Six Months in the Hejaz: an account of the Mohammedan Pilgrimages to Meccah and Medinah, etc

Front matter

BEING Keane's Journeys to Meccah and Medinah. NEW SIX-SHILLING BOOKS. THE MEMOIRS OF AN ARABIAN PRINCESS. RUSSIA UNDER THE TZARS. By " Stepniak." THE EMPEROR WILLIAM : THE STORY OF A GREAT KING AND A GOOD MAN. By G.. L. M. STRAUSS. RECOLLECTIONS OF LISZT. By Madame Wohl. A LOOK ROUND LITERATURE. By Robert Buchanan. CATHEDRAL DAYS: A TOUR THROUGH SOUTHERN ENGLAND. By Anna Bowman Dodd. THROUGH GREEN GLASSES. By F. M. Allen. Illustrated by M. Fitzgerald. THE STORY OF ANTHONY GRACE. By G. Manville Fenn. Illustrated by Gordon Browne. AT THE RED GLOVE. By Katharine S. Macquoid. Illustrated by C. S. Reinhart. TRAVELS IN THE INTERIOR ; OR, THE WONDER- FUL ADVENTURES OF LUKE AND BELINDA. Illustrated by Harry Furniss. JOHN O' LONDON : A Story of the Days of Roger Bacon. By Somerville Gibney. Illustrated by M. Fitzgerald.

FOLK AND FAIRY TALES. By Mrs. Burton Harrison. Illustrated by Walter Crane. WARD AND DOWNEY, PUBLISHERS, LONDON. An Account of the Mohammedan Pilgrimages to Meccah and Medinah. ACCOMPLISHED BY AN ENGLISHMAN PROFESSING MOHAMMEDANISM. BY JOHN F. KEANE, (Has J Mohammed A min,) Author of " Three Years of a Wanderer's Life;" " Mere Shakings," etc " The first of the Pilgrims to Meccah and El-Medinah who has left an authentic account of the Holy Cities is Lewes Werlomannus (Ludovicus Bartema), gentelman, of the citie of Rome. ' If any man,' says this author, ' shall demand of me the cause of this my voyage, certeynely I can shewe no better reason than is the ardent desire of knowledge, which hath moved many other to see the world and the miracles of God therein.' " — Burton s Pilgrimage, Appendix II.

First Edition. Longman. " The Navigation and Voyages of Ludovicus Vertomannus, gentelman, of Rome. A.D. 1503." LONDON : WARD AND DOWNEY, 12, YORK STREET, COVENT GARDEN, W.C. 1887. [All rights reserved.] CHARLES DICKENS AND EVANS, CRYSTAL PALACE PRESS.

Preface

TO FIRST EDITION OF "SIX MONTHS IN MECCAH." My object in the following pages is to give an account, in as short and inviting a manner as I can, of everything of interest that came under my notice while in Meccah, during the pilgrim season 1877-78; and chiefly for the benefit of those who may not have had the leisure, or perhaps inclina tion, to read the complete and exhaustive descriptions of the same scenes in the volumes of the well-known Swiss traveller, Johan Ludwig Burckhardt (Shaykh Hajj Ibrahim), and of the better-known learned traveller and author, Captain R. F. Burton (Shaykh Hajj Abdallah). So, promising to make up for my lack of further prelude by what I only hope may not be deemed my too frequent interludes, I will with your permission proceed at once to spin my yarn " in my own way. JOHN F. KEANE (Hajj Mohammed Amin).

PREFACE.

TO FIRST EDITION OF "MY JOURNEY TO MEDINAH." On concluding my account of the Mohammedan pilgrimage to Meccah, in my work "Six Months in Meccah," I promised that, should the reception of it by the public encourage me to do so, I would continue the narrative of my travels in the Hejaz. I am happy to say that the book has been most favourably received, and therefore I now fulfil my promise, by publishing the following account of my pilgrimage to Medinah. I trust that the series of uncommon adventures met with will make up in interest for what the book may lack in information. For the truth of the narrative, I pledge my name and faith. JOHN F. KEANE (Hajj Mohammed Amin).

PREFACE.

