of Al-Islam, holding Ali’s hand, happened to pass beneath, it cried, “This is Mohammed the Prince of Prophets, and this is Ali the Prince of the Pious, and the Progenitor of the Immaculate Imams.[FN#6]” Of course the descendants of so intelligent a vegetable hold high rank in the kingdom of palms, and the vulgar were in the habit of eating the Sayhani and of throwing the stones about the Harim.  The Khuzayriyah is thus named because it preserves its green colour, even when ripe; it is dried and preserved as a curiosity.  The Jabali is the common fruit:  the poorest kinds are the Laun and

[p.402]the Hilayah, costing from four to seven piastres per mudd.[FN#7]

I cannot say that the dates of Al-Madinah are finer than those of Meccah, although it is highly heretical to hold such tenet.  The produce of the former city was the favourite food of the Prophet, who invariably broke his fast with it:  a circumstance which invests it with a certain degree of relic-sanctity.  The citizens delight in speaking of dates as an Irishman does of potatoes, with a manner of familiar fondness:  they eat them for medicine as well as for food; “Rutab,” or wet dates, being held to be the most saving, as it is doubtless the most savoury, of remedies.  The fruit is prepared in a great variety of ways:  the favourite dish is a broil with clarified butter, extremely distasteful to the European palate.  The date is also left upon the tree to dry, and then called “Balah”:  this is eaten at dessert as the “Nukliyat"-the quatre mendiants of Persia.  Amongst peculiar preparations must be mentioned the “Kulladat al-Sham[FN#8]” (necklace of Sham).  The unripe fruit is dipped in boiling water to preserve its gamboge colour, strung upon a thick thread and hung out in the air to dry.  These strings are worn all over Al-Hijaz as necklaces by children, who seldom fail to munch the ornament when not in fear of slappings; and they are sent as presents to distant countries.

[p.403]January and February are the time for the masculation[FN#9] of the palm.  The “Nakhwali,” as he is called, opens the female flower, and having inserted the inverted male blossom, binds them together:  this operation is performed, as in Egypt, upon each cluster.[FN#10] The fruit is ripe about the middle of May, and the gathering of it, forms the Arabs’ “vendemmia.”  The people make merry the more readily because their favourite diet is liable to a variety of accidents:  droughts injure the tree, locusts destroy the produce, and the date crop, like most productions which men are imprudent enough to adopt singly as the staff of life, is often subject to complete failure.

One of the reasons for the excellence of Madinah dates is the quantity of water they obtain:  each garden or field has its well; and even in the hottest weather the Persian wheel floods the soil every third day.  It has been observed that the date-tree can live in dry and barren spots; but it loves the beds of streams and places where moisture is procurable.  The palms scattered over the other parts of the plain, and depending solely upon rain water, produce less fruit, and that too of an inferior quality.