a very great noise is heard. We passed this said mountain with great danger, so much so that we thought we should never arrive at this place.] Then we departed from the said well and travelled for ten days, and twice we fought with 50,000 Arabs, till at length we arrived at Mecca, and there was a very great war, one brother with another, for there are four brothers, and they fought to be Lords of Mecca.1

THE CHAPTER SHOWING HOW MECCA IS CONSTRUCTED, AND WHY THE MOORS GO TO MECCA.

We will now speak of the very noble city of Mecca, what it is, its state, and who governs it. The city is most beautiful, and is very well inhabited, and contains about 6,000 families. The houses are extremely good, like our own, and there are houses worth three or four thousand ducats each. This city is not surrounded by walls. A quarter of a mile distant from the city we found a mountain where there was a road cut by human labour. And then we descended into

1 The remarkable coincidence of this casual remark with the historical record of the period has been fully noticed in the Introduction.

"The city is open on every side; but the neighbouring mountains, if properly defended, would form a barrier of considerable strength.... The mode of building is the same as that adopted at Djidda, with the addition of windows looking towards the street: of these many project from the wall, and have their framework elaborately carved or gaudily painted. Before them hang blinds made of slight reeds... Every house has its terrace."-BURCKHARDT's Travels in Arabia, vol. i. pp. 189, 190.

3 Burton identifies this with the Saniyah Kuda, a pass opening upon the Meccah plain. It is, doubtless, the same as that described by Burckhardt in the following extract: "Opposite to this building [a house belonging to the Sherîf Ghâleb], a paved causeway leads towards the western hills, through which is an opening that seems artificial. El-Azraki applies the name of Jebel el-Hazna to this part of the mountain, and says that the road was cut through the rock by Yahia ibn Khold ibn Barmak. On the other side of the opening, the road descends into the plain of Sheikh Mahmoud, so named from the tomb of a saint, round which the Syrian pilgrims generally encamp."—Ibid. p. 234.

the plain. The walls of the said city are the mountains, and it has four entrances. The governor of this city is a Sultan, that is, one of the four brothers, and is of the race of Mahomet,1 and is subject to the Grand Sultan of Cairo. His three brothers are always at war with him. On the 18th of May we entered into the said city of Mecca; we entered from the north, and afterwards we descended into the plain. On the side towards the south there are two mountains which almost touch each other, where is the pass to go to the gate of Mecca. On the other side, where the sun rises, there is another mountain pass, like a valley,2 through which is the road to the mountain where they celebrate the sacrifice of Abraham and Isaac, which mountain is distant from the said city about eight or ten miles. The height of this mountain is two or three casts of a stone by hand, and it is of some kind of stone, not marble, but of another colour. On the top of this said mountain there is a mosque according to their custom, which has three doors. At the foot of the said mountain there are two very beautiful reservoirs of water. One is for the caravan from Cairo, and the other for the caravan from Damascus ; which water is collected there from the rain and comes from a great distance. Now,

'A Sherîf. "In Arabia the Sherîf is the descendant of Hasan through his two sons, Zaid and Hasan el-Musanna."-BURTON's Pilgrimage to el-Medinah, etc. Vol. ii. p. 257, n.

"This is the open ground leading to the Muna Pass.”—Ibid. p. 362, n.

3 "An error. The sacrifice is performed at Muna, not at Arafat, the mountain here alluded to."-Ibid. p. 362, n.

4 Burckhardt's account of Arafât reads like an amplification of Varthema's briefer description. "This granite hill, which is called Jebel er-Rahme, rises on the north-east side of the plain, close to the mountains which encompass it, but separated from them by a rocky valley. It is about a mile or a mile and a half in circuit: its sides are sloping, and its summit is nearly two hundred feet above the level of the plain... On the summit is shown the place where Mohammed used to take his station during the hadj; a small chapel [Varthema's 'mosque'?] formerly stood over it, but it was destroyed by the Wahabys...Several large

let us return to the city. At the proper time we will speak of the sacrifice which they make at the foot of the said mountain. When we entered into the said city we found the caravan from Cairo, which had arrived eight days before us, because they had not travelled by the same route as ourselves. In the said caravan there were sixty-four thousand camels and one hundred Mamelukes. You must know that, in my opinion, the curse of God has been laid upon the said city, for the country produces neither grass nor trees, nor any one thing. And they suffer from so great a dearth of water, that if every one were to drink as much as he might wish, four quattrini worth of water daily would not suffice them. I will tell you in what manner they live. A great part of their provisions comes from Cairo, that is, from the Red Sea. There is a port called Zida [Juddah], which is distant from the said city forty miles. A great quantity of food also comes there from Arabia Felix, and also a great part comes from Ethiopia. We found a great number of pilgrims, of whom

reservoirs lined with stone are dispersed over the plain: two or three are close to the foot of Arafat... They are filled from the same fine acqueduct which supplies Mecca, and the head of which is about one hour and a half distant in the eastern mountains."-Travels in Arabia, vol. i. pp. 40-42. Burton says the Meccans have a tradition that the water comes from Baghdad.

