We waited about five minutes for the intervening pilgrims to ride on in single file, and when we reached the spot it was to find that the road lay between two rocks some four feet apart. One of my friends, quoting a well-worn proverb, bent towards me and remarked: “Why do they not remove those stones out of the path of the Faithful?” Seyyid ’Alí observed a priest in front of him, and replied significantly, “I behold a bigger stone in my path!” The priest, who was reading the Kurán atop of his camel, overheard the words, and tugged his camel round that he might face the sceptical rascal. The camel made a vicious snap at Seyyid ’Alí’s mule. The mule, finding itself between two fires--the rock on the one side and the camel on the other--sat down on its haunches; and my guide, crying out the word, “Astaghferallah,” came a cropper, striking his head against a stone. The upper portion of his íhram fell off. “Was it you, Seyyid ’Alí who fell?” cried Sheykh Eissa. Seyyid ’Alí, all bruised and bleeding, crept from under the mule’s legs, and picked up his sacred habit. “Astaghferallah!” he replied; “it was not I who fell. It was my íhram. Unfortunately I happened to be in it.” A burst of laughter followed and then a shrill scream. “I verily believe,” said Sheykh Eissa, addressing me, “that your guide would make a kitten ‘eat a dozen sticks’ if it mispronounced the Arabic letter ‘ain’ in the feline word ‘maou! maou!’” But I had turned whence the scream had come and made him no reply. My guide’s mishap, as I saw on looking ahead, had excited the compassion of a lady in a palanquin. She was a Meccan. No sooner did she see the blood than she uttered a shriek of deepest commiseration. Then she recovered herself, and cooed out a couple of orders. Her warmth of heart was now as evident as had been her emotional susceptibility. In one breath she summoned her husband and sent him to Seyyid ’Alí with an offer of a certain famous prescription for wounds and bruises. In the next she implored her _moghavem_ to ransack on one of the camels a chest that contained, among other things, a small bottle of scorpion oil. It was the remedy in question. This is the way it is prepared: the stings having been extracted, a couple of black scorpions are dried in the sun, are then put in a bottle holding about half a pint of castor-oil, and in this they are kept corked up for the space of a year. The unwilling Arab made demur, pleading that the delay would inconvenience the pilgrims behind her own caravan; but she reduced him to obedience with a look. “Be sharp!” she crooned, as he swung reluctantly on his heel; so sweet was her voice that without another sign of hesitation he leaped forward to carry out her wishes. The camel was made to kneel down by the wayside; then the chest was overhauled. By the time her husband had returned the precious oil was found and given to him. “Take it,” she said, still gazing in ’Alí’s countenance