ISLAM'S HOLY PLACES

Evening Post, Volume CXVIII, Issue 54, 1 September 1934, Page 24

ISLAM'S HOLY PLACES

The Holy Places of Islam have been written about before, but. never from the point of view of a Western woman convert to Islam. Therefore Lady Evelyn Cobboid's "Pilgrimage to Mecca" (John Murray) is unique. She has had experiences in her pilgrimage to Mecca, and has visited sacred places under circumstances which have never : before been permitted. She describes fully and graphically what shesaw and heard in Jeddah, Mecca, and Medina, the. notable people whom she mot and' the religious ceremonies. She explains the reasons of her belief in Islam and throws new light on its history and doctrines, its aims and outlook. The striking illustrations give additional interest to a most unusual book.

In these days wo take it as a matter of course and are no longer oven faintly surprised when we hear of women crossing Syrian deserts and living for months at a time in tho tents of Arab and Bedouin chiefs, but in the eighteenth century such activities were not associated with ladies brought up in the, sophistication of the Court of George HX' Lady Hester Stanhope, a fresh biography of whom, has been writton by Joan Haslip and published by Cobden-Sanderson, howevr, was. in 1813; crowned, Queen of tho Arabs under the columns of Zenobia's temple. For nearly thirty' years did this • fantastic woman (daughter of a Jacobin Earl, niece of William Pitt, and hostess of Downing Street), brought up in the I atmosphere of a Kentish manor, courted and flattered by the brilliant London j society of her day,, live and finally die in a half-ruined castle on the heights of Mount Lebanon. Miss Haslip has not confined her biography to the better-known and dramatic later years of Lady Hester's life, but in addition has given an admirable picture of the early years in London and elsewhere, in which characters as well known and diverse as William Pitt, Beau Brummell, General Sir John Moore, Canning, Byron, and Mehemet Ali form a very complete background to the story she has: to. tell. The book is fully illustrated with collotype plates.