On arriving at Medina, Burton became the guest of one of the company he had met at Suez, and during his stay of a month in the city performed all the religious ceremonies and visitations which are prescribed for the pilgrim. He gives the following description of the Prophet’s mosque: “Passing through muddy streets—they had been freshly watered before evening time—I came suddenly upon the mosque. Like that at Mecca, the approach is choked up by ignoble buildings, some actually touching the holy ‘enceinte,’ others separated by a lane compared with which the road around St. Paul’s is a Vatican square. There is no outer front, no general aspect of the Prophet’s mosque; consequently, as a building it has neither beauty nor dignity. And entering the Bab el-Rahmah—the Gate of Pity—by a diminutive flight of steps, I was astonished at the mean and tawdry appearance of a place so universally venerated in the Moslem world. It is not like the Meccan mosque, grand and simple—the expression of a single sublime idea; the longer I looked at it the more it suggested the resemblance of a museum of second-rate art, a curiosity-shop, full of ornaments that are not accessories, and decorated with pauper splendor.” [Picture: View of Medina from the West] We must also quote the traveller’s account of his manner of spending the day during his residence in Medina: “At dawn we arose, washed, prayed, and broke our fast upon a crust of stale bread, before smoking a pipe, and drinking a cup of coffee. Then it was time to dress, to mount, and to visit the Haram in one of the holy places outside the city. Returning before the sun became intolerable, we sat together, and with conversation, shishas and chibouques, coffee and cold water perfumed with mastich-smoke, we whiled away the time till our _ariston_, an early dinner which appeared at the primitive hour of 11 A.M. The meal was served in the _majlis_ on a large copper tray sent from the upper apartments. Ejaculating ‘Bismillah’—the Moslem grace—we all sat round it, and dipped equal hands in the dishes set before us. We had usually unleavened bread, different kinds of meat and vegetable stews, and at the end of the first course plain boiled rice, eaten with spoons; then came the fruits, fresh dates, grapes, and pomegranates. After dinner I used invariably to find some excuse—such as the habit of a ‘Kaylúlah’ (midday siesta), or the being a ‘Saudawi,’ or person of melancholy temperament, to have a rug spread in the dark passage, and there to lie reading, dozing, smoking, or writing, all through the worst part of the day, from noon to sunset. Then came the hour for receiving and paying visits. The evening prayers ensued, either at home or in the Haram, followed by our supper, another substantial meal like the dinner, but more plentiful, of bread, meat, vegetables, rice, and fruits. In the evening we sometimes dressed in common clothes and went to the café; sometimes on festive