es of comparison.
Catholicism, is not, of course, schismatic, otherwise there are points
of resemblance, such as observances of saints and shrines, which have
permeated the other sects to a certain extent; also the degree of
antagonism is about the same. Therefore we can ignore the Catholic
Church in this chapter, and when we are talking of pan-Islam we should
consider it a Sunnite (or Orthodox) movement, and count the Shiites out,
as they do not even recognise the same centre of pilgrimage.

Perhaps the strongest factor in pan-Islam as a political movement or a
world-wide fellowship is the Meccan pilgrimage. I have already alluded
to its cosmopolitan nature in the previous chapter, but never realised
it so much till after the surrender of Jeddah, when stately Bokhariots,
jabbering Javanese, Malays, Chinese, Russians, American citizens and
South Africans were among those who beset me as stranded pilgrims. This
implies a very wide sphere of influence, against which we can only set
the well-known immorality and greed which pilgrims complain of at Mecca;
a huge influx of cosmopolitan visitors to _any_ centre will generally
cause such abuses. On the feast of Arafat there are normally 100,000
pilgrims in the Meccan area who represent 100 million orthodox Moslems
throughout the world, while the actual population of the city is only
50,000.

The Arabic language is another strong bond of brotherhood in Islam. I do
not mean to say that it is generally "understanded of the people," any
more than Latin is throughout the Catholic world; but it is the language
of most Sunnites and is moderately understood in Somaliland, East
Africa, Java and the Malay peninsula as the language of the Koran; in
fact, it is the only written language in Somaliland, and Turkey uses the
script though not the tongue.

The daily observances of prayer, with their simple but obligatory
ceremonial, and the yearly fast for the month of Ramadhan unite Moslems
with the common ties of duty and hardship, as in the comradeship which
sailors and soldiers have for each other throughout the world.

Then, again, there is no colour-line in Islam; a negro may rise to place
and power (he often does), and usually enjoys the intimate confidence of
his master as not readily amenable to local intrigue. Difference of
nationality is not stressed except by the Young Turks, who have slighted
Semitic Moslems to their own undoing. Contrast this attitude with our
Church and esti