And I Profess I Found Nothing Worth Seeing In
It, Only Two Wooden Pillars In The Midst, To Keep Up The Roof,[FN#24]
And A Bar Of Iron Fastened To Them, On Which Hanged Three Or Four
Silver Lamps, Which Are, I Suppose, But Seldom,
[P.370] if ever, lighted.
In one corner of the Beat is an iron or brass
chain, I cannot tell which (for I made no use of it): the pilgrims just
clap it about their necks in token of repentance. The floor of the Beat
is marble, and so is the inside of the walls, on which there is written
something in Arabick, which I had no time to read. The walls, though of
marble on the inside, are hung over with silk, which is pulled
off[FN#25] before the Hagges enter. Those that go into the Beat tarry
there but a very little while, viz. scarce so much as half a quarter of
an hour, because others wait for the same privilege; and while some go
in, others are going out. After all is over, and all that will have
done this, the Sultan of Mecca, who is Shirreef, i.e. one of the race
of Mahomet, accounts himself not too good to cleanse the Beat; and,
therefore, with some of his favourites, doth wash and cleanse it. And
first of all, they wash it with the holy water, Zem Zem, and after that
with sweet water. The stairs which were brought to enter in at the door
of the Beat being removed, the people crowd under the door to receive
on them the sweepings of the said water. And the besoms wherewith the
Beat is cleansed are broken in pieces, and thrown out amongst the mob;
and he that gets a small stick or twig of it, keeps it as a sacred
relique.
“But to speak something further of the temple of Mecca (for I am willing
to be very particular in matters about it, though in so being, I
should, it may be, speak of things which by some people may be thought
trivial). The compass of ground round the Beat (where the people
exercise themselves in the duty of Towoaf) is paved with marble[FN#26]
about 50 foot in breadth, and round this marble pavement stand pillars
of brass about 15 foot high[FN#27] and
[p.371] 20 foot distant from each other; above the middle part of which
iron bars are fastened, reaching from one to the other, and several
lamps made of glass are hanged to each of the said bars, with
brasswires in the form of a triangle, to give light in the night
season, for they pay their devotions at the Beat-Allah as much by night
as by day, during the Hagges’ stay at Mecca. These glasses are
half-filled with water, and a third part with oil, on which a round
wire of brass buoyed up with three little corks; in the midst of this
wire is made a place to put in the wick or cotton, which burns till the
oil is spent.
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