Slavery, like polygamy, was a custom which Mohammed found fully established among the Arabs. He disliked slavery and tried in several ways to lessen its evils. He declared that the emancipation of Moslem slaves was an act of special merit, and ordered that in a war between Moslems the prisoners were not to be enslaved. Mohammed also insisted on kind treatment of slaves by their masters. "Feed your slaves," he directed, "with food of that which you eat and clothe them with such clothing as you wear, and command them not to do that which they are unable to do." The condition of Moslem slaves does not appear to be intolerable, though the slave traffic which still exists in some parts of Africa is a disgrace to Islam. STUDIES 1. On an outline map indicate the Arabian Empire at its widest extent. Locate the more important cities, including Mecca, Medina, Jerusalem, Damascus, Bagdad, Cairo, Alexandria, Granada, Cordova, and Seville. 2. Define the following: Kaaba; Islam; Koran; and caliph. 3. How did the geographical situation of Arabia preserve it from being conquered by Persians, Macedonians, or Romans? 4. Why had the Arabs, until the time of Mohammed, played so inconspicuous a part in the history of the world? 5. Mohammed "began as a mule driver and ended as both a pope and a king." Explain this statement. 6. How does Mohammed's career in Mecca illustrate the saying that "a prophet is not without honor save in his own country"? 7. What resemblances may be traced between Islam on the one side and Judaism and Christianity on the other side? 8. Did religion have anything to do with the migrations of the Germans? How was it with the Arabs? 9. Contrast the methods of propagating Christianity in Europe with those of spreading Islam in Asia. 10. Why is the defeat of the Moslems before Constantinople regarded as more significant than their defeat at the battle of Tours? 11. Compare the eastern limits of the Arabian Empire with those of Alexander's empire (maps facing pages 124, 376). 12. Show that the Arabian Empire, because of its geographical position, was less easily defended than the Roman Empire. 13. Locate on the map facing page 376 the following commercial cities in the Arabian Empire: Samarkand; Cabul; Bokhara; Mosul; Kairwan; Fez; Seville; and Toledo. 14. Can you suggest any reason why the Arabs did little in painting and sculpture? 15. What are some of the best-known stories in the _Thousand and One Nights_? 16. Discuss the justice of this statement: "If our ideas and our arts go back to antiquity, all the inventions which make life easy and agreeable come to us from the Arabs." 17. "From the eighth to the twelfth century the world knew but two civilizations, that of Byzantium and that of the Arabs." Comment on this statement. 18. Show that Islam was an heir to the Graeco-Oriental civilization. 19. Can you suggest any reasons why Islam to-day spreads among the African negroes more rapidly than Christianity?