my ankle severely. It did not pain me until night, when it was swollen and kept me “on crutches” for several days. _Hirwa_ is a small Arab village with a weekly market, and we found shelter in the usual coffee-shop characteristic of Yemen. The following day we reached _Sept Ez zeilah_, where we found cleaner quarters than the night before. At about midnight a war party of Bedouins came and frightened the peaceful villagers with demands for food, etc. They had just returned from setting fire to a small castle, and, numbering sixty hungry men, were not to be intimidated. They were about to force their way into our quarters when Nasir and the women promised to give them food. Within, I kept quiet and listened to the noise of grinding and baking and coffee-pounding. Without, some of the Arabs seized a cow belonging to a poor woman and butchered it for their feast. At this there was a crying of women and barking of dogs and swearing of oaths by the Great Allah, such as I hope never to hear again. Finally, the Arabs went away with full stomachs, and we slept a broken sleep for fear they might return. The next day we proceeded to Taiz, and arrived at noon, one week after leaving Aden.

The Mutasarrif Pasha, or Governor, was satisfied with my passports, and expressed his regrets that the books had been seized at Mufallis, but such was the law. He would, however, allow me to send for them for inspection. What is written here in four lines was the work and patience of four weary days! A soldier was sent to Mufallis; I was obliged to entrust him with money to pay the custom dues; to hire a camel to carry the books; finally to pay for two sticks of sealing wax (price in Taiz one rupee) with which to seal the books and maps lest they be tampered with—all this at the order of the enlightened government of the Sublime Porte! The first messenger never reached Mufallis; on the road he was attacked by Arabs, stabbed in the neck, robbed of his rifle, and carried back to the military hospital at Taiz. Then there was more delay to find and send a second soldier with the same camel and money and sealing wax, but with a new rifle. He returned with the books safely after five days! No Turk could set a value on a book, and so the law is that books are taxed by weight, boxes included. The customs receipt was attached for “200 kilograms Jewish books (at twenty piastres a kilo), value, 4,000 piastres, and custom dues amounting to 288 piastres.” In the same document I was spoken of as “the Jew, Ishmail, Dhaif Ullah,”—a rather curious combination of names. I was called a “Jew” because of the case of Hebrew New Testaments; Ishmail was the equivalent for Samuel; and Dhaif Ullah, my Arabic cognomen.

VI

YEMEN: THE SWITZERLAND OF ARABIA

“If the Turks would clear out of Yemen, a wonderful field for commerce would be thrown open, for the Turkish government is vile and all cultivators are taxed to an iniquitous extent.”—_Ion Keith Falconer._

While waiting at Taiz I had an opportunity to study Yemen town life and the system of government, as well as to learn a little about the cultivation of coffee and kaat, the two chief products of this part of Yemen.

Taiz has not often been visited by travellers from the occident, and is a most interesting place. It is a large fortified village of perhaps 5,000 inhabitants, the residence of a Mutasarrif whose authority extends from the province of Hodeidah to the Aden frontier including Mocha and Sheikh Seyyid on the coast, recently abandoned by France. The place has five gates, one of which has been walled up, and five large mosques in Byzantine style. The largest Mosque is called El Muzafer, and has two large minarets and twelve beautiful domes. Taiz was once a centre of learning and its libraries were celebrated all over Arabia. Firozabadi, the Noah Webster of the Arabic language, taught in Taiz and edited his “Ocean” dictionary there. He died at the neighboring town of Zebid, in 1414 A.D., and his grave is honored by the learned of Yemen.

The bazaar is not large, but the four European shops kept by Greek merchants are well supplied with all ordinary articles of civilization. One public bath, in splendid condition, and a military hospital show Ottoman occupation. The fort holds perhaps 1,300 soldiers and the residence of the Mutasarrif is in a beautiful and comfortable little building outside of the town. The mosques were once grand but are now ruined and a home for bats; the famous libraries have disappeared and the subterannean vaults of the largest Mosque formerly used as porticoes for pupils are now Turkish horse-stables. There is a post office and telegraph; the post goes once a week to Hodeidah via Zebid and Beit el Fakih, and the telegraph in the same direction a little more rapidly when the wires are in order.

