Throughout this whole account we notice that Ibn Hisham is scrupulously careful to give us the very words which his predecessor Ibn Ishaq had used in his narrative. We have therefore something definite to go upon in considering the history and beliefs of these reformers, and especially of Zaid, whose touching story and whose noble verses show what an influence for good he might have exercised upon Muhammad. We shall see reason to believe that he did exercise ¹ a certain amount of influence, and we may well wish it had had more effect upon Muhammad's life and character.

Ibn Hisham, again on Ibn Ishaq's authority,

informs us that Al Khattab, who was Zaid's uncle, reproved the latter for abandoning the religion of his people, and persecuted him to such an extent that he was unable to live in Mecca any longer. He seems to have travelled in other parts of the country, but at last took up his residence in a cave on Mount Hira ¹. There he lived to a great age, and when he died he was buried at the foot of the mountain. His death is said to have occurred only five years before Muhammad first put forth, in A.D. 612, his claim to the prophetic office. Now Ibn Ishaq tells us that it was the custom of the Quraish "in the Days of Ignorance" to leave the city and spend a month upon Mount Hira — the month of Ramadan, as he implies — every year in the practice of penance (tahnannuth) ². It is clear that it was in consequence of this custom that Muhammad afterwards selected the whole of that particular month to be observed by his followers for ever as a time of abstinence. As it fell in summer in his time, this retreat may have been a welcome change to the wealthier members of the community, who were thus enabled to leave for a time the hot and close streets of an