The Last Secrets by John Buchan

The "spell of far Arabia" has been a potent thing from the days when the Egyptians drew wealth from the spice-land of Punt, and Greek traders brought stories of the gums and jewels of Araby the Blessed. But ever since it became the Holy Land of Islam a veil of secrecy, other than that of its stern climate and inhospitable deserts, has descended upon it. It is one of the oldest of arenas of adventure, and it is still one of the least exploited; indeed, in its great Southern Desert it holds one of the few unriddled mysteries of the globe. Except for the semi-mythical Gregorio, who may be read of in Albuquerque's Commentaries, no one who did not profess the creed of Islam has entered its two Holy Cities and lived. But the greatest tale of Arabian exploration is not concerned with Mecca and Medina. It is to be found rather in the journeys of the English soldier Captain Sadlier in Nejd; of Sir Richard Burton in the land of Midian; of Wallin, who crossed the great Nafud sands; of William Gilford Palgrave, who may, or may not, have been an agent of Napoleon III.; and, above all, of Charles Montague Doughty, who, as an avowed Christian, explored the Northern Hedjaz, and in his _Arabia Deserta_ has written one of the foremost classics of travel in the English tongue.

Compared with some of these wanderings, a visit to the Holy Cities was a simple matter, requiring only a firm nerve, a good knowledge of Arabic and of Mohammedan ritual, and a real or professed adherence to the creed of Islam. At the beginning of this century the list of Europeans who had entered Mecca and Medina was a long one. They were mostly renegades -- French, English, Irish, Scottish, and Italian. In 1807 a certain Domingo Badia y Leblich of Cadiz, travelling as a Moslem prince called Ali Bey, and probably in the pay of Napoleon, entered Mecca in state; but he had become a genuine Mussulman. In 1815 one Thomas Keith, a deserter from the 72nd Highlanders, was Governor of Medina -- surely one of the strangest posts ever held even by a Scot! The great European travellers like Burckhardt, Wallin, and Burton went to the Holy Cities in order that by attaining the rank and fame of a Hadji they might win an advantage for travelling in other Moslem lands. More than one of them has described minutely the interior of both Mecca and Medina and the ritual of the great ceremonies. The Holy Places, though few Western eyes had seen them, were sufficiently well known to the Western world. Their true unveiling may be said to have come about during the Great War, when Hussein, the Sherif of Mecca, fought as an ally with the British, and, as King of the Hedjaz, proclaimed his independence of Turkey.