Taiz is girt around by Jebel Sobr, the highest range of mountains in southern Yemen. Hisn Aroos peak, near the town, has an elevation of over 7,000 feet. According to Niebuhr and Defler, on a clear day one can look from the summit of this peak across the lowlands and the Red Sea into Africa. I was unable to reach the summit as my Arab guide failed me and the days were misty and frequent rains fell.

Taiz is the centre of kaat-culture for all Yemen, and coffee comes here on its way to Hodeidah or Aden. Amid all the wealth of vegetation and fruitage every plant seems familiar to the tourist save kaat. It is a shrub whose very name is unknown outside of Yemen, while there it is known and used by every mother’s son, as well as by the mothers and daughters themselves. Driving from Aden to Sheikh Othman, one first learns the _name_. Why are those red flags hoisted near the police stations, at intervals on the road, and why are they hauled down as soon as those camels pass? Oh, they are taking loads of kaat for the Aden market, and the flags are to prevent cheating of the customs. Over 2,000 camel loads come into Aden every year, and each load passes through English territory by “block-signal” system, for it is highly taxed. As to its _use_, step into a kahwah in any part of Yemen shortly before sunset, and you will see Arabs each with a bundle of green twigs in his lap, chewing at the leaves of kaat.

At Taiz I first had an opportunity to meet the Jews of the interior of Yemen. Altogether they number perhaps 60,000 in the whole province. They live mostly in the large towns and very few are agriculturists. They are a despised and down-trodden race, but they say at Sana, that their condition is not so bad under the Turks as it was under the Arab rulers before 1871. The accounts of their origin are discrepant. Some say they are descended from the Jews of the Dispersion, but others hold that they were immigrants from the North over 900 years ago. They are more cleanly, more intelligent and more trustworthy than the Arabs; and although they are out of all communication with the rest of the world and in ignorance of their European countrymen they are not ignorant of Hebrew and rabbinic learning. Their synagogue near Taiz is a low stone building, twenty-five by fifteen feet. For furniture it has only a few curtains of embroidered texts, a printed diagram of the ancient candlestick, with the names of the twelve tribes, and a high reading-desk. Such are all the synagogues of Yemen.

At Taiz the Jews seemed to have grown content under long centuries of oppression and taxation. Many of the old Moslem laws against infidels, such as those forbidding them to _ride_, to carry weapons or wear fine clothes in public, are still rigorously enforced by custom if not by the government. The Jew is universally despised, yet he cannot be spared, for nearly all artisan work is in Jewish hands. The Moslem Arab has learned nothing from the Jew outside of the Koran; but, alas! the Jew has imbibed many foolish customs and superstitions foreign to his creed from Islam.

When the Hebrew Scriptures reached Taiz I was again disappointed, for the Governor would not permit the boxes to be opened, but they were to be sent sealed and under guard to Sana. I afterward learned that the “guard” was for me as well as the books, and that the soldier carried a letter with this accusation written: “This is a converted Jew, who is corrupting the religion of Islam, and sells books to Moslems and Jews.” I had no alternative but to proceed to Sana; taking a Damar Arab as servant, having dismissed the Aden camels.

I left Taiz on a mule July 26th, and arrived at Seyanee the same day. The following night we reached Ibb. Here I was forced to lodge outside of the town, as the guard had instructions not to let me “see things.” I endured this impatiently, until I learned that our servant had been imprisoned on our arrival because he told me the names of the villages on the route! I then appealed to the Mayor, and on virtue of my passports demanded the right of going about the town and the release of my servant. After some delay, both requests were granted. The incident is one of many to show the suspicion with which a stranger is regarded by the authorities in Yemen. On Saturday the soldier and I hastened on to reach the large town of Yerim before Sunday, and rest there, waiting for the baggage camel. It was a long ride of twelve hours, but through a delightful country everywhere fertile and terraced with coffee plantations and groves of kaat.

