The Value Of
A Shilling, Distributed In Paras At Each Of The Mouleds, Fully Answers
The Expectation Of The Greedy And The Indigent.
Mouled Abou Taleb, in the Mala, is completely destroyed, as I have
already said; and will, probably, not be rebuilt.
Kaber Setna Khadidje: the tomb of Khadidje, the wife of Mohammed, the
dome of which was broken down by the Wahabys, and is not yet rebuilt; it
is regularly visited by hadjys, especially on Friday mornings. It lies
in the large burial-ground of the Mala, at the declivity of the western
chain; is enclosed by a square wall, and presents no objects of
curiosity except the tomb-stone, which has a fine inscription in Cufic
characters, containing a passage of the Koran from the chapter entitled,
Souret el Kursy. As the character is not the ancient Cufic, I suspect
that the stone was not intended originally to cover this grave: there is
no date in the inscription. The Sherif Serour, predecessor of Ghaleb,
had the vanity, on his death-bed, to order his family
[p.173] to bury his body close to the tomb of Khadidje, in the same
enclosure where it still remains. At a short distance from hence, the
tomb of Umna, the mother of Mohammed, is shown. It was covered with a
slab of fine marble, bearing a Cufic inscription, in an older character
than the former. The Wahabys broke it, and removed the two pieces, to
show their indignation at the visits paid to the receptacles of the
bones of mortals, which was, in their estimation, a species of idolatry.
Even at these tombs I found women, to whom permission was granted to
spread their handkerchiefs, and ask alms of every visitor.
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