two favourite symbols, and transformed them into an arch and a tower. [FN#35] The Ustawanat al-Hannanah, or “Weeping-Post.”  See page 335, chapter xvi., ante. [FN#36] As usual, there are doubts about the invention of this article.  It was covered with cloth by the Caliph Osman, or, as others say, by Al-Mu’awiyah, who, deterred by a solar eclipse from carrying out his project of removing it to Damascus, placed it upon a new framework, elevated six steps above the ground.  Al-Mahdi wished to raise the Mambar six steps higher, but was forbidden so to do by the Imam Malik.  The Abbasides changed the pulpit, and converted the Prophet’s original seat into combs, which were preserved as relics.  Some historians declare that the original Mambar was burnt with the Mosque in A.H. 654.  In Ibn Jubayr’s time (A.H. 580), it was customary for visitors to place their right hands upon a bit of old wood, inserted into one of the pillars of the pulpit; this was supposed to be a remnant of the “weeping-post.”  Every Sultan added some ornament to the Mambar, and at one time it was made of white marble, covered over with a dome of the “eight metals.”  It is now a handsome structure, apparently of wood, painted and gilt of the usual elegant form, which has been compared by some travellers with the suggesta of Roman Catholic churches.  I have been explicit about this pulpit, hoping that, next time the knotty question of Apostolic seats comes upon the tapis, our popular authors will not confound a Curule chair with a Moslem Mambar.  Of the latter article, Lane (Mod.  Egyptians, chap. iii.) gave a sketch in the “Interior of a Mosque.” [FN#37] The Prophet is said to have had a dwelling-house in the Ambariyah, or the Western quarter of the Manakhah suburb, and here, according to some, he lodged Mariyah, the Coptic girl.  As pilgrims do not usually visit the place, and nothing of the original building can be now remaining, I did not trouble myself about it. [FN#38] Meaning the Prophet’s fifteen to twenty-five wives.  Their number is not settled.  He left nine wives and two concubines.  It was this title after the Koranic order (chap, xxxiii. v. 53) which rendered their widowhood eternal; no Arab would willingly marry a woman whom he has called mother or sister. [FN#39] Authors mention a place outside the Northern wall called Al-Suffah, which was assigned by Mohammed as a habitation to houseless believers; from which circumstance these paupers derived the title of Ashab al-Suffah, “Companions of the Sofa.” [FN#40] So I translate the Arabicised word “Saj.” [FN#41] A place about five miles from Al-Madinah, on the Meccan way.  See Chap.  XIV. [FN#42] And curious to say Al-Islam still has the largest cathedral in the world-St. Sophia’s at Constantinople.  Next to this ranks St. Peter’s at Rome; thirdly, I believe, the “Jumma Masjid,” or cathedral of the old Moslem city Bijapur in India; the fourth is St. Paul’s, London, [FN#43] It is to this monarch that the Saracenic Mosque-architecture mainly