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Updated: June 5, 2025
The behaviour of some of them is so violent, and at the same time so cunning, that even the least charitably disposed hadjys give willingly something to escape from them. They mostly come from other countries; for among the Arabians themselves there are fewer crazy of these people than in other parts of the east.
It was now occupied by the ladies of Mohammed Aly; Sherif Yahya, after throwing off the ihram, having returned to Mekka, where many hadjys also repair immediately after that ceremony; but it is their duty to revisit Muna at noon on the 11th or 12th of this month, in order to throw the stones, as the neglect of this ceremony would render their pilgrimage imperfect.
Many hadjys did so; and I preferred this mode, because I had led a very sedentary life for some months. We were several hours before we could reach the outskirts of the town beyond the Moabede, so great was the crowd of camels; and many accidents happened.
My metowaf or guide traced his descent to an Usbek Tatar, from the neighbourhood of Bokhara, and whenever any hadjys arrived from that quarter, he never failed to recommend himself as their guide, though entirely ignorant of their language. The Mekka Sherifs form a large class, into which no foreigners are admitted, and it is spreading over many other parts of Arabia.
Tradition says that the Kaaba once extended as far as the Hatym, and that this side having fallen down just at the time of the Hadj, the expenses of repairing it were demanded from the pilgrims, under a pretence that the revenues of government were not acquired in a manner sufficiently pure to admit of their application towards a purpose so sacred, whilst the money of the hadjys would possess the requisite sanctity.
They are much more rigid in the observance of their sacred rites, and public decorum is much more observed at Medina than at Mekka: the morals, however, of the inhabitants appear to be much upon the same level with those of the Mekkans; all means are adopted to cheat the hadjys.
Formerly hadjys were permitted to carry with them from Suez as great a quantity of provisions as they chose, part of which they afterwards sold in the Hedjaz to some profit; but at present none can embark with more than what is barely sufficient for his own consumption during the pilgrimage.
There is no religious police or inquisition here; and every body is left to the dictates of his conscience, either to observe or neglect the precepts of the canonical law. Great bustle prevailed this evening in the town. Every body was preparing for his journey to Arafat; Syrian hadjys came to engage lodgings, to inquire about the state of the markets, and to pay their first visits to the Kaaba.
Dervishes of every sect and order in the Turkish empire are found among the pilgrims; many of them madmen, or at least assuming the appearance of insanity, which causes them to be much respected by the hadjys, and fills their pockets with money.
On the arrival of a party of hadjys from Djidda, which happens almost every morning, for four or five months of the year, their baggage is usually deposited in this street, after which they pay their visit to the mosque, About the time of my stay at Mekka, the Mesaa resembled a Constantinopolitan bazar.
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