The streets were packed with camels, brought in thousands by the Bedouins and by the Syrian and the Egyptian drivers. Round about the Harem the _moghavems_ tried our endurance to the utmost. These are the men who conduct the pilgrims by camel caravan to the Hill of Arafat and back, supplying all their needs on the journey. There is no fixed price for the hiring of a camel, but by dint of persistent bargaining it is possible to get one for five shillings, and each _moghavem_ may have as many as fifty pilgrims under him. We were tormented by these contractors more than I had ever been tormented by the Indian jugglers outside the gates of any hotel in Bombay. They were as plentiful as flies in Egypt and not less irritating. Perhaps that is the fault of the pilgrims themselves. They begin by feigning indifference, and when they have reduced the _moghavems_ to a haughty silence they assume an air of eager business. Thus the _moghavems_ have learned from experience never to take no for an answer. Out of the madding crowd the talk was all of the cholera epidemic. On my way to a coffee-house I happened to meet a Turkish official, an acquaintance of mine, and he gave it as his conviction that the death-rate had risen to over five hundred victims a day. He advised me to leave the Valley of Mina at sunset on the tenth of the moon. In the coffee-house a Syrian pilgrim entered into conversation with me. He told many stories of his pilgrimage across the desert: of the discomforts and the perils of the road, of the cruelties of the drivers, and the almost inconceivable presumption of his own _moghavem_. With the immense caravan had come the Syrian Mahmil, in the charge of a Pasha, and the Surreh, in the care of another Turkish dignitary. This Surreh is the pension sent from Constantinople to the officials of the Harem. It was formerly the accumulated hoard of centuries of legacies. It is now managed by the Imperial Treasury. A strong force of cavalry accompanied the caravan, which, according to the pilgrim in question, counted some eighteen thousand camels. The number stated was, perhaps, an exaggeration, though a pardonable one, for the string which I saw on reaching the Plain of Sheykh Mahmud, where the caravan had been encamped, and which was now on the move, extended for miles and miles. I determined then and there to avoid the crush on the road by remaining in Mecca until the day was far spent. It was four hours before sunset ere I could tear myself away from the Plain of Sheykh Mahmud. The endless string of camels and of pilgrim wayfarers was an unforgettable sight, and on my return to my host’s house I met crowds of Syrian and Egyptian stragglers, mounted and on foot, proceeding up the Moalla to rejoin the immense caravan which was already threading its way to the mountains.