Yerim, with perhaps 300 houses, lies in a hollow of the Sumara range of mountains. It has a fortress and some houses of imposing appearance, but the general aspect of the town is miserable. A neighboring marsh breeds malaria, and the place is proverbially unhealthy in this otherwise salubrious region. Niebuhr’s botanist, Forskal, died here on their journey in 1763. The road from Ibb to Yerim has perhaps the finest scenery of any part of Yemen; never have I seen more picturesque mountains and valleys, green with verdure and bright with blossoms. Scabiosa, bluebells, forget-me-nots, golden-rod, four-o’clocks and large oleander-trees—

“All earth was full of heaven
And every bush afire with God.”

The cacti-plants were in full bloom, and measured twenty feet against the mountain passes. Two thousand feet below one could hear the sound of the water rushing along the wady-bed or disappearing under the bridges that span the valleys. While high above, the clouds were half concealing the summit of the “Gazelle Neck” (Unk el-Gazel).

Sunday, July 29th, was a cold day at Yerim; early in the morning the temperature went down to 52°, and at night two blankets were needed. Not until nine o’clock was it warm enough for the Yerim merchants to open their shops.

A Jewish family, en route for Taiz, were stopping with us at the caravansari, and at night I spoke for over two hours with them and the Arabs about Christ. There was no interruption, and I was impressed to see the interest of a Jew and Arab alike in what I told them from Isaiah liii., reading it in Arabic by the dim candle light, amidst all the baggage and beasts of an Oriental inn. At the little village of Khader, eight miles from Waalan, angry words arose from the “guard” because I tried to speak to a Jew. When I spoke in protest they began to strike the Jew with the butt end of their rifles,[22] and when the poor fellow fled, my best defence was silence. On my return journey, I inadvertently raised trouble again, by mentioning that Jesus Christ and Moses were _Jews_—which the Arabs considered an insult to the prophets of God.

On the road beyond Yerim we passed a large boulder with an irregular impression on one side. This is called Ali’s footprint, and the Arabs who pass always anoint it with oil. The steep ascents and descents of the journey were now behind us. From Yerim on to Sana the plateau is more level. Wide fields of lentils, barley and wheat take the place of the groves of kaat and coffee; camels were used for ploughing, and with their long necks and curious harness, were an odd sight.

The next halt we made was at Damar, 8,000 feet above sea-level. It is a large town, with three minaret-mosques and a large bazaar; the houses are of native rock, three and four-stories high, remarkably clean and well-built. Inside they are whitewashed, and have the Yemen translucent slabs of gypsum for window-panes. From Damar the road leads northeast over Maaber and the Kariet en-Nekil pass to Waalan; thence, nearly due north, to Sana. From Damar to Waalan is thirty-five miles, and thence to the capital, eighteen miles more. The roads near the city of Sana are kept in good repair, although there are no wheeled vehicles, for the sake of the Turkish artillery.

On Thursday, August 2d, we entered Sana by the Yemen gate. Three years before I had entered the city from the other side, coming from Hodeidah; then in the time of the Arab rebellion and now myself a prisoner. I was taken to the Dowla and handed over to the care of a policeman until the Wali heard my case. After finding an old Greek friend from Aden, who offered to go bail for me, I was allowed liberty, and for nineteen days was busy seeing the city and visiting the Jews.[23]

Sana, anciently called Uzal, and since many centuries the chief city of Yemen, contains some 50,000 inhabitants and lies stretched out in a wide, level valley between Jebel Nokoom and the neighboring ranges. It is 7,648 feet above sea-level. The town is in the form of a triangle, the eastern point consisting of a large fortress, dominating the town, and built upon the lowest spur of Nokoom. The town is divided into three walled quarters, the whole being surrounded by one continuous wall of stone and brick. They are respectively the city proper, in which are the government buildings, the huge bazaars, and the residences of the Arabs and Turks; the Jews’ quarter; and Bir-el-azib, which lies between the two, and contains gardens and villas belonging to the richer Turks and Arabs. The city had once great wealth and prosperity, and to-day remains, next to Bagdad, the most flourishing city in all Arabia. The shops are well supplied with European goods, and a large manufacture of silk, jewelry and arms is carried on. The government quarter, with its cafés, billiard-rooms, large Greek shops, carriages, bootblacks, and brass-band reminds one of Cairo. Sana has forty-eight mosques, thirty-nine synagogues, twelve large public-baths, a military hospital with 200 beds, and is the centre of trade for all northern Yemen and northwestern Hadramaut, as well as for the distant villages of Nejran and fertile Wady Dauasir. Arabs from every district crowd the bazaars, and long strings of camels leave every day for the Hodeidah coast.

