[439] Aly, however, maintained his view, and sought, when he became Caliph, to give practical effect to it. He searched for Obeidallah, and would, we are told, have put him to death. But Obeidallah made his escape to Syria, where he was safe under the rule of Muâvia.
[440] From this point begin the rough waters of the great cataclysm. Tradition becomes deeply affected by faction, especially the envenomed shafts of the party of Aly and the Abbassides, under cover of which they built up their pretensions, and, in the end, succeeded in supplanting the Omeyyad dynasty. The evidence, therefore, must be received with caution as we go along.
[441] Kabul is said to have been first attacked A.H. 24. The early Moslems seem to have been as unfortunate (perhaps as unwise) as ourselves in their expeditions against Afghanistan, where they met with many sad reverses.
[442] Ascalon is said to have been reduced (apparently for the first time) just before Omar’s death, A.H. 23; but the delay was purely owing to its maritime position. This excepted, Syria had for some years been under the firm yoke of Islam.
[443] For his full name (Abdallah ibn Sád ibn Abu Sarh), see note at p. 290; but it may conveniently be abbreviated into Abu Sarh.
[444] Party spirit has, no doubt, been freely used to magnify the offence of Abu Sarh. He is supposed to be the person alluded to in Sura vi. 94:—‘Who is more wicked than he who saith, I will produce a Revelation, like unto that which the Lord hath sent down?’ Vide Sale’s note in loco. The circumstances as quoted there are altogether apocryphal. He must, however, have deceived, if not betrayed, Mahomet, in some very marked way, to have led to his proscription on the capture of Mecca—an occasion on which the Prophet treated the inhabitants, with but few exceptions, with mercy and even generosity. See Life, p. 425. We have seen above (p. 248) that Omar is said by some to have been dissatisfied with Amru’s administration in Egypt—so much so, as to have superseded him partially by appointing Abu Sarh to the command in Upper Egypt. The evidence of Omar’s disapproval of Amru is imperfect, but there is no doubt that he appointed Abu Sarh to Egypt, and that Othmân on his accession found him already in power there.
[445] This is all we are told by Ibn al Athîr. But there is elsewhere a not unlikely tradition that the unhappy maiden, tearing herself from her captor’s embrace, leapt from the camel, and found in death an escape from her humiliation. This campaign furnishes plentiful material for many still wilder stories in the romances of the pseudo-Wâckidy and later writers.
[446] According to some authorities, Othmân presented the royal share of the booty as a free gift to Merwân, and they add that this was one of the grounds of Othmân’s impeachment. But it reads like a party calumny.
[447] Coming there in disguise, he was recognised by a woman, who gave the alarm, and the natives rushed upon the boat. Asked how she recognised the Saracen captain, this woman said, ‘He came as a merchantman; but when I asked an alms of him, he gave as a prince giveth; so I knew it was the captain of the Saracens.’
The payment of jazia, or poll-tax, implied the corresponding claim of protection. Zimmy signifies one who, so assessed, becomes part and parcel of the Moslem empire, and as such entitled to its guardianship. The Cypriots were not expected, from their position, to take any active part on the Moslem side; but they were bound to give their new masters warning of any hostile expedition, and generally to facilitate their naval operations.