CH.VII OVEKCOMING DIFFICULTIES 83 



of his followers was to practise this rite any more. 

 Perhaps, considering that his followers, like the 

 other Arabs, lived chiefly on dates, it would have 

 been wiser to have made the experiment on one 

 date-palm, to be sure that it was only a foolish 

 ceremony, but Mohammed was an enthusiast, and 

 enthusiasts do not always stop to think. 



His fiat went forth then no branch of the 

 wild date is to be brought into the garden of a 

 believer. They must stand idly by while the 

 unbelievers carry out the operation as usual. He 

 was obeyed ; he knew how to make himself obeyed, 

 but in all the gardens of his followers no date 

 swelled and set, no fruit hung from the tree in 

 harvest -time. All the months when the un- 

 believers' dates were growing amber-coloured and 

 translucent on the trees, the Mohammedans must 

 needs stand aside and watch the unfertilised flower 

 clusters wither on their own trees, must see in their 

 store-chambers the pile of last year's dried dates 

 slowly diminish, knowing that no luscious, sugary 

 fruits would come to take the place of the old. 

 We must admit that it was a severe trial of faith ! 



But Mohammed, who did not lack resourceful- 

 ness, just at the time when starvation was beginning 

 to stare his followers in the face, issued a new edict, 

 that Allah permitted the true believers to pillage 

 the caravans of the outside world. It was this 