On August 14th I took an early morning walk to Rhoda, a village about eight miles north of Sana, and in the midst of beautiful gardens. From Roda the direct caravan route leads to Nejran, and from the outskirts of the village, looking north, an inviting picture met the eye. A fertile plateau stretched out to the horizon, and only two days’ journey would bring one into the free desert beyond Turkish rule. But this time the way across the peninsula was closed by my bankruptcy; robbed at Yerim in the coffee-shop, and already in debt at Sana, it would have been impossible to proceed, except as a dishonest dervish.

On the 21st of August I left Sana for Hodeidah, receiving a loan of twenty dollars from the Ottoman government, to be paid back at the American consulate. We followed the regular postal route, the same which I had travelled on my first journey.

The plateau or table-land between Sana’a and Banàn is a pasture country. The Bedouins live in the stone-built villages and herd their immense flocks on the plain; camels, cows and sheep were grazing by the hundreds and thousands. After Banàn begins the difficult descent to the coast down breakneck mountain _stairways_ rather than roadways, over broken bridges, and through natural arches. Fertile, cultivated mountain slopes were on every side, reminding one of the valleys of Switzerland. In one district near Suk-el-Khamis the whole mountain-side for a height of 6,000 feet was terraced from top to bottom. General Haig wrote of these terraces: “One can hardly realize the enormous amount of labor, toil and perseverance which these represent. The terraced walls are usually from five to eight feet in height, but toward the top of the mountain they are sometimes as much as fifteen or eighteen feet. They are built entirely of rough stone, laid without mortar. I reckon on an average that each wall retains a terrace not more than twice its own height in width, and I do not think I saw a single breach in one of them unrepaired.”[24]

In Yemen there are two rainy seasons, in spring and in autumn, so that there is generally an abundance of water in the numerous reservoirs stored for irrigation. Yet, despite the extraordinary fertility of the soil and the surprising industry of the inhabitants, the bulk of the people are miserably poor, ill-fed and rudely clothed, because they are crushed down by a heartless system of taxation. Every agricultural product, implement and process is under the heavy hand of an oppressive administration and a military occupation that knows no law. The peasantry are robbed by the soldiers on their way to market, by the custom-collector at the gate of each city, and by the tax-gatherer in addition. On the way to Sana my soldier-companion stopped a poor peasant who was urging on a little donkey loaded with two large baskets of grapes; he emptied the best of the grapes into his saddle-bags, and then beat the man and cursed him because some of the grapes were unripe! No wonder we read of rebellions in Yemen, and no wonder that intense hatred lives in every Arab against the very name of Turk.

From Suk-el-Khamis, a dirty mountain village,[25] with an elevation of over 9,500 feet, the road leads by Mefak and Wady Zaun to the peculiarly located village of Menakha. At an altitude of 7,600 feet above sea-level, it is perched on a narrow ridge between two mountain ranges. On either side of the one street that forms the backbone of the summit are precipices 2,000 feet deep. So narrow is the town that there are places where one can stand and gaze down both sides of the abyss at the same time. To reach it from the west there is only one path zigzagging up the mountain-side, and from the east it can only be approached by a narrow track cut in the face of the precipice and winding up for an ascent of 2,500 feet. Menakha is the centre of the coffee trade; it has a population of 10,000 or more, one-third of which are Jews. There are four Greek merchants, the Turks had 2,000 troops garrisoned in the town, and the bazaars were equal to those of Taiz. Its exact elevation is given by Defler, after eighteen observations, as 7,616 feet above sea-level.

