Page:Ossendowski - The Fire of Desert Folk.djvu/48

32 was already night. As we strolled out into the garden, filled with the scent of roses and other fragrant flowers, the sky looked dark and very low, like a soft, black cloth with countless miniature openings, down through each of which gleamed the light-shafts of a star. In the surrounding orchards of pomegranates and olives, locusts rasped their strange night-call; through the garden swift bats traced their hurrying, broken flight; while somewhere from the mountain slopes seeped down the wild, unfriendly jackal's howl, to which the dogs of the surrounding town sent bade their long-drawn challenge. Suddenly, as by the wave of some unseen leader's light baton, the tempo changed, and from the olive-grove hard by there floated out the sounds of a flute, which formed themselves into a sad, monotonous tune, to which a voice was joined in plaintive words, as though complaining about something beyond its master's strength to bear, sobbing and praying God for pity and favor. Once more the motif changed, as a loud note, carrying distant and strong, spread itself o'er the place and drowned all other sounds. It was the voice of the muezzin, from his minaret calling the Faithful to their later evening prayer and appealing to the Omnipotent Lord of Life:

"La Illah Illah Allah u Mahomet Rassul Allah, Allah Akbar! (Praise to the Name of Allah. God is One and God is God!)"

Finally now, we are in the land of Islam, impressive with the worship of today and filled with the tradition and stories of its ancient saints and sages.

In 1141, during an athletic contest in Seville, Choaib ibn Husein el-Andalosi, a youth of fifteen, distinguished