When he had concluded, “Come here,” said Khasib, “and open this seam.” He did so. Khasib then said, “Take this ruby.” The poet refused; but being adjured to do so, he complied, and went away to the street of the jewellers to offer it for sale. From the beauty of the stone, it was supposed it could have belonged to no one but the calif, who, being informed of the matter, ordered the poet before him, and interrogated him respecting it. The poet ingenuously related the whole truth; and the tyrant, repenting of his cruelty, sent for Khasib, overwhelmed him with splendid presents, and promised to grant him whatever he should desire. Khasib demanded and obtained the small minyet in Upper Egypt in which he resided until his death, and where his fame was still fresh when Ibn Batūta passed through the country.
Frustrated in his attempt to reach Mecca by this route, after penetrating as far as Nubia, our traveller returned to Cairo, and from thence proceeded by way of the Desert into Syria. Here, like every other believer in the Hebrew Scriptures, he found himself in the midst of the most hallowed associations; and strengthened at once his piety and his enthusiasm by visiting the graves of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, as well as the many spots rendered venerable by the footsteps of Mohammed. As the believers in Islamism entertain a kind of religious respect for the founder of Christianity, whom they regard as a great prophet, Batūta did not fail to include Bethlehem, the birthplace of Christ, in the list of those places he had to see. Upon this town, however, as well as upon Jerusalem, Tyre, Sidon, and others of equal renown in Syria, he makes few observations which can assist us in forming an idea of the state of the country in those times; but in return for this meagerness, he relates a very extraordinary story of an alchymist, who had discovered the secret of making gold, and exercised his supernatural power in acts of beneficence.
From Syria he proceeded towards Mesopotamia, by Emessa, Hameh, and Aleppo, and having traversed the country of the Kurds, and visited the fortresses of the Assassins, the people who, as he says, “act as arrows for El Malik el Nāisr,” returned to Mount Libanus, which he pronounces the most fruitful mountain in the world, and describes as abounding in various fruits, fountains of water, and leafy shades. He then visited Baalbec and Damascus; and, after remaining a short time at the latter city, departed with the Syrian caravan for Mecca. His attempt to perform the pilgrimage, a duty incumbent on all true Mussulmans, was this time successful: the caravan traversed the “howling wilderness” in safety; arrived at the Holy City; and the pilgrims having duly performed the prescribed rites, and spent three days near the tomb of the prophet, at Medina, Ibn Batūta joined a caravan proceeding through the deserts of Nejed towards Persia.
The early part of this journey offered nothing which our traveller thought worthy of remark; but he at length arrived at Kadisia, near Kufa, anciently a great city, in the neighbourhood of which that decisive victory was obtained by Saad, one of the generals of Omar, over the Persians, which established the interests of Islamism, and overthrew for ever the power of the Ghebers. He next reached the city of Meshed Ali, a splendid and populous place, where the grave of Ali is supposed to be. The inhabitants, of course, were Shiahs, but they were rich; and Ibn Batūta, who was a tolerant man, thought them a brave people. The gardens were surrounded by plastered walls, adorned with paintings, and contained carpets, couches, and lamps of gold and silver. Within the city was a rich treasury, maintained by the votive offerings of sick persons, who then crowded, and still crowd, to the grave of Ali, from Room, Khorasān, Irak, and other places, in the hope of receiving relief. These people are placed over the grave a short time after sunset, while other persons, some praying, others reciting the Koran, and others prostrating themselves, attend expecting their recovery, and before it is quite dark a miraculous cure takes place. Our traveller, from some cause or another, was not present on any of these occasions, and remarks that he saw several afflicted persons who, though they confidently looked forward to future benefit had hitherto received none.
