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Abu Sofian was silent, and looked around him carefully. Suddenly he started up as he caught sight of their camels' litter, wherein were visible the small date stones peculiar to Medinan palms. "Camels from Yathreb!" he cried quickly; "these be the scouts of Mahomet." Then he gathered his company together and departed hastily towards the sea.
As the Khazradites belonged to one of the most powerful tribes of Yathreb, Mahomet sought to secure their protection, and proposed to accompany them on their return; but they informed him that they were at deadly feud with the Awsites, another powerful tribe of that city, and advised him to defer his coming until they should be at peace.
His quest was for a time unsuccessful. Those who had come to worship at the Kaaba drew back from a man stigmatized as an apostate; and the worldly-minded were unwilling to befriend one proscribed by the powerful of his native place. At length, as he was one day preaching on the hill Al Akaba, a little to the north of Mecca, he drew the attention of certain pilgrims from the city of Yathreb.
In the thirteenth year of his mission, finding his enemies all banded against him, forty sworn men, one out of every tribe, waiting to take his life, and no continuance possible at Mecca for him any longer, Mohammed fled to the place then called Yathreb, where he had gained some adherents; the place they now call Medina, or "Medinat al Nabi, the City of the Prophet," from that circumstance.
In that month came the great concourse of pilgrims from Yathreb to Mecca, among them seventy of the "Faithful" who had received the faith at Medina, headed by their teacher Musab and strengthened by the knowledge that they were before long to stand face to face with their Prophet.
In the thirteenth year of his mission, finding his enemies all banded against him, forty sworn men, one out of every tribe, waiting to take his life, and no continuance possible at Mecca for him any longer, Mahomet fled to the place then called Yathreb, where he had gained some adherents; the place they now call Medina, or "Medinat al Nabi, the City of the Prophet," from that circumstance.