[p.353]their idols and openly to profess Al-Islam. The next season, Musab having made many converts, some say seventy, others three hundred, marched from Al-Madinah to Meccah for their pilgrimage; and there induced his followers to meet the Prophet at midnight upon the Steep near Muna. Mohammed preached to them their duties towards Allah and himself, especially insisting upon the necessity of warring down infidelity. They pleaded ancient treaties with the Jews of Al-Madinah, and showed apprehension lest the Apostle, after bringing them into disgrace with their fellows, should desert them and return to the faith of his kinsmen, the Kuraysh. Mohammed, smiling, comforted them with the assurance that he was with them, body and soul, for ever. Upon this they asked him what would be their reward if slain. He replied, "Gardens 'neath which the streams flow,"-that is to say, Paradise. Then, in spite of the advice of Al-Abbas, Mohammed's uncle, who was loud in his denunciations, they bade the Preacher stretch out his hand, and upon it swore the oath known as the "Great Fealty of the Steep." After comforting them with an Ayat, or Koranic verse, which promised heaven, the Apostle divided his followers into twelve bodies; and placing a chief at the head of each,[FN#23] dismissed them to their homes. He rejected the offer made by one of the party-namely, to slay all the idolaters present at the pilgrimage-saying that Allah had favoured him with no such order. For the same reason he refused their invitation to visit Al-Madinah, which was the principal object of their mission; and he then took an affectionate leave of them. [p.354]Two months and a half after the events above detailed, Mohammed received the inspired tidings that Al-Madinah of the Hijaz was his predestined asylum. In anticipation of the order, for as yet the time had not been revealed, he sent forward his friends, among whom were Omar, Talhah, and Hamzah, retaining with him Abu Bakr[FN#24] and Ali. The particulars of the Flight, that eventful accident to Al-Islam, are too well known to require mention here; besides which they belong rather to the category of general than of Madinite history. Mohammed was escorted into Al-Madinah by one Buraydat al-Aslami and eighty men of the same tribe, who had been offered by the Kuraysh a hundred camels for the capture of the fugitives. But Buraydat, after listening to their terms, accidentally entered into conversation with Mohammed; and no sooner did he hear the name of his interlocutor, than he professed the faith of Al-Islam. He then prepared for the Apostle a standard by attaching his turband to a spear, and anxiously inquired what house was to be honoured by the presence of Allah's chosen servant. "Whichever," replied Mohammed, "this she-camel[FN#25] is ordered to show me." At the last