TO "SIX MONTHS IN THE HEJAZ." I take none the less pleasure in seeing the present edition of this narrative through the press, on account of the number of years that have elapsed since the first edition was sold out. The persistent incredulity of a large section of authorities deterred the publishers from increasing the venture to more editions ; but as time has worn on, every new circumstance bearing on the subject has only tended to confirm my story, and now the truth of it (as was in evitable sooner or later) has been established by the test of time. What a very apex of fame as a writer of fiction my critics would have elevated me to ! and yet I do not believe one of them saw how tremendously he might have been complimenting me. J. F. KEANE. CONTENTS.

TO "SIX MONTHS IN MECCAH" . . . SIX MONTHS IN THE HEJAZ, DEING Keane's Journeys to Meccah and Medinah.

Chapter I. Meccah's Pilgrims

Meccah's pilgrims, confident of Fate, And resolute in heart ! — Longfellow. THOUGH Mohammedans are divided into almost as many sects and schisms as Christians, they are all* agreed on one point, namely, that it is imperative on every Mohammedan who can afford it to make a pilgrimage to Meccah at some time in his life. And it is even considered obligatory on those who may have undertaken the pilgrimage during childhood to remake it when they become adult. This pilgrimage must be performed after prescribed rules and forms, and certain ceremonies must be gone through on the proper days of the year; consequently many thousands of Mohammedans assemble at Meccah from * Excepting a few barbarians, who can no more be called Mohammedan than some of the tribes of missionaries' pets in South Africa can be called Christian.

B n SIX MONTHS IN THE HEJAZ. all parts of the East during the pilgrim season, some of whom come in caravans across the Arabian deserts, while by far the greater number come by sea, giving employment to a number of English ships, and during the season of which I am writing, 42,718 disem barked at Jeddah .* It was at this place that I was enabled to attach myself to the train of a youthful Hindis Amer,;]; whom I accompanied on pilgrimages to Meccah and other places in the Holy Land of Islam,§ and of my expedition to Meccah I shall now attempt to give some account. On the first landing of these pilgrims at Jeddah, what struck me most was their helplessness and gulli bility, for no party of English tourists in Egypt could have been more victimised than were the pilgrims by their brother Mohammedan touts and crimps of Jeddah.

Before they landed a Turkish Custom house official demanded one rupee a head on no apparent grounds whatever, and then, on landing, charged them a rather high duty on all their baggage, by weight, so that as most of the wealthier pilgrims bring almost sufficient food to last them during their stay in the country, they get a pretty good foretaste * "The British Consul at Jeddah states that in the season of 1877-78 there were 42,718 pilgrims landed at that port, an increase of nearly 4000 over the preceding year ; but this was more than counterbalanced by the falling off in the numbers at Zembo and Leet. . . . The concourse at Meccah on the Great Feast-day was estimated to have exceeded 180,000 souls." — The Times, October 26th, 1S78. f Mohammedan native of India as distinguished from a Hindoo. t Properly, and in this case really, a lord of the land under a ruler, and subject to feudal conditions. § The Hejaz.

MECCAH 'S PILGRIMS. 3 of what is coming ere they are handed over to the native cicerones to undergo further extortion. Many of the wealthy pilgrims bring introductions to friends or countrymen resident in the Hejaz ; with these in troductions my patron was well provided, and thus we secured a tolerably peaceful reception. I cannot describe polyglot Jeddah, as I was not there long enough to find out anything new or interestingabout it. To the gentleman acting as British Consul I gave my name and the addresses of friends in England, informing him of my intentions. He said much to dissuade me, telling me the roads were in an unsafe state and the country rather disturbed on account of the withdrawal of Turkish troops to the war in Europe ; but I had already made up my mind on the subject, and accordingly sold such of my clothes as would be unsuitable and provided myself with a native wardrobe ; then, after a three days' rest in Jeddah, I entered into the preparations of our party en route for Meccah.