1 "Moslems who are disposed to be facetious on serious subjects often remark, that it is a mystery why Allah should have built his house in a spot so barren and desolate."-BURTON, Ibid. Vol. ii. p. 363, n.

"With respect to water, Mecca is not much better provided than Djiddah. There are but few cisterns for collecting rain, and the well water is so brackish, that it is used only for culinary purposes... The famous well of Zemzem, in the Great Mosque, is indeed sufficiently copious to supply the whole town; but, however holy, its water is heavy to the taste, and impedes digestion... The best water in Mecca is brought from the vicinity of Arafat, six or seven hours distant. The supply which it affords in ordinary times is barely sufficient for the use of the inhabitants, and during the pilgrimage sweet water becomes an absolute scarcity. A small skin of water, two of which skins a person may carry, being then often sold for one shilling, a very high price among Arabs." -BURCKHARDT's, Travels in Syria, vol. i. pp. 193-195.

some came from Ethiopia, some from India Major, some from India Minor, some from Persia, and some from Syria. Truly I never saw so many people collected in one spot as during the twenty days I remained there. Of these people some had come for the purposes of trade, and some on pilgrimage for their pardon, in which pardon you shall understand what they do.

THE CHAPTER CONCERNING THE MERCHANDIZE IN

MECCA.

First we will speak of the merchandize, which comes from many parts. From India Major there come a great many jewels and all sorts of spices, and part comes from Ethiopia; and there also comes from India Major, from a city called Bangchella,1 a very large quantity of stuffs of cotton and of silk, so that in this city there is carried on a very extensive traffic of merchandize, that is, of jewels, spices of every kind in abundance, cotton in large quantites, wax and odoriferous substances in the greatest abundance.

THE CHAPTER CONCERNING THE PARDONING IN MECCA.

Now let us turn to the pardoning of the said pilgrims. In the midst of the said city there is a very beautiful temple, similar to the Colosseum of Rome, but not made of such large stones, but of burnt bricks, and it is round in the same manner; it has ninety or one hundred doors around it, and is arched, and has many of these doors. On entering the said

Bengal, pronounced Bangala by the Arabs(?)

2 Joseph Pitts, who visited Meccah in 1608, describes the Great Mosque as having “about forty-two doors to enter into it,—not so much, I think, for necessity, as figure; for in some places they are close by one another." Ali Bey says: "The temple has nineteen gates with

temple you descend ten or twelve steps of marble, and here and there about the said entrance there stand men who sell jewels, and nothing else. And when you have descended the said steps you find the said temple all around, and everything, that is, the walls, covered with gold. And under the said arches there stand about 4,000 or 5,000 persons, men and women, which persons sell all kinds of odoriferous things; the greater part are powders for preserving human bodies, because pagans come there from all parts of the world. Truly, it would not be possible to describe the sweetness and the odours which are smelt within this temple. It appears like a spicery full of musk, and of other most delicious odours. On the 23rd of May the said pardon commences in the above-mentioned temple. The pardon is this: Within the said temple, and uncovered, and in the centre, there is a tower, the size of which is about five or six paces on every side, around which tower there is

thirty-eight arches." Burckhardt, in 1814: "The gates of the mosque are nineteen in number, and are distributed about without any order of symmetry. As each gate consists of two or three arches or divisions, separated by narrow walls, those divisions are counted in the enumeration of the gates leading into the Kaabah, and thus make up the number thirty-nine." Burton says: The principal gates are seventeen in number. In the old building they were more numerous." The latter fact, coupled with Burckhardt's description of the double and triple division in each gate, may account for Varthema's approximate estimate, and might have spared him Burton's remark thereon, who calls it "a prodigious exaggeration."

1 "Seven [or, according to Burton, eight] paved causeways lead from the colonnades towards the Kaabah or Holy House in the centre...The whole area of the mosque is on a lower level than any of the streets surrounding it. There is a descent of eight or ten steps from the gate on the north side into the platform of the colonnade, and of three or four steps from the gate on the south side."-BURCKHARDT's Travels in Arabia, vol. i. p. 247.

"I saw nothing of the kind, though constantly in the Haram at Meccah."-BURTON.

3 The Kaabah is here described. Burckhardt calls it " an oblong massive structure 18 paces in length, 14 in breadth, and from 35 to 40