YEZID APPOINTED HEIR APPARENT.--HEREDITARY NOMINATION BECOMES A PRECEDENT. A.H. LVI. A.D. 676. [Sidenote: Precedents for nomination or election to the Caliphate.] The election of a Caliph on each recurring succession, excepting only that of Omar, had been followed by the risk of serious perils to the peace of Islam. The choice was supposed to be a privilege vested in the inhabitants of Medîna--‘Citizens,’ as well as ‘Refugees;’ but the practice had been various, and the rule had been oftener broken than observed. The Prophet himself nominated no one. Abu Bekr may be said to have been chosen by acclamation.[581] Abu Bekr, on his death-bed, named Omar his successor. And Omar, establishing yet another precedent, placed the nomination in the hands of Electors. It is true that on the two last-named occasions, the choice was ratified by the homage of Medîna; but that was little more than the formal recognition of an appointment already made. At the fourth succession, the election of Aly, though carried out under the compulsion of insurgent bands, resembled somewhat the popular election of the first Caliph. Then followed the unsuccessful rebellion of Talha and Zobeir, based on the allegation that homage had been extorted from them under pressure. After that, ensued the struggle between Muâvia, the _de facto_ sovereign of Syria, and Aly, which ended in the irregular recognition of Muâvia as Caliph upon the so-called Arbitration of Dûma, and in the double Caliphate. On the death of Aly, who (we are told) declined to nominate a successor, his son Hasan was elected, not, as heretofore, by the people of Medîna, but by the citizens of Kûfa. And, finally, we have the first example of abdication, when Hasan resigned his rights into the hands of Muâvia, and left him sole Caliph of Islam. [Sidenote: The initiative in election no longer at Medîna.] Whatever the rights of Medîna originally may have been, circumstances had now materially altered the only practical means of exercising them. Having been abandoned as the seat of government, the privilege of choosing a Caliph, or of confirming his nomination, however much it may have vested by prescription in the citizens of Medîna, had become an anachronism now. The succession, as in the case of Hasan, followed necessarily, and at once, upon the death of the reigning Caliph, and Medîna could only ratify what had taken place elsewhere. The functions of the citizens of Medîna were thus, from the course of events, transferred to the inhabitants of the seat of government, wheresoever it might be. [Sidenote: Danger surrounding each succession.]