About noon on the third day, camels were hired from the Bedawins (the real Sons of the Desert, as distinguished from their spurious brethren in Egypt, Palestine, and other countries generally visited by Europeans), whom I now met for the first time, and of whom, notwithstanding their wretched appearance at first sight, their haggling, and their shrill voices, I formed a favourable opinion, and still believe to have their good points. One con clusion I quickly arrived at : the '* wily Hindi " would be no match for the ** swarty Paynim " in a '■rough-and-tumble." After a great deal of hard swearing in a Babel of tongues, the camels were laden and got under way, and I, following the example of B my companions, performed the greater ablution (i.e. the bathing of the entire person), and put on the pilgrim's garb, which consists of two pieces of white or light-coloured cotton fabric, one piece round the body over the left shoulder, leaving the right arm bare, the other round the loins, enveloping the body from the waist to below the knee (the head is left un covered and the upper part of the foot bare), and then said a two-prostration prayer, which is a supple mentary act of devotion for special occasions.

We afterwards joined our camels, which had become part of a larger caravan outside the walls of Jeddah. I had no difficulty in getting through the gate in the crowd, nor did I hear of any pass being required from the pilgrims, either here or at Meccah, though one may have been got for me by the Amer as Abdur Mohammed, the name I had adopted. As we went through the gate two fine soldierly looking Turkish sentries stood leaning on their rifles, smoking cigarettes, and seemed scarcely to notice even the camels passing them. Our party was composed of about fifty in all, men and women ; and, as only fifteen camels had been hired, ten with shugdufs, or litters, and five pack-camels (four of these latter with shibriyahs), and as each of these (the shugduf and the shibriyah) carries only two persons, about twenty of our party had to walk by the camels, in company with a number of fakirs, or beggar-pilgrims, who had attached themselves to us and who were accepted as a matter of course, receiving a great deal of charity in the shape of broken victuals and water, which latter has a money value in this country.

I found I had to MECCAH 'S PILGRIMS. 5 share a shugduf with one of whom I shall often have to speak, since he was my camel-mate during the whole pilgrimage, and, as I intend, for reasons that will readily suggest themselves to the reader, to sup press or translate all my companions' names, I shall call him (as I always thought of him) the " third warrior," the junior of the three armed retainers who formed the Amer's body-guard. The kind of panniers or litters, in which we sat or lay at full length when riding, are known by the names of shugduf or shibriyah. Inside the shugduf is a pocket for food, tobacco, and other little necessaries; outside, at the tail end and within easy reach, a wicker basket containing a bottle of water. Having mounted, that is to say, having, by the help of a ladder, ascended into this construction of bent boughs and old bags, resembling a rickety wigwam poised airily on the hump of a camel, the impression I laboured under was that we instantly plunged off in mad bounds across an exceedingly rough country, feeling at the same time pity for the poor beast under what I supposed could only have been an immense burden, spiced with momentary expectation of a spill.

But on looking out I found the road a perfectly level sandy plain, the camel crawling along at a slow walk, jolting more than the fastest pace of the hardest trotting horse ; moreover the platform on which you lie is on a level with the top of the animal's hump, and the whole structure of the shugduf so top-heavy that it requires the nicest adjustment of weight on either side to prevent the saddle, to which the shugduf is securely lashed (but which has no attachment whatever to the animal, merely adhering to its back in some mysterious way), turning a complete somersault — a thing which not unfrequently happens, for the art of balancing a shugduf is only acquired after long practice. Our camel-driver threatened and abused us wildly for our awkwardness, my companion being as much a novice and as unaccustomed to this mode of travel as myself; however, we purchased peace at the price of a few dates and a little bread.

I, for my part, spent one of the most wretched and apparently perilous nights I have ever had the misfortune to undergo, for the pitching and rolling of that desert-ship could not find its equal afloat ; so that I, old sailor as I was, became exceedingly sick, a thing which had not happened to me for many years while at sea. The country over which we passed was a sandy plain, if anything, a slight ascent ; our course, by the stars, nearly east ; and the distance, I was informed, twenty-eight miles to Haddah, where we halted at daylight. Haddah is the stage, or half-way halting-place, between Jeddah and Meccah. Here there are about four or five square miles of cultivated ground, dotted over with groups of Bedawi huts. A stream of brackish water rises in the north-east, and flows a mile or two over stone-built watercourses before losing itself in the desert.

