Page:William Muir, Thomas Hunter Weir - The Caliphate; Its Rise, Decline, and Fall (1915).djvu/184

639] infected cities into the desert; and himself wended his way back to Medina.

Acting on the Caliph's wish, Abu ʿObeida lost no time in making the people fly to the high lands of the Ḥaurān. He had reached as far as Al-Jābiya, when he too was struck down, and with his son fell a victim to the pestilence. Moʿādh ibn Jebel, designated to succeed, died almost immediately after; and it was left for ʿAmr to lead the panic-stricken folks to the hill-country, where the pestilence abated, Shuraḥbīl ibn Ḥasana also fell a victim—it is said on the same day as Abu ʿObeida. Yezīd, son of Abu Sufyān, also perished. Not less that five-and-twenty thousand perished in the visitation. Of a single family which had emigrated seventy in number from Medina, but four were left. Such was the deadliness of the scourge.

The country was disabled, and fears were entertained of an attack from the Roman armies. The terrible extent of the calamity showed itself in another way. A vast amount of property was left by the dead, and the gaps amongst the survivors caused much embarrassment in the succeeding claims. The difficulty grew so serious, that to settle this and other matters ʿOmar resolved on making a progress through his dominions. At first he thought of visiting Chaldæa, and thence by Mesopotamia, entering Syria from the north; but he abandoned the larger project, and confining his resolution to Syria, took the usual route. The way lay through the Christian town of Ayla, at the head of the Gulf of Akaba; and his visit here brings out well the