When, However, The Youth Appeared,
With Even More Jauntiness Of Mien Than Usual, Ali Bin Ya Sin Lost
Heart, Brushed By Him, Mounted His Mule, And, Doubtless Cursing Us “Under
The Tongue,” Rode Away, Frowning Viciously, With His Heels Playing Upon
The Beast’S Ribs.
Mohammed had been delayed, he said, by the difficulty of finding asses.
We were now to mount for “the Throwing,[FN#2]” as a preliminary to which we
washed “with seven waters” the seven pebbles brought from Muzdalifah, and
bound them in our Ihrams.
Our first destination was the entrance to the
western end of the long line which composes the Muna village. We found
a swarming crowd in the narrow road opposite the “Jamrat al-Akabah,[FN#3]”
or, as it is vulgarly called, the Shaytan al-Kabir—the “Great Devil.” These
names distinguish it from another pillar, the “Wusta,” or “Central Place,” (of
stoning,) built in the middle of Muna, and a third at the eastern end,
“Al-Aula,” or the “First Place.[FN#4]” The “Shaytan al-Kabir” is a dwarf buttress
of rude
[p.204] masonry, about eight feet high by two and a half broad, placed
against a rough wall of stones at the Meccan entrance to Muna. As the
ceremony of “Ramy,” or Lapidation, must be performed on the first day by
all pilgrims between sunrise and sunset, and as the fiend was malicious
enough to appear in a rugged Pass,[FN#5] the crowd makes the place
dangerous.
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