The whole of that portion of Mesopotamia was at this period in the power of the Bedouin Arabs, without whose protection there was no travelling through the country. With them, therefore, Ibn Batūta proceeded from Basra, towards various holy and celebrated places, among others to the tomb of “My Lord Ahmed of Rephaā,” a famous devotee, whose disciples still congregate about his grave, and kindling a prodigious fire, walk into it, some eating it, others trampling upon it, and others rolling in it, till it be entirely extinguished, while others take great serpents in their teeth, and bite the head off. From hence he again returned to Basra, the neighbourhood of which abounded with palm-trees. The inhabitants were distinguished for their politeness and humanity towards strangers. Here he saw the famous copy of the Koran in which Othman, the son of Ali, was reading when he was assassinated, and on which the marks of his blood were still visible.
Embarking on board a small boat, called a sambūk, he descended the Tigris to Abbadān, whence it was his intention to have proceeded to Bagdad; but, adopting the advice of a friend at Basra, he sailed down the Persian Gulf, and landing at Magul, crossed a plain inhabited by Kurds, and arrived at a ridge of very high mountains. Over these he travelled during three days, finding at every stage a cell with food for the accommodation of travellers. The roads over these mountains were cut through the solid rock. His travelling companions consisted of ten devotees, of whom one was a priest, another a muezzin, and two professed readers of the Koran, to all of whom the sultan of the country sent presents of money.
In ten days they arrived in the territories of Ispahan, and remained some days at the capital, a large and handsome city. From thence he soon departed for Shiraz, which, though inferior to Damascus, was even then an extensive and well-built city, remarkable for the beauty of its streets, gardens, and waters. Its inhabitants likewise, and particularly the women, were persons of integrity, religion, and virtue; but our singular traveller remarks, that for his part he had no other object in going thither than that of visiting the Sheïkh Majd Oddin, the paragon of saints and workers of miracles! By this holy man he was received with great kindness, of which he retained so grateful a remembrance, that on returning home twenty years afterward from the remotest countries of the east, he undertook a journey of five-and-thirty days for the mere purpose of seeing his ancient host.
The greater portion of the early life of Ibn Batūta was consumed in visiting saints, or the birthplaces and tombs of saints: but his time was not therefore misemployed; for, besides the positive pleasure which the presence or sight of such objects appears to have generated in his own mind, at every step he advanced in this sacred pilgrimage his personal consequence, and his claims upon the veneration and hospitality of princes and other great men, were increased. As he may be regarded as the representative of a class of men extremely numerous in the early ages of Islamism, and whose character and mode of life are highly illustrative of the manners of those times, it is important to follow the footsteps of our traveller in his whimsical wanderings a little more closely than would otherwise be necessary.
Proceeding, therefore, at the heels of the honest theologian, we next find him at Kazerun, beholding devoutly the tomb of the Sheïkh Abu Is-hāk, a saint held in high estimation throughout India and China, especially by sailors, who, when tossed about by adverse or tempestuous winds upon the ocean, make great vows to him, which, when safely landed, they pay to the servants of his cell. From hence he proceeded through various districts, many of which were desert and uninhabitable, to Kufa and Hilla, whence, having visited the mosque of the twelfth imam, whose readvent is still expected by his followers, he departed for Bagdad. Here, as at Rome or Athens, the graves of great men abounded; so that Ibn Batūta’s sympathies were every moment awakened, and apparently too painfully; for, notwithstanding that it was one of the largest and most celebrated cities in the world, he almost immediately quitted it with Bahadar Khan, sultan of Irak, whom he accompanied for ten days on his march towards Khorasān. Upon his signifying his desire to return, the prince dismissed him with large presents and a dress of honour, together with the means of performing the pilgrimage to Mecca, which, as an incipient saint, he imagined he could not too frequently repeat.
Finding, on his return to Bagdad, that a considerable time would elapse before the departure of the caravan for the Holy City, he resolved to employ the interval in traversing various portions of Mesopotamia, and in visiting numerous cities which he had not hitherto seen. Among these places the most remarkable were Samarā, celebrated in the history of the Calif Vathek; Mousul, which is said to occupy the site of ancient Nineveh; and Nisibēn, renowned throughout the east for the beauty of its position, and the incomparable scent of the rose-water manufactured there. He likewise spent some time at the city and mountain of Sinjar, inhabited by that extraordinary Kurdish tribe who, according to the testimony of several modern travellers, pay divine honours to the Devil.