In the world-famous city of Mecca, two men stood by the arch that leads to the immortal Caaba.
They were engaged in an earnest conversation, heedless of everything about them, when the distant cry of a camel driver sounded on the still air.
Both of the men started and looked at each other in surprise. One of them said:
"A caravan at the gate at this time of day!" for it was several hours past midday and a caravan, in the ordinary course of things, reaches a city gate during the night or very early in the morning.
Arabia was seeing troubled times, and every one was on the alert for anything out of the accepted rule.
The camel-driver's cry was repeated. The first speaker remarked:
"They have left the burdened camels at the Moabede gate and are entering the city."
With an anxious look upon his face the elder of the two replied, "Either they have been hard pressed by an enemy or it is important news which brings them over the desert in such haste, in this insufferable heat."
The two men were evidently of great importance in the holy city. They were surrounded by powerful black slaves, who had all that they could do to keep the passers-by from pressing too close upon the elder man, in a desire to touch the hem of his garment. Many, in passing, knelt and touched their foreheads to the ground. Thus they waited the coming caravan.
The first camel of an important caravan is led by a man who walks before it, through the narrow streets of a city, and his cry is to warn the crowd to clear the way; there being no sidewalks, and, indeed, but very little street.
"There it comes," said the younger of the two, as the long line of drowsy camels appeared, swinging, swinging, swinging along the narrow street.
"Led by a white camel," added the elder, and they both looked down the street.
The lead-camel was larger than the rest--much larger, and very much lighter colored; a sort of dingy white, like a sheep before shearing. The chief of the caravan sat upon his back, as unmindful of everything as though he were still upon the trackless sand.
It is not impossible that the sheik was really sleeping, and unconsciously grasping his ugly lance, while his Damascus blade hung ready by his side.
He roused in a moment, however, for with many a grunt and groan the great, ungainly, and yet very stately, ships of the desert came slowly and drowsily to anchor in the court before the Caaba.