Page:William Muir, Thomas Hunter Weir - The Caliphate; Its Rise, Decline, and Fall (1915).djvu/75

48 By the beginning of the twelfth year of the Hijra rebellion had been put down throughout Arabia, excepting the south, which was also in fair way of pacification. It became now Abu Bekr's policy to turn his restless Arab columns to similar work elsewhere. He despatched two armies to the north. One, under command of Khālid joined by Al-Muthanna, was to march on Ubulla, an ancient city near the mouth of the Euphrates, and from thence, driving the enemy up the western bank, to work its way towards Al-Ḥīra the capital of Chaldæa. ʿIyād, at the head of the other, was directed to Dūma (midway between the head of the Red Sea and Persian Gulf) which had cast off its allegiance, and thence to pass also on to Al-Ḥīra. Whichever first reached that city was to be in command of the country.

ʿIyāḍ, hampered by his enemy, was long detained in the neighbourhood of Dūma. Khālid, meeting no such obstacle, was joined on his march from Al-Yemāma to Al-ʿIrāḳ by large bodies of Bedawīn. These were of the greater service, as his numbers had been thinned, not only by the carnage at Al-Yemāma, but also by the free permission given the army, after that arduous campaign, to proceed on furlough to their homes. Nevertheless, the expedition was so popular that when, after a flying visit to the Caliph, Khālid rejoined his camp by the Euphrates, he found himself at the head of 10,000 men; and this besides the 8000 of Al-Muthanna, who hastened loyally to place himself under the great leader's command,

The country before them was in some of its features familiar to the invading army, in others new and strange. From the head of the Persian Gulf across to the Dead Sea stretches a stony desert, trackless and bereft of water. Advancing north, Nature relaxes; the plain, still a wilderness, is in season clothed with verdure, bright with flowers, instinct with the song of birds and hum of winged life. Such is the pasture-land which for hundreds of miles lies between Damascus and the Tigris. Still farther north, the desert gradually disappears, and about the latitude of Mosul blends with the hills and vales of Asia Minor. Athwart the country