Page:William Muir, Thomas Hunter Weir - The Caliphate; Its Rise, Decline, and Fall (1915).djvu/101

 72 that the horses of the Arabs slipped or sank, and their main arms were put out of action, The stratagem, however, told against the Greeks themselves, for if the enemy could not advance, they themselves could not retreat. Details are wanting; but once more the Arabs, under the invincible Khālid, gained the upper hand, and the Greeks were driven across the Jordan and took up a fresh position at Fiḥl or Faḥl, the ancient Pella, which lay on an eminence overlooking the River to the south-east. After a short investment this place also capitulated on the same terms as Sebaste and Neapolis had done. This happened about one month from the close of the year 13. The province of Gaulanitis (Jaulān or Decapolis) was quickly overrun, and the Muslim armics found themselves within two days of the Capital of Syria, Damascus. Here they seem to have rested for some time, awaiting fresh instructions from the Caliph. The country furnished abundance of fodder and supplies; and the people of the Arab kings of Ghassān were not the friends, even if they had been the dependents, of the Greek Emperor.

It may have been here that the Muslims suffered a reverse which, in the narratives of Seif and other ancient sources, is placed at the beginning of the conquest. Khālid ibn Saʿīd had ventured from the main body as far as Merj aṣ-Ṣoffar ('the Birds' Meadow'), one of the meadows lying outside Damascus, between that city and the Khaulān district. Here he was surprised by a force of 4000 Greeks. The fight was furious and fatal. The blood of the slain is said to have set the neighbouring mill-wheels a-going. Khālid ibn Saʿīd himself was probably killed. He had just celebrated his wedding with the widow of ʿIkrima, who was killed at Ajnādain, and his bride is said to have joined in the fray and with a tent-post slain seven of the enemy. The date of the encounter is given as the first day (1st Moḥarram) of the year 14 (25th February 635).