There Is Not A Single Public School In The Town Where Lectures Are Given, As In Other Parts Of Turkey; And The Great Mosque Is The Only Place Where Teachers Of Eastern Learning Are Found.

The schools in which boys are taught to read and write, are, as I have already mentioned, held in

The mosque, where, after prayers, chiefly in the afternoon, some learned olemas explain a few religious books to a very thin audience, consisting principally of Indians, Malays, Negroes, and a few natives of Hadramaut and Yemen, who, attracted by the great name of Mekka, remain here a few years, until they think themselves sufficiently instructed to pass at home for learned men. The Mekkawys themselves, who wish to improve in science, go to Damascus or to Cairo. At the latter many of them are constantly found, studying in the mosque El Azhar.

The lectures delivered in the mosque at Mekka resemble those of other Eastern towns. They are delivered gratis; each lecture occupies one hour or two; and any person may lecture who thinks himself competent

[p.212] to the task, whether he belongs to the mosque or not. This happens also in the Azhar at Cairo, where I have seen more than forty different persons occupied at the same time in delivering their lectures. The subjects of the lectures in the Beitullah of Mokka, are, as usual, dissertations on the law, commentaries on the Koran, and traditions of the Prophet. There were none, during my residence, on grammar, logic, rhetoric, or the sciences, nor even on the Towhyd, or explanation of the essence or unity of God, which forms a principal branch of the learning of Moslim divines.

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