Next day I had an opportunity of witnessing the funeral of one of the chief priests of Mecca, who had died of cholera. The procession, despite the panic created by the epidemic, was of considerable length. Half a dozen mullás, intoning passages of the perspicuous Book, led the way. These were followed by twelve unkempt dervishes in quaint uniforms, reciting in unison the praises of the dead priest. Then came the rough bier peculiar to Mecca on the shoulders of ten pilgrims of as many nationalities. The son, supported by two stalwart priests, and the chief mourners came next, and after them the women, about twenty in number, and a crowd of beggars, who had heard that the flesh of two camels was to be distributed among them. Every now and then, as we noticed on watching the procession pass by, the bearers would be relieved of their burden by the most eager among the bystanders, for it is a tradition that seventy thousand angels will praise the man who lends a helping hand in carrying the dead to the cemetery. A frequent cry went up of “O Lord, may his sins be forgiven him. Praise be with Muhammad and with his people.”
“Yá-Moulai,” said Seyyid ’Alí, “you saw how the people lent their assistance in order to win the approval of the angels? Well, I will tell you of a clever trick performed in Mecca last year by four Sunnis who had murdered a Shiah in a lodging-house. One of the assassins was chosen by the arbitrament of the estakhhareh to buy the bier and to bring it to the house where the body lay. That being done, the mutilated corpse was laid inside by the four men, who, so to speak, bore the burden of their misdeed into the street. The passers-by, seeing a funeral, hastened to offer their help in carrying the corpse to its resting-place. No sooner was each one of the assassins relieved than he made good his escape, so that by the time the washing-house was reached the culprits had all disappeared. The crime was detected when the body was taken out to be washed. Suspicion fell on the bearers—half a dozen strange pilgrims who had lent a willing shoulder—and they were brought before the Kazi on the charge of murder. They only escaped death by paying a heavy sum in blood money.”
We pursued our course eastward to the temporary Syrian bazaar called Sughé-Shami. Goods from all parts of Syria—from the town of Smyrna to the remotest fastness of Lebanon—were to be found there. The Syrians drove a lively trade in silk stuffs from Damascus and Aleppo, as well as in European cotton prints and in steel ware. The steel ware was sold as “Inglisi,” though it was generally of German manufacture, imported into Asia Minor either direct from the Fatherland or from Constantinople. I saw “Inglisi” silk umbrellas, with what appeared to be silver handles, priced at half a mejidi, or about two shillings. German watches, guaranteed to be “Inglisi,” could be bought at a cost varying from four to ten shillings. On the other hand, Persian carpets were far more expensive there than they are in London, and so also were Turkish ones. Silk headgear called chepi and silk kerchiefs called kefi were in great request among the Bedouins, who purchased, besides, the dried fruits of Syria. There were many coffee-houses à la turque, where story-tellers recited in flowery language, either Arabic or Turkish, the tales of the Arabian Nights. Some pilgrims might sit listening from sunrise to sunset, but my guide and I, having drunk a cup of coffee, proceeded on our way, past the Prophet’s birthplace, to the Moamil or pottery bazaar. There, as I watched the potters at work, I couldn’t help quoting the immortal lines of Omar Khayyám, as translated by Fitzgerald:
“For I remember stopping by the way
To watch a potter thumping his wet clay;
And with its all-obliterated Tongue
It murmur’d—‘Gently, Brother, gently, pray.’”
Thence, in the Sughé-Lail, the carpenters have their niches. My guide told me a story of a Meccan carpenter who went once to measure a doorway of one of the houses in the neighbourhood. Having forgotten his yard measure he calculated the width by opening his arms. Then, still keeping his arms in the same position, he hastened back to his shop. On the way he fell down a well; the people gathered round; and one among them threw him a rope, but the carpenter refused to catch hold of it, lest he might change the measurement of the doorway. “Ah, my friend,” said I, “there I waited for you. That story is taken from ‘Mullá Nasiru’-Din,’ a book satirising the mock piety and the folly of the priests. You must be more careful in choosing the tales you would foist on my credulity.” And so wrangling we reach the cattle market.
Now, kindness to animals is specially recommended by Muhammad, but his followers have still much to learn in practice. The sheep and cattle are driven to the market in the early morning, before sunrise, and, unless they are sold, must remain all day long without anything to eat or to drink. The condition of some of the sheep was pitiful. The camels, that are not accustomed to be for ever nibbling like the sheep, appeared to suffer less from the deprivation of food. In that quarter of the town nearly all the tradesmen, whether cattle-sellers, butchers, fruiterers, or grocers, were Bedouins, dwelling in their encampments inside the town, and holding themselves aloof from the Arab townsmen and the foreigners. In manners, customs, and morality they have suffered but little change from the time of the Prophet, for, unlike the Meccans themselves, they have borrowed none of the characteristics of their co-religionists from alien countries. They forbid their women to be on intimate terms with the townswomen; and when you meet them buying and selling in the market place they are always extremely reserved, and sometimes not less haughty in their demeanour towards you. For the frankness which is their most pleasing quality in their canvas cities is held in restraint so soon as they take up their quarters in Mecca during the pilgrimage. The women, both rich and poor, work hard, in most cases even harder than the men, and that is why they wear, in contrast to the townswomen, who are corpulent and comely, an appearance of being as muscular as they are lean and sun-baked. Near the cattle market we saw some low shops and warehouses in which corn and provisions were being sold by Indians and Egyptians to some Bedouins who had entered the town in order to replenish their supplies, and there, too, the out-going caravans are wont to take in their eatables for the homeward journey. Rice and wheat are the commodities which are most needed by the Bedouins of Hejaz, and in these the southern Indians carry on a brisk trade with the interior of that barren province.