“O Allah! bless and preserve, and increase, and perpetuate, and benefit, and be propit[i]ous to, our Lord Mohammed, and to his Family, and to his Companions, and be Thou their Preserver!  O Allah! this is the Mosque Kuba, and the Place of the Prophet’s Prayers.  O Allah! pardon our Sins, and veil our Faults, and place not over us one who feareth not Thee, and who pitieth not us, and pardon us, and the true Believers, Men and Women, the Quick of them and the Dead:  for verily Thou, O Lord, art the Hearer, the near to us, the Answerer of our Supplications.”  After which we recited the Testification and the Fatihah, and we drew our palms as usual down our faces.

We then moved away to the South-Eastern corner of the edifice, and stood before a Mihrab in the Southern wall.

[p.410]It is called “Takat al-Kashf” or “Niche of Disclosure,” by those who believe that as the Prophet was standing undecided about the direction of Meccah, the Archangel Gabriel removed all obstructions to his vision.  There again we went through the two-bow prayer, the Supplication, the Testification, and the Fatihah, under difficulties, for people mobbed us excessively.  During our devotions, I vainly attempted to decipher a Cufic inscription fixed in the wall above and on the right of the Mihrab,-my regret however, at this failure was transitory, the character not being of an ancient date.  Then we left the Riwak, and despite the morning sun which shone fiercely with a sickly heat, we went to the open area where stands the “Mabrak al-Nakah,” or the “Place of kneeling of the she-Dromedary.[FB#23]” This, the exact spot where Al-Kaswa sat down, is covered with a diminutive dome of cut stone, supported by four stone pillars:  the building is about eight feet high and a little less in length and in breadth.  It has the appearance of being modern.  On the floor, which was raised by steps above the level of the ground, lay, as usual, a bit of dirty matting, upon which we again went through, the ceremonies above detailed.

Then issuing from the canopy into the sun, a little outside the Riwak and close to the Mabrak, we prayed upon the “Makan al-Ayat,[FN#24]” or the “Place of Signs.”  Here was revealed to Mohammed a passage in the Koran especially alluding to the purity of the place and of the people of Kuba, “a Temple founded in Purity from its first Day;” and again:  “there live Men who love to be

[p.411]cleansed, and verily Allah delights in the Clean.”  The Prophet exclaimed in admiration, “O ye Sons of Amr! what have ye done to deserve all this Praise and Beneficence?” when the people offered him an explanation of their personal cleanliness which I do not care to repeat.  The temple of Kuba from that day took a fresh title-Masjid al-Takwa, or the “Mosque of Piety.”