them Al Asfar's daughters, Jidd ibn Qais, one of the Ansars, stood up and said, 'O Apostle of God, thou knowest the Ansars, and my admiration for women. And I am afraid, if I make a raid with thee and see the daughters of Al Asfar, I shall be led astray by them. Therefore leave me, and do not lead me astray.'" It is in complete accordance with Muhammad's conduct on this occasion that 'Abdu'llah Al Hashimi in Al Ma'mun's reign, in his letter to Al Kindi the Christian, in urging him to embrace Islam, uses no spiritual inducement, but speaks of the sensual delights of Paradise and all the good things here and hereafter offered by Islam, including permission to have four wives at a time as well as slave-girls, and entreats his Christian friend on this account to enter "this ¹ abiding, easy religion "

Another inducement to become Muslims was afforded by the prospect of plunder. That those who for this object joined Muhammad's banner were not disappointed is well known, but we give a few examples. 'Abdu'r Rahman, whom we have already mentioned as one of the Muhajirun, came to Medinah in great poverty. When he died, he left such a heap of gold that it was cut up with axes until people's hands bled with hacking at it. Besides this, he left 1,000 camels, large herds of cattle and flocks of sheep. Again, after the battle of Nahavand, the amount of booty taken by the Arabs was so enormous that, when the consecrated fifth had been removed, what remained gave every horseman of the Muslim army 6,000 darhams ² and every foot-soldier 2,000.

A very great deal of Muhammad's time between the Hijrah and his death was spent in planning and in taking part in expeditions for the purpose of enriching his supporters by plunder. Al Waqidi says that Muhammad was present in nineteen out of twenty-six or twenty-seven of these raids (غزوات). Ibn Athir ³ speaks

of thirty-five such expeditions, others count as many as forty-eight. Ibn Hisham is more probably correct in saying that they were ¹ twenty-seven altogether. Al Kindi states that Muhammad himself ² fought in nine such expeditions, but was present in twenty-six, besides some sorties by night. We need make no comment upon this part of Muhammad's conduct, but content ourselves with referring to what Al Kindi ³ says on the subject.

With reference to the motives which led to the spread of Islam at this period and for long after, it suffices for us to quote the following speech by the Khalifah Al Ma'mun. He said ⁴ on one occasion: "Verily, I know for certain that So-and-so and So-and-so . . . assume the outward mask of Islam, while they are devoid of a trace of it. And they look at me, and I know that their inward parts are indeed contrary to what they show forth outwardly . . . They are a people who enter Islam, not through inclination towards this religion of ours; but, on the contrary, they seek nearness to us and honour through the sovereignty of our realm. They have no insight into and no inclination for the correctness of that into which they have entered. And verily I know that their story is as the tale which the common people have made proverbial, that, as for the Jew, verily his Judaism is correct, and he keeps the enactments of the Torah and then professes Islam. And what is the story of these men in their being Magians and their professing to be Muslims but like the story of the Jew? And verily I indeed know that So-and-so and So-and-so . . . were Christians, and they became Muslims against their will: and they are not Muslims, nor are they Christians, but they are a mixture of both. What then is my device, and how shall I act? The curse of God be upon them all! . . . But I have a pattern in the