"From what I had witnessed, I became convinced that Mohammad would conquer in the end, and I persisted in demanding a safe-conduct proving that he granted me his pardon and that there no longer existed any cause for enmity between him and me. Obeying his orders, Abu Bakr made out, on a piece of leather, the document I claimed. It saved my life during the Taif expedition. I then turned back. Once more in Makkah, I told my black slave and all my fellow-citizens--who had guessed the motives governing my journey--that I had seen nothing, and I cursed the information that had led me to set out on such a useless and fatiguing expedition." [Sidenote: THE PROPHET'S ARRIVAL AT QUBA (_June 28th A.D. 622_)] Thanks to the inconceivable rapidity with which news travels in Arabian countries, the Mussulmen of Yasrib had already heard of the Prophet's departure and that he intended to rejoin them. Quoth one among them: "Every day, after the morning prayer, we go to the Hira, a burning plain, covered with scattered black pebbles and which stretches out south-west of the town. There, our hands shading our eyes from the dazzling sun, we gaze as far as our sight permits, hoping to catch sight of Allah's Apostle. We turn not back in the direction of our dwellings until high noon, doubly defeated by the blaze of the perpendicular rays of the sun and their reverberation on white sand and calcined stones. "One day, among all these days of overwhelming heat, we had just returned, when a Jew, noted for the extraordinary acuity of his sight, made out, from the top of one of the towers on the ramparts, a caravan consisting of a few men in white garb, mounted on camels. They seemed rising and falling, driven to and fro by the eddying mirage. "Guessing that he saw the Prophet and his companions, the Jew turned round in the direction of the city. 'O Assembly of the Arabs!' he shouted in resouding accents, 'the good luck ye did expect hath come at last!' "Awakened from our siesta, we rushed in the direction of the caravan. It was encamped at the foot of a solitary palm-tree, a few paces off the Quba oasis. With Abu Bakr, the Prophet was resting in the shade of this tree. As both appeared to be about the same age, and considering that the majority had never met Allah's Apostle, we hesitated, not knowing to whom of the couple we should pay homage. "Just then, the palm's scanty shade having changed its direction, the sunlight fell on the face of one of the travellers. Thereupon, we noticed the other rise to his feet and stretch his mantle over the head of his companion, to protect him from the rays of the orb of day. Thus an end was put to our hesitation."