Around are what would be called the foot-hills of the approach to a range of mountains, the first out-cropping of stone from the sandy plain, gradually increasing into rocky ridges and higher hills to the eastward. In the shade of a large shed-like caravanserai we spent the day, praying, eating, and resting ; but sleep could not be got, for some of the MECCAH'S PILGRIMS. 7 more devout pilgrims kept up the " Talbiyat," or Pilgrim's Prayer : Labbayk' Allahumma, Labbayk ! La Sarika laka, Labbayk ! Inna'l Handa wa'n Niamata laka w'al Mulk La Sharika laka, Labbayk ! * Imagine for yourself an unmusical old man of ninety, with his nose in a rat-gin, trying to sing at the top of his voice those words to the tune of " Silent, O Moyle," or " The Sailor's Grave," for the first time in his life, and you will be able to faintly realise the excruciating discord and ghastly contortions these pilgrims keep up for hour after hour while on their way to Meccah, to say nothing of many other almost equally disturbing devotional cries.

I now found I could perform my ablution and prayer without attract ing notice by any awkwardness on my part, audacious imitation giving me considerable help. About an hour before sunset we got under way for Meccah ; after this the road became a more decided ascent, the hills around being higher and more rugged as we passed through rocky defiles in which the moaning of the camels and the labbayks of the pilgrims were echoed and re-echoed with a truly weird effect. At daylight, when we seemed to * " Here I am ! O Allah ! here am I : No Partner hast Thou, here am I. Verily the Praise and the Beneficence are Thine, and the Kingdom : No Partner hast Thou, here am I." Translation from " Burton's Pilgrimage." Third Edition. W. Mullan and Son. London, 1879. SIX aMOaYTHS in the hejaz. have reached the summit of a rocky platform, the increased intensity of the labbayks and the dismounting of those ahead told that " the Meccah " was in sight.

The distance we had come from Haddah was about twenty miles, and the course still easterly. The approach to Meccah by this road does not give a good view of the town. You arrive among collec tions of high stone buildings scattered over rocky slopes, then dismounting — for it is the proper thing to enter Meccah on foot if possible, women and invalids only being excepted — you find yourself pass ing along rather wide streets, and between houses of some height ; and as you continue on a down hill course the streets become more narrow and dirty towards the centre of the city, where a house had been prepared for us in the walks of the Haram or square enclosed for public worship, where is situated the Moslem Holy of Holies, the Kaabah. Now here was I, a veritable " Britisher," looking through a plain iron-barred window, estimating the dimensions of that Mohammedan pivotal point of the world — " Hub of the Universe," the Kaabah, a shrine for which to die at hundreds of thousands stint and pauper themselves in their old age, and towards which millions of eyes from all points of the com pass turn with reverence five times daily.

But my calculating mood was soon cut short, for having established ourselves on the premises, there was no escaping the forms and ceremonies appropriate to the occasion, which, tired and weary as I felt, kept me going the whole day. Besides the usual everyday five prayers and ablutions, we had to perform a two prostration prayer in one part of the Haram and MECCAH'S PILGRIMS. 9 another in another part ; to do the tawas— i.e., walk, or rather trot, round the Kaabah seven times, kissing the Black Stone let into the corner of the building, and touching another stone in it at every circuit ; to run seven times about one-third of a mile through the streets repeating (after a guide hired for the purpose) proper prayers — this latter ceremony is called El-Sai, and is done in commemoration of Hagar's running up and down searching for water on the same spot.

The street is in the middle of the city, skirting the Haram on the east, and crossing the valley of Meccah in directly from side to side. Lastly, the head must be shaved. And now I was at liberty to take off the pilgrim's garb. My companions only shaved as much of the top of their heads as could be covered by a skull-cap, but I preferred, for reasons of cleanliness, to do all the shearing, moustache-clipping, and nail paring of the most close-shaving Mohammedan, leaving my beard, the ends of my moustache, and two small locks under my temples, the only hair about me. The costume I assumed was a sort of mixture of Hindi and Turk, with perhaps as much of the Arab as of either in it. My headdress was a Turkish tarbouche* with a long silk handkerchief tied round it ; on my feet the Hindi sandals, a strip of leather protecting the entire sole of the foot, and kept on by a band over the instep and down between the big and second toes; by way of breeches, a pair of Hindi cotton pyjamas, four feet round the waist and tight at the ankles; a tunic of the same material, girded about the loins with several folds of a cotton scarf ; and over all, when in the open air, an Arab-brown * Nau/icc, tarbrush.

