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the town, took up his quarters at the house of Hareth, one of the principal inhabitants, and here met with a reception which eventually cost him his life. Zeinab, the daughter of Hareth, while preparing a meal for the conqueror and his attendants, inserted a quantity of poison into a shoulder of mutton which was served up at the table. Ba shar, a companion of Mohammed, had scarcely. began to eat of it, before he was seized with convulsions, and died upon the spot. Mohammed, by spitting out the greatest part of what he had taken into his mouth, escaped immediate death, but the effects of the fatal drug had entered his system, and, resisting every effort of medicine to expel or counteract it, in somewhat more than three years afterward it brought him to his end. If, as the reporters of Mohammed's miracles affirm, the shoulder of mutton informed the prophet of its being poisoned, it is certain the intelligence came too late. The seeds of death were henceforth effectually sown in his constitution; and his own decline ever after kept pace with his growing power. When Zeinab was asked, how she had dared to perpetrate a deed of such unparalleled enormity, she is said to have answered, "that she was determined to make trial of his powers as a prophet: if he were a true prophet," said she, he would know that the meat was poisoned; if not, it would be a favour to the world to rid it of such a tyrant." It is not agreed among the Mohammedan writers what was the punishment inflicted upon this second Jael, or whether she suffered any. Some affirm that she was pardoned; others that she was put to death,

The progress of the prophet's disease was not such as to prevent him from prosecuting that successful course of conquests in which he was now engaged. The Jews, the constant objects of his vengeance, again tempted his victorious sword. He proceeded against Beder, Watiba, and Selalima; places which he brought under subjection, permitting their inhabitants to retain possession on condition of paying him one half the product of their date-trees as an annual tribute. On these terms they remained undisturbed in their towns and villages during the lifetime of the prophet; till at length, in the reign of Omar, who pretended that Mohammed in his last sickness had given him a charge not to permit two religions to coexist in Arabia, they were all expelled from their ancient settlements.

CHAPTER XIII.

Mohammed alleges a Breach of Faith on the part of the Meccans, and marches an Army against them-The City surrendered to the Conqueror-Abu Sophyan and Al Abbas, the Prophet's Uncle, declare themselves Converts-Mecca declared to be Holy Ground-The neighbouring Tribes collect an Army of four thousand men to arrest the growing power of the Prophet-The Confederates entirely overthrown -A rival Prophet arises in the person of Moseilama-Is crushed by Caled

Two years had scarcely elapsed when Mohammed accused the Meccans of violating the truce, and made their alleged breach of faith a pretence for summoning an army of ten thousand men with a design to make himself master of the city. He was now strong, and his enemies were weak. His superstitious reverence for the city of his birth, and the temple it contained, served to influence his determination for war. The time since the concluding of the truce had been skilfully employed in seducing the adherents of the Koreish, and converting to his religion, or enticing under his standard, the chief citizens of Mecca. By forced marches he urged his large army rapidly towards the city, and so unexpectedly was the place invested by the Moslem troops, that they had scarcely time to put themselves in a posture of defence before they were driven to such extremities, that the surrender of the city at discretion, or total destruction, seemed to be the only alternative. In these cir

cumstances the former step was resolved upon, humiliating as it was, and Abu Sophyan, the former inveterate enemy of Mohammed and his religion, accompanied by Al Abbas, an uncle of the impostor, came forth and presented the keys of the city to the conqueror. Nor was this all: they both crowned their submission by bowing to the prophetic claims of their new master, and acknowledging him as the apostle of God. This we may suppose was a constrained admission, made under the uplifted scimitar of the furious Omar, and yielded as the price of life. Mohammed, though a conqueror and an impostor, was not habitually cruel; his anger was directed rather against the gods of his country, than its inhabitants. The chiefs of the Koreish prostrated themselves before him, and earnestly demanded mercy at his hands. "What mercy can you expect from the man you have wronged?" exclaimed the prophet. "We confide in the generosity of our kinsman." shall not confide in vain," was the generous or politic reply of Mohammed. "Be gone; you are safe; you are free." They were thenceforth left unmolested, and places of honour and trust were still confided to them. On his entry into the city, of which he had now made himself absolute master with the sacrifice of only three men and two women, whom he ordered to be executed, he proceeded to purge the Caaba of its three hundred and sixty idols, and to consecrate that temple anew to the purposes of his religion. The apostle again fulfilled the duties of a pilgrim, and a per

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petual law was enacted, that no unbeliever should dare to set his foot on the territory of the holy city. On the day on which the prophet entered Mecca in triumph, he ordered Belal, his crier, to mount to the top of the temple at noon, and from thence to call the people to prayer for the first time under the new institution. This custom has been religiously observed in Mohammedan countries from that day to the present; the crier, who is called muezzin, still giving the people notice of the hour of prayer from the minarets of their

mosques.

When the news of the conquest of Mecca reached the neighbouring tribes of Arabs, the Hawazins, Takifians, and others, hastily assembled a force amounting to about four thousand men, with the design of crushing the usurper before his dangerous power had attained to any greater height. Mohammed, appointing a temporary governor of the city, marched out with an army of no less than twelve thousand men, and met the enemy in the valley of Honein, three miles from Mecca, on the way to Tayef. The Moslems, seeing themselves so vastly superior in point of numbers, were inspired with a presumptuous confidence of victory, which had like to have resulted in their ruin. In the first encounter, the confederates rushed upon the faithful with such desperate valour, that they put nearly the whole army to flight, many of them retreating back to the walls of Mecca itself. Mohammed, mounted on a white mule, with a few of his faithful followers at his side, boldly maintained

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