The
Hajj installed us with ceremony, and insisted, despite my remonstrances,
upon occupying the floor whilst I sat on the raised seat. After ushering
in supper, he considerately remarked that travelling is fatiguing, and
left us to sleep.
The well-known sounds of El Islam returned from memory. Again the
melodious chant of the Muezzin,--no evening bell can compare with it for
solemnity and beauty,--and in the neighbouring mosque, the loudly intoned
Amin and Allaho Akbar,--far superior to any organ,--rang in my ear. The
evening gun of camp was represented by the Nakkarah, or kettle-drum,
sounded about seven P.M. at the southern gate; and at ten a second
drumming warned the paterfamilias that it was time for home, and thieves,
and lovers,--that it was the hour for bastinado. Nightfall was ushered in
by the song, the dance, and the marriage festival,--here no permission is
required for "native music in the lines,"--and muffled figures flitted
mysteriously through the dark alleys.
* * * * *
After a peep through the open window, I fell asleep, feeling once more at
home.
FOOTNOTES
[1] "A tradition exists," says Lieut. Cruttenden, "amongst the people of
Harar, that the prosperity of their city depends upon the exclusion of all
travellers not of the Moslem faith, and all Christians are specially
interdicted." These freaks of interdiction are common to African rulers,
who on occasions of war, famine or pestilence, struck with some
superstitious fear, close their gates to strangers.
[2] The 6th of Safar in 1864 corresponds with our 28th October. The Hadis
is [Arabic] "when the 6th of Safar went forth, my faith from the cloud
came forth."
[3] The Abyssinian law of detaining guests,--Pedro Covilhao the first
Portuguese envoy (A.D. 1499) lived and died a prisoner there,--appears to
have been the Christian modification of the old Ethiopic rite of
sacrificing strangers.
[4] It would be wonderful if Orientals omitted to romance about the origin
of such an invention as the Dayrah or compass. Shaykh Majid is said to
have been a Syrian saint, to whom Allah gave the power of looking upon
earth, as though it were a ball in his hand. Most Moslems agree in
assigning this origin to the Dayrah, and the Fatihah in honor of the holy
man, is still repeated by the pious mariner.
Easterns do not "box the compass" after our fashion: with them each point
has its own name, generally derived from some prominent star on the
horizon. Of these I subjoin a list as in use amongst the Somal, hoping
that it may be useful to Oriental students.
