Before the time of the Prophet the ground on which the Harem is now situated belonged to several landlords of the tribe of Kuraish, who laid great store by the property on account of its proximity to the House of God. To Omar, the second Caliph, the idea of extending the Harem first occurred, and it was he who built the walls round it. The gates were erected by Abdullah Zobair. Thenceforward every Caliph and every Sultán made a point of beautifying the sacred enclosure until it came at last to wear its present appearance. However, considering the enormous sums contributed by the quick and the dead on purpose to keep it in repair it is being shamefully neglected in this year of the Flight. How the priests who batten on the fund can find it in their consciences to watch the decay of their surroundings without loosening their purse-strings in order to check it is a source of wonder to many a child of Islám. They are “resigned,” these unrighteous stewards, for no other reason than because theirs is a bed of roses. “After us the Deluge” is their motto, and it cannot be denied that of all the sacred places of the Faith that of the Harem, situated as it is in the gap of the surrounding cliffs and dipping as it does towards the centre where the Ka’bah stands, is the best adapted to be a target to the winds and the rain. For the floods, when they descend, rush down the flights of steps of the gateways and inundate the open sanctuaries, and that is why the Ka’bah has been so often destroyed and rebuilt in the course of the centuries. These priests of the Harem may be as wise as serpents where their own interests are involved, but they are not so harmless as doves where those of the Faithful in general clamour for redress. Talking of the Deluge reminds me of the pigeons that strut about the floor of the Harem or wing their flight above its sacred buildings. They are the prettiest birds imaginable, and so tame that they will come and perch on the pilgrims’ shoulders and feed out of their hands. In colour they are of a blueish brown, with deeper spots of the same colour on their breasts and backs. They have grey rings round their necks, and their wings are streaked with black lines. A traditionist says that to feed one of these birds is to ensure to one’s self a sumptuous palace in heaven; whereas to kill one of them is as bad as committing homicide, and meets with the same punishment hereafter. The consequence of this belief is that there are crowds of women whose business it is to sell grain to the pilgrims for the Harem pigeons, about twenty grains of wheat in a box costing not less than one piastre. The tradition was that the pigeons never alighted on the domes and minarets of the Harem, but hovered above them, like guardian angels. The fact that the sanctuaries now stand in frequent need of whitewashing is taken to be a proof of the growing wickedness of the people, and a certain sign that the Day of Judgment is at hand.