Mohammed, overjoyed at this unexpected good fortune and completely oblivious to the major part played by the insects, rightly gave thanks to Allah. But new, and even more sinister, events impended. Within a few months death deprived him of the loyal protection of Abu Talib and the tender ministrations of Khadija. He comforted his wife’s dying hours with the assurance that she, together with three other well-known women--the Virgin Mary, Potiphar’s wife, and “Kulthum, Moses’ sister”--would occupy his chamber in Paradise; but all he could conscientiously promise his expiring uncle was that he would inhabit the coolest, or at any rate the least hot, regions in Hell. The contingent deaths of these two made the Prophet’s position very precarious: Khadija had constantly nerved him to face the severest trials, and Abu Talib had just as constantly kept the number of those trials down. Abu Talib, in fact, was barely in his grave when the populace of Mecca cast dust on Mohammed’s head; and he therefore betook himself to At-Taif, a city some seventy miles east of Mecca, to test its possibilities as a refuge. Arriving there early in 620, he was much disconcerted to learn that none of its inhabitants had even so much as heard of his ten-year-old mission; and when he attempted to enlighten them, the sheiks and their groundlings merely sneered in open contempt. He then besought them not to divulge his religious views--an exhibition of invaliant diplomacy that caused the people to hoot and hurl stones at him, until he fled from the city with blood flowing down his legs. Utterly cast down in spirit, he spent the next two months in seclusion at Mecca. During the pilgrimage month of Dhul-Hijja, while he was addressing the crowds of visitors in his usual way, a coincidence of measureless significance occurred. Mohammed chanced to notice a little group of men whom he recognized as inhabitants of Medina. [Illustration: V] THE HEGIRA I