Jinni also inhabit the lakes in the Gara mountains, and it is considered dangerous to wet your feet in them, for you will catch a fever. We could not induce the Bedouin to gather a water-plant we coveted in one of them for this reason. They inhabit, too, the caves where the people dwell, and have to be propitiated with suitable offerings. In fact, the fear of jinni, and the skill of certain magicians in keeping them friendly, are the only tangible form of religion that we could discover amongst them. When at the coast villages they outwardly conform to the Mohammedan customs, but when away in their mountains they abandon them altogether. During the time we were with them they never performed either the prayers or the ablutions required by the Moslem creed, and the only thing approaching a religious festival amongst them that we heard of, is an annual festival held by the Garas in November by the side of one of their lakes, to which all the members of the different families repair, and at which a magician sits on a rock in the centre of a group of dancing Bedouin, to propitiate, with certain formulas, the jinni of the lake. Amongst the Bedouin of the Hadhramout we noticed the same absence of religious observances and the same superstitious dread of jinni, but at the same time I fully believe they have their own sacred places and festivals, which they conceal as much as possible from the fanatical Moslems who dwell amongst them. A Bedouin never fasts during Ramazan, and does not object to do his work during the month of abstinence, but he goes to mosque and says his prayers when occasion brings him to the coast. It seems to me a curious coincidence that in many other Mohammedan countries we have visited we have come across the same story of concealed religion as practised by the nomad races. We have the Ali-Ullah-hi in the Persian mountains, about whose secret rites horrible stories are told; we have the Ansairi and the Druses in the Lebanon, and the nomad Yourouks of Asia Minor, and the Duenmeh of Salonika, about all of whom the strict Mohammedans of the towns tell you exactly the same story that we heard about the Bedouin of Southern Arabia. They are all looked upon as heathen by the Moslems, and accredited with secret rites and ceremonies about which no definite knowledge can be gained; and thus it would seem that throughout the length and breadth of Islam there are survivals of more ancient cults which the followers of Mohammed have never been able to eradicate, cults which no doubt would offer points of vast interest to the anthropologist if it were possible to unravel the mysteries which surround them. We were for ever hearing stories of jinni amongst the Gara Bedouin, and all we could gather was that when propitiated they are friendly to the human race. Old Sheikh Sehel and his men stuck to it that they had constantly seen jinni, and their belief in them seems deeply rooted. This word is pronounced ghinni in Southern Arabia.