Yusuf gratefully accepted the invitation, and the camels were urged on again down the narrow, crooked street.

“Know you aught of one Mohammed?” asked the priest.  “A roguish Hebrew left me, with scant ceremony, in possession of a manuscript which must be given to him.”

“Aye, well do I know him,” said Amzi.  “Mohammed, the son of Abdallah the handsome, and grandson of Abdal Motalleb, who was the son of Haschem of the tribe of the Koreish—­a tribe which has long held a position among the highest of Mecca, and has, for ages past, had the guardianship of the Caaba itself.  Mohammed himself is a man of sagacity and honor in all his dealings.  He is married to Cadijah, a wealthy widow, whose business he has long carried on with scrupulous fairness.  He, too, is one of the few who, in Mecca, have ceased to believe in idols, and would fain see the Caaba purged of its images.”

“There are some, then, who cast aside such beliefs?”

“Yes, the Hanifs (ascetics), who utterly reject polytheism.  Waraka, a cousin of the wife of Mohammed, is one of the chief of these; and Mohammed himself has, for several years, been accustomed to retire to the cave of Hira for meditation and prayer.  It is said that he has preached and taught for some time in the city, but only to his immediate friends and relatives.  Well, here we are at last,”—­as a pretentious stone building was reached.  “Amzi the benevolent bids Yusuf the Persian priest welcome.”

Amzi led the priest into a house furnished with no small degree of Oriental splendor.

    “Right to the carven cedarn doors,
    Flung inward over spangled floors,
    Broad-based flights of marble stairs
    Ran up with golden balustrade,
    After the fashion of the time.”

A meal of Oriental dishes, dried fruit and sweetmeats was prepared; and, when the coolness of evening had come, the two friends proceeded to the temple.

Entering by a western gate, they found the great quadrangle crowded with men, women and children, some standing in groups, with sanctimonious air, at prayers, while others walked or ran about the Caaba, which loomed huge and somber beneath the solemn light of the stars.  A few solitary torches—­for at that time the slender pillars with their myriads of lamps had not been erected—­lit up the scene with a weird, wavering glare, and threw deep shadows across the white, sanded ground.

A curious crowd it seemed.  The wild enthusiasm that marked the conduct of the followers of Mohammed at a later day was absent, yet every motion of the motley crowd proclaimed the veneration with which the place inspired the impressionable and excitable Arabs.

Here stood a wealthy Meccan, with flowing robes, arms crossed and eyes turned upward; there stalked a tall and gaunt figure whose black robes and heavy black head-dress proclaimed the wearer a Bedouin woman.  Here ran a group of beggars; and there a number of half-naked pilgrims clung to the curtained walls.  Once a corpse was carried into the enclosure and borne in solemn Tawaf round the edifice.