Hulagu withdrew to the village of Vakaf, some distance from Bagdad, because the air of the city had grown pestilential and loathsome. He summoned Mostassim. The trembling Kalif asked Ibn Alkamiya if there was no way of salvation. “My beard is long,” replied the vizir, referring to a taunt of the chancellor. [15] The Kalif and his eldest son were placed each in a felt sack, and trampled to death under horse hoofs. Mostassim’s attendants were cut down, and slaughtered by various methods. Next day the youngest son of the Kalif died, and all of the Abbasids whose names were on the list of that ruling family were then put to death. The Kalif, whose mother was an Ethiopian slave, was the thirty-seventh of his line. He was forty-six years of age when he died, February 21, 1258, after a reign of fifteen years. Hulagu appointed new dignitaries for Bagdad. The old vizir, Ibn Alkamiya, was continued in office. Among new men was one quite deserving of notice; this was Ben Amran, prefect of a place east of Bagdad and touching it. This man had been a servant to the governor of Yakuba. One day when stroking the soles of that governor’s feet to bring sleep to him Ben Amran himself began to slumber. Roused by his master he said that he had just had a marvelous vision. “What was it like?” asked the governor. “I thought that Mostassim and the Kalifat were gone, and that I was the governor of Bagdad.” His master gave him in answer a kick of such force that he fell over backward. Being in Bagdad during the siege days Ben Amran heard that provisions were scarce in the camp of the Mongols. He tied a letter to an arrow and shot it over the wall with this message: “If Hulagu would learn something of value let him send for Ben Amran.” The letter was taken to the Mongol, and he sent for Ben Amran. The Kalif, who was foolish in all things, permitted the man to go from the city. When brought to the chief of the Mongols he declared that he could obtain a great stock of provisions. Hulagu, though not greatly believing his phrases, sent him off with an officer; Ben Amran took the man to large underground granaries near Yakuba where there was wheat enough to supply all the Mongols for a fortnight, and thus he enabled Hulagu to continue the siege without trouble. Ben Amran received the reward of his treachery, and now was made prefect. Ibn Alkamiya, the vizir, was accused of treason both before the fall of the city, and afterward. For a long time the books used in schools bore this sentence: “Cursed of God be he who curses not Ibn Alkamiya.” On the Friday next after the death of the Kalif these words were pronounced in place of the usual invocation: “Praise to God who has destroyed high existences, and condemned to nonentity dwellers in this abode (of humanity). O God, assist us in woes such as Islam has never experienced: but we belong to God and return to Him.”