Mecca, the Forbidden.

New Zealand Graphic, Volume XLVII, Issue 2, 10 January 1912, Page 56

Mecca, the Forbidden.

Although one of the most inaccessible cities on earth Mecca each year has visitors in such number that it must be ranked in this particular with London and New York. Even the world’s metropolis on the Thames can boast no such cosmopolitan character as is imparted to this mysterious city in the. wilderness of Arabia by the myriads of pilgrims, who at the cost of incredible pains annually crowd into its confines. This city is the oldest place of resort in existence, yet of all 'the millions who have visited it not a score of Christians are known to have come out alive. No flag

of citizenship would save a man’s life were he known to be a Christian within the sacred precincts of the city, where the Prophet himself decreed that no unbeliever should set foot. Of the 225,000,000 Moslems in the world only 15,500,000 live under the Turkish flag, yet most of them acknowledge the Sultan of Turkey as their caliph, the successor of the' Prophet. As Mohammed shrewdly foresaw, the Mecca pilgrimage binds together his disciples into a unity which could be effected in no other way. “Mecca,” says Dr. Samuel M. Zwemer, of Arabia, '“has become the religious capital and the centre of universal pilgrimage for one-seventh of the human race.”