Page:William Muir, Thomas Hunter Weir - The Caliphate; Its Rise, Decline, and Fall (1915).djvu/337

 308 by the way besought him to divert his course towards the hills of Ajā and Selma, "Where," said he, "in ten days' time, 20,000 lances of the Beni Ṭaiʾ will rally round thee." "How can I," replied Al-Ḥosein, "surrounded as thou seest I am by women and children, turn aside with them into the desert? I must needs go forward." And so forward he went to his sad fate. They had not proceeded far when they were met by a troop of Kūfan horse under an Arab chief of the tribe of Temīm named Al-Ḥorr, who courteously but firmly refused to let him pass. "My orders," he said, "are to bring thee to the Governor; but if thou will not go, then turn to the right hand, or turn to the left, as thou choosest, only the way back again to Mecca that thou mayest not take." So the little band, leaving Al-Kūfa on the right, marched to the left, skirting the desert for a day or two along the western branch of the Euphrates. In so doing Al-Ḥosein had apparently no immediate object beyond avoiding attack from Al-Kūfa. Al-Ḥorr kept close by, and courteous communications still passed between them.

But it was dangerous to leave the pretender to hover about the city already excited by the affair of Muslim. So ʿObeidallah sent ʿOmar son of Saʿd with 4000 horse and a second summons. Thus arrested, Al-Ḥosein pitched his camp on the field of Kerbalā on the river bank, five-and-twenty miles above Al-Kūfa. At repeated interviews, Al-Ḥosein disclaimed hostilities, which indeed, with his slender following, and no prospect now of a rising in the city, were out of thought. He would submit, but only thus, he said:—"Suffer me to return to the place from whence I came; if not, then lead me to Yezīd, the Caliph, at Damascus, and place my hand in his, that I may speak with him face to face; or, if thou wilt do neither of these things, then send me far away to the wars, where I shall fight, the Caliph's faithful soldier, against the enemies of Islām." But ʿObeidallah insisted upon unconditional submission; and,