From Menakha to the coast is only two long days’ journey; three by camel. The first stage is to Hejjeila, at the foot of the high ranges, thence to Bajil, a village of 2,000 people, and along the barren, hot plain to Hodeidah. At Bajil the people are nearly all shepherds, and the main industry is dyeing cloth and weaving straw. Here one sees the curious Yemen straw hats worn by the women, and here also the peasant-maidens wear no veils. Yet they are of purer heart and life than the black-clouted and covered women of the Turkish towns.

Hodeidah by the sea is very like Jiddah in its general appearance. The streets are narrow, crooked and indescribably filthy. The “Casino” is a sort of Greek hotel for strangers, and the finest house in the city is that of Sidi Aaron, near the sea, with its fine front and marble courtyard. The population is of a very mixed character; east of the city in a separate quarter live the _Akhdam_ Arabs, whose origin is uncertain, but who are considered outcasts by all the other Arabs. They are not allowed to carry arms and no Arab tribe intermarries with them.

From Hodeidah there is a regular line of small steamers to Aden, and the Egyptian Red Sea coasting steamers also call here fortnightly. The trade of Hodeidah was once flourishing, but here too Turkish misrule has brought deadness and dullness into business, and taxation has crushed industrial enterprise.

VII

THE UNEXPLORED REGIONS OF HADRAMAUT

“As when to them who sail
Beyond the Cape of Hope, and now are past
Mozambic, off at sea northeast winds blow
Sabean odors from the spicy shore
Of Araby the blest.”—_Milton._

We must take at least a glimpse of the almost unknown region called Hadramaut.[26] This is a strip of territory stretching between the great desert and the sea from Aden eastward to Oman. Our knowledge of the interior of this region was almost a perfect blank until some light was thrown on it by the enterprising traveller A. Von Wrede in 1843. The coast is comparatively well known, at least as far as Makalla and Shehr. The land rises from the coast in a series of terraces to Jebel Hamra (5,284 feet), which is connected on the northeast with Jebel Dahura, over 8,000 feet high.

Adolph Von Wrede sailed from Aden to Makalla and thence penetrated inland as far as Wady Doan the most fertile spot of all South Arabia. This wady flows northward through the land of the Bni Yssa and the district is bordered on the west by Belad-el-Hasan and on the east by Belad-el-Hamum. But how far this region extends northward and whether the sandy desert of El Ahkaf (quicksands) really begins with the Wady Rakhia, a branch of the Doan are points on which Von Wrede throws no light and which are still uncertain. In 1870 the French Jew, Joseph Halévy, made a bold attempt to penetrate into Hadramaut from Yemen. Since then little was added to our knowledge of Hadramaut until 1893 when Shibam, the residence of the most powerful Sultan of Hadramaut was visited by Theodore Bent and his wife. In 1897 they made a second journey into the same region which cost Mr. Bent his health and afterward his life. From the account of these journeys we quote a few paragraphs which set forth clearly the interesting character of this almost unknown country.[27]

“Immediately behind Makalla rise grim arid mountains of a reddish hue, and the town is plastered against this rich-tinged background. By the shore, like a lighthouse, stands the white minaret of the Mosque, the walls and pinnacles of which are covered with dense masses of seabirds and pigeons; not far from this the huge palace where the Sultan dwells reminds one of a whitewashed mill with a lace-like parapet; white, red and brown are the dominant colors of the town, and in the harbor the Arab dhows with fantastic sterns rock to and fro in the unsteady sea, forming altogether a picturesque and unusual scene.

“Nominally Makalla is ruled over by a Sultan of the Al Kaiti family, whose connection with India has made them very English in their sympathies, and his Majesty’s general appearance, with his velvet coat and jewelled daggers, is far more Indian than Arabian. Really the most influential people in the town are the money-grubbing Parsees from Bombay, and it is essentially one of those commercial centres where Hindustani is spoken nearly as much as Arabian. We were lodged in a so-called palace hard by the bazaar, which reeked with mysterious smells and was alive with flies; so we worked hard to get our preparations made and to make our sojourn in this uncongenial burning spot as short as possible....