These latter performances, though so common among the Arabs, are inconsistent with the spirit of the Mohammadan religion, and especially with respect to music, which was not employed in religious ceremonies until after the second century of the Flight. The Imám Aboo-Bekr Eṭ-Ṭoosee, being asked whether it were lawful or not to be present with people who assembled in a certain place and read a portion of the Ḳur-án, and, after a munshid had recited some poetry, would dance and become excited and play upon tambourines and pipes,--answered, that such practices were vain, ignorant, and erroneous, not ordained by the Ḳur-án or the Traditions of the Prophet, but invented by those Israelites who worshipped the Golden Calf; that the Prophet and his companions used to sit so quietly that a bird might alight upon the head of any one of them and not be disturbed; that it was incumbent on the Sulṭán and his vicegerents to prevent such persons from entering the mosques and other places for these purposes; and that no one who believed in God and the Last Day should be present with them or assist them in their vain performances: such, he asserted, was the opinion of the Imáms of the Muslims.[77] Some eminent doctors, however, have contended for the lawfulness of these practices. The following is an account of a Zikr I myself witnessed. The zikkeers (or performers of the zikr), who were about thirty in number, sat cross-legged upon matting extended close to the houses on one side of the street, in the form of an oblong ring.[78] Within this ring, along the middle of the matting, were placed three very large wax candles, each about four feet high, and stuck in a low candlestick. Most of the zikkeers were Aḥmedee darweeshes, persons of the lower orders, and meanly dressed: many of them wore green turbans. At one end of the ring were four munshids (or singers of religious odes), and with them was a player on the kind of flute called náy. I procured a small seat of palm-sticks from a coffee-shop close by, and, by means of a little pushing and the assistance of my servant, obtained a place with the munshids, and sat there to hear a complete act, or "mejlis," of the zikr; which act commenced at about three o'clock, Muslim time (or three hours after sunset), and continued two hours.