SIX MONTHS IN THE HEJAZ. 10 cloth mantle, having wide sleeves and reaching down to the ankles. Right glad was I on this my first night in Meccah when we had said our last prayer and had lain down for the night to sleep, although the Amer and some thirty other " True Believers," packed head and tail in the same room, were snoring like pigs around me — yes, such was the thought, even the name of the unmentionable animal — literally unmentionable to all strict Mohammedans. Notwithstanding this impious thought my conscience did not prevent my sleeping soundly. Nor did I wake at the 2 a.m. meal — for this was the month Ramazan, when all food must be eaten between sunset and sunrise — but my well-meaning friends took sufficient interest in my spiritual welfare to turn me out for the morning prayer, for which service I appeared properly grateful, exhibiting a great deal of cheerful alacrity in the shape of a cold-water wash before sunrise on a chilly morning, and a quarter of an hour's gymnastic praying.

One convenience was that the room in which we lived had three large recess windows looking straight into the Haram, so that we could see the Kaabah to which we prayed, and which is known as the " Ear of God " and by a dozen other flowery Eastern appellations, without going out. Neither the Amer nor any of his superior retainers went into the arcades surrounding the Kaabah to pray except at noon on the Moham medan Sunday, which falls on our Friday, and on a few other festive occasions. At first I always secured a place at these windows, not caring to show myself more in public than was necessary. As this narrative is written chiefly for those who MECCA H'S PILGRIMS. 11 know little of Mohammedanism or Meccah, before going farther I will explain what this pilgrimage is, and endeavour to demonstrate my position in Meccah.

I had often heard it said and myself believed that this great concourse of people which every year assembles at Meccah, ostensibly on a pilgrimage, really meets for a great mart or fair held there ; but now having made the journey I know that this is not the case. It is a true pilgrimage, the outcome of a belief in the tenets of a religion, the commands of the Prophet. I think I might truly say that a very small minority go for temporal gain, though the majority do not go from disinterested motives (the devotion of love talked of by Christians playing a small part in Mohammedanism, so far as I have seen). The journey and hardship are undertaken professedly with an eye to the future, as believed to be necessary for the salvation of the soul from the punishment and in the hope of the rewards promised in the Koran, and are, as I said before, the outcome of a wonderful and widespread belief, difficult to understand, and which could only exist among such races as imagina tive miracle-mongering dwellers of the East.

From this it will be understood that the community of Meccah is composed of the most bigoted Moham medans, the fanatical scum of the whole Mohammedan world. Now, the precarious position of an unbeliever in any wholly Mohammedan town is well known ; but let a Jew, Christian, or idolater approach to defile ground so holy and held in such veneration as is Meccah in the eyes of Mohammedans — ground of which many declare that should any but a True Believer stand on, it would open and swallow him — to say that he would be stoned to death, torn in pieces, burnt and his ashes sent out of the country, would only be repeating what I have heard Mohammedansdeclare. I am confident the life of a solitary white man re fusing to make "profession of that faith" would not be worth an hour's purchase — two hours outside the walls of Jeddah — even at this day : so that should any but a Mohammedan, from motives of curiosity, gain, or for adventure, wish to enter the Hejaz, he must conform to the customs and habits of a Mohamme dan, and adopt great caution ; for notwithstanding the security in which the majority affect to live, there are many jealous and inquisitive watchers, self-con stituted spies, who would soon seal the fate of any one suspected of insincerity.

But let him be master of the thousand little signs and allusive phrases of Mohammedan Freemasonry, and let him affect minutely all observances and points of etiquette among Mohammedans, and sustain throughout a character for devotion, and he need fear no incon venience on the score of his nationality in a place like Meccah. He may declare himself a Peckham Ryot, a native of Belgravia, or a country called North, as I have done, and he will meet with courteous, polite credence ; for there is so much dissembling and cunning in the Eastern character and respect for deceit that a Mohammedan will outwardly appear to believe a lie, in direct proportion to its obvious un truth. I have told an Arab that I was by profession mate of a steamer, which must have seemed an imposition in such a poor wretch as I looked at the time, and he has immediately after, in my hearing, declared as a matter of fact that I was captain of a MECCAH' S PILGRIMS. 13 steamer, giving me my promotion out of compliment to what must have appeared to him the immensity of my first crammer.

