These fanatics—the French called them “Meccans”—were answering a call for help Murad had sent to the religious leaders of Jedda, and they served themselves up as willing cannon fodder, astonishing witnesses like Denon with their sacrifice. Napoleon later wrote of them: “Their ferocity is equaled only by the misery of their standard of life, exposed as they are, day by day, to the hot sand, the burning sun, without water.”
