DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.12664#0226
DEPARTURE OP THE PILGRIMS.
215
prised at the noise, tumult, and confusion, the
strifes and battles of these pilgrim-travellers. If I
had met them in the desert after their line of march
was formed, it would have been an imposing spec-
tacle, and comparatively easy to describe; but here,
as far as the eye could reach, they were scattered
over the sandy plain, 30,000 people, with probably
20,000 camels and dromedaries, men, women, and
children, beasts and baggage, all commingled in a
confused mass that seemed hopelessly inextricable.
Some had not yet struck their tents, some were
making coffee, some smoking, some cooking, some
eating, many shouting and cursing, others on their
knees praying, and others, again, hurrying on to
join the long moving stream that already extended
several miles into the desert.
It is a vulgar prejudice, the belief that women
are not admitted into the heaven of Mohammed. It
is true that the cunning Prophet, in order not to
disturb the joyful serenity with which his follow-
ers look forward to their promised heaven, has not
given to women any fixed position there, and the
pious Mussulman, although blessed with the law-
ful complement of four wives, is not bound to see
among his seventy-two black-eyed houries the
faces of his companions upon earth; but the women
are not utterly cast out; they are deemed to have
souls, and entitled to a heaven of their own ; and it
may be, too, that their visions of futurity are not
less bright, for that there is a mystery to be unrav-
elled beyond the grave, and they are not doomed
to eternal companionship with their earthly lords.
215
prised at the noise, tumult, and confusion, the
strifes and battles of these pilgrim-travellers. If I
had met them in the desert after their line of march
was formed, it would have been an imposing spec-
tacle, and comparatively easy to describe; but here,
as far as the eye could reach, they were scattered
over the sandy plain, 30,000 people, with probably
20,000 camels and dromedaries, men, women, and
children, beasts and baggage, all commingled in a
confused mass that seemed hopelessly inextricable.
Some had not yet struck their tents, some were
making coffee, some smoking, some cooking, some
eating, many shouting and cursing, others on their
knees praying, and others, again, hurrying on to
join the long moving stream that already extended
several miles into the desert.
It is a vulgar prejudice, the belief that women
are not admitted into the heaven of Mohammed. It
is true that the cunning Prophet, in order not to
disturb the joyful serenity with which his follow-
ers look forward to their promised heaven, has not
given to women any fixed position there, and the
pious Mussulman, although blessed with the law-
ful complement of four wives, is not bound to see
among his seventy-two black-eyed houries the
faces of his companions upon earth; but the women
are not utterly cast out; they are deemed to have
souls, and entitled to a heaven of their own ; and it
may be, too, that their visions of futurity are not
less bright, for that there is a mystery to be unrav-
elled beyond the grave, and they are not doomed
to eternal companionship with their earthly lords.