All through I made assurance my strong suit and my acquaintance with India and hailing from Bombay my trump card ; but if ever really cornered, as on one or two occasions, a little hand-play, implying that I was a recent convert, would in every case call forth nothing but approval and commendation. To undertake an expedition of this kind was certainly a wild and unscrupulous thing, and I suffered many qualms of conscience and felt the veriest hypocrite ; but having once entered into it there was no drawing back and the ordeal had to be gone through, though I often at first longed to declare myself a humbug. I remembered once hearing a sailor say to another : " You have told that lie so often, Jack, you believe it yourself." I now found this to be no impossibility. It became my case to a nicety, and in less than a month I was to all intents and purposes as honestly Mohammedan as any born Arab among them.

I, in fact, acted that lie so well I believed it myself! The name I had adopted, the " Servant of the Prophet," though common in several forms in India, was objected to by the most correct of our party as not strictly orthodox, for, said they, was not Mohammed himself the servant of God ? I thought this would be very inconvenient, as a cause of discussion bringing me into uncoveted notice, and added " Amin" to the name I had already adopted, then dropping " the servant," by an easy transition I became known as " Mohammed Amin," a name which I supposed could not be objected to by any Moham medans, no matter of what peculiar persuasion. Though I do not pretend but that I should be very much out of my depth were I to enter into any de scription of the discrepancies of belief existing among the various sects of the Mohammedans, still I do know more of Wahhabis than of the Wesleyans, and the Shafei is not altogether such a mystery to me as the Shaker ; but I will spare the reader the infliction and myself the risk of exposure, having received probably much misinformation from so fertile a source as a Hindi one-sided education, and so I shall continue my narrative as the pilgrim Mohammed Amin, a Suni Mohammedan of the " reasonable class."

Chapter II. In Meccah

I WAS now settled in Meccah, living the ordinary everyday life of a pilgrim waiting for the " Great Pilgrimage." My ablutions were performed with the water of the well Zem Zem — Hagar's well in the wilderness, as tradition has it — and for appearance' sake I drank not a little of it, disagreeable as it was, being a mineral spring tasting like a weak solution of Epsom salts, and having a similar medicinal action. For each prayer said in Meccah, I was supposed to get credit for a thousand said elsewhere ; still it was not desirable for any but the very devout to reside wholly in Meccah, as one's sins are multiplied in like proportion. I was not supposed to have any intercourse with my harem, if I had had one, nor to indulge in any feasting, sports, or amusements other than those allowable on religious grounds, lighting and the shedding of blood were especially to be abstained from, and killing of vermin, flies, worms, etc., was almost equally reprehensible, on account of the probability of offending a "djin" — a class of spirit which is believed to take this form and to be especially abundant in Meccah — and on account of the sanctity of all living things Meccan, whether "djins," men, or insects.

I have heard a hot discussion as to the advisability of killing a human parasite, the slaughterer defending himself on the plea that the insect was undoubtedly of foreign extraction and but recently imported. My food consisted of the native diet of India, two meals of curry and rice a day, morning and evening, supple mented by such sweets, fruit, or tea as might be going in the household ; for the rice I ate, no matter how much, never satisfied my cravings, it having, as far as my experience goes, much the same effect on a hungry man as salt water on a thirsty man. I sometimes went out into the streets and purchased bread from the Turkish soldiers, who sell their rations, and judging from the quality of their bread and the quantity they have to dispose of, they must be in clover here. After a week or ten days I found I could walk about the crowded bazaars without attracting notice, my fair complexion exciting no curiosity among the chequered masses, nor my ignorance of Arabic giving me any inconvenience where so many nationalities were gathered, speaking more languages than I will stay to enumerate here, only mentioning that you may jostle against a Tartar, Malay, Negro, and Turk round any Hindi tea-stall.