Ibn Battuta

Ibn Battuta is known as the great moslem traveler. He appeared to be designed by nature to be a great traveler. Romantic in his disposition, a great lover of the marvellous, and possessing a sufficient dash of superstition in his character to enable him everywhere to discover omens favourable to his wishes, the slightest motives sufficed to induce him to undertake at a day’s notice the most prodigious journeys, though he could reckon upon deriving from them nothing but the pleasure of seeing strange sights, or of believing that he was fulfilling thereby the secret intentions of Providence respecting him...

Ibn Battuta left his native city of Tangiers for the purpose of performing the pilgrimage in the year of the Hejira 725 (A. D. 1324-5). Traversing the Barbary States and the whole breadth of Northern Africa, probably in company with the great Mogrebine caravan which annually leaves those countries for Mecca, he arrived without meeting with any remarkable adventure in Egypt, where, according to the original design of his travels, he employed his time in visiting the numerous saints and workers of miracles with which that celebrated land abounded in those days. Among the most distinguished of these men then in Alexandria was the Imam Borhaneddin el Aaraj. Our traveler one day visiting this man, “Battuta,” said he, “I perceive that the passion of exploring the various countries of the earth hath seized upon thee!”—“I replied, Yes,” says the traveler, “though I had at that time no intention of extending my researches to very distant regions.”—“I have three brothers,” continued the saint, “of whom there is one in India, another in Sindia, and the third in China. You must visit those realms, and when you see my brothers, inform them that they are still affectionately remembered by Borhaneddin.”—“I was astonished at what he said,” observes Battuta, “and determined within myself to accomplish his desires.” He in fact regarded the expressions of this holy man as a manifestation of the will of Heaven.