On the whole Hakim seems at this time to have been endeavouring to conciliate Sunni opinion, perhaps he had even intended to honour Abu Bakr and ʿUmar by shrines in one or other of the burial places of Cairo. Certainly he was trying to please the Sunnis when, in this same year (400), he founded a college for instruction in the Malikite system of jurisprudence, the form of canon law in vogue before the arrival of the Fatimids, and the one to which the Egyptians were most attached. He presented the college with a library, and appointed Abu Bakr Antaki as its principal, and bestowed robes of honour on the principal and the lecturers whom he welcomed at court. For three years Hakim continued to favour the Sunnis, and then he suddenly changed his attitude. In the following year indeed the pro-Sunni decrees began to be modified. On the 12th of Rabiʿ II. 401 the call to prayer was again ordered to be made in the Shiʿite form, the _tethwib_, and the words “Prayer is better than sleep” were again forbidden, and the formula “Come to the excellent work” was restored. The fore-noon voluntary prayer was prohibited and so the _Tarawih_. When Hakim found that the latter form had been used in the Old Mosque in spite of his prohibition during the whole of Ramadan he had the leader of the prayer put to death. At the same time the “Conferences of wisdom” were restored in the palace, and the various subscriptions due from the initiated of the Ismaʿilian sect were again collected. It is impossible to follow anything like policy or purpose in these incessant changes; it can only be supposed that the Khalif’s mental malady was getting worse. In the following year (401) new laws were published forbidding all pleasure parties on the banks of the canal and requiring all doors and windows opening on the canal to be kept closed: other laws forbade music, games, or meetings for pleasure at Sahra: and others forbidding loose entertainments anywhere or the sale of singing girls. Changes in the personnel of the administration now begin to become more numerous and capricious. At the beginning of 401 the chief minister, Mansur b. ʿAbdun, the one who had once been scourged and left for dead, was deprived of his office, and later in the year was put to death and his goods confiscated. He was replaced by Ahmad b. Muhammad Kashuri, who was beheaded after ten days. The next minister was the clerk Zara, son of Isa b. Nestorius. Husayn b. Jawhar and ʿAbdu l-ʿAziz b. Numan, who had fled the country in the previous year were invited to return and were received with honour; only to be put to death and have their goods confiscated a few months later. The third fugitive, Abu l-Kasam Husayn, had gone to Syria and declined to come back. We shall find him a little later stirring up trouble for Hakim.