Page:The Romance of Isabel, Lady Burton.djvu/98

70 he landed at Alexandria, he was recognized and blessed as a true Moslem by the native population. From Alexandria he went to Cairo disguised as a dervish, and lived there some months as a native. Thence he travelled to Suez, and crossed in an open boat with a party of Arab pilgrims to Yambú. The rest of his dare-devil adventures and hair-breadth escapes—how he attached himself to the Damascus caravan and journeyed with the pilgrims to Mecca in spite of the fiery heat and the scorching sands, how he braved many dangers and the constant dread of "detection"—is written by him in his Pilgrimage to Mecca and El Medinah, and is touched upon again in Lady Burton's Life of her husband. The story needs no re-telling here. Suffice it to say that Burton was the first man not a Mussulman who penetrated to the innermost sanctuary of Moslem, and saw the shrine where the coffin of Mohammed swings between heaven and earth. He did the circumambulation at the Harem; he was admitted to the house of our Lord; he went to the well Zemzem, the holy water of Mecca; he visited Ka'abah, the holy grail of the Moslems, and kissed the famous black stone; he spent the night in the Mosque; and he journeyed to Arafat and saw the reputed tomb of Adam. He was not a man to do things by halves, and he inspected Mecca thoroughly, absolutely living the life of the Mussulman, adopting the manners, eating the food, wearing the clothes, conforming to the ritual, joining in the prayers and sacrifices, and speaking the language. He did all this, literally carrying his life in his hand, for at any moment he