angel Gabriel had not happened by the merest good luck to be there to

seize it, it would have done it. Very few people have a grip like

Gabriel--the prints of his monstrous fingers, two inches deep, are to be

seen in that rock to-day.

This rock, large as it is, is suspended in the air. It does not touch

any thing at all. The guide said so. This is very wonderful. In the

place on it where Mahomet stood, he left his foot-prints in the solid

stone. I should judge that he wore about eighteens. But what I was

going to say, when I spoke of the rock being suspended, was, that in the

floor of the cavern under it they showed us a slab which they said

covered a hole which was a thing of extraordinary interest to all

Mohammedans, because that hole leads down to perdition, and every soul

that is transferred from thence to Heaven must pass up through this

orifice. Mahomet stands there and lifts them out by the hair. All

Mohammedans shave their heads, but they are careful to leave a lock of

hair for the Prophet to take hold of. Our guide observed that a good

Mohammedan would consider himself doomed to stay with the damned

forever

if he were to lose his scalp-lock and die before it grew again. The most

of them that I have seen ought to stay with the damned, any how, without

reference to how they were barbered.

For several ages no woman has been allowed to enter the cavern where that

important hole is. The reason is that one of the sex was once caught

there blabbing every thing she knew about what was going on above ground,

659

The Innocents Abroad