"دليل الخليج. مجلد I. القسم التاريخي. الأجزاء Iأ و Iب. ج.ج. لوريمر ١٩١٥" [‎١‎٠‎٦‎٦] (١٧٨٢/١٢٢١)

1066
was probably not lees than £10,000 a year. It was a favourable
point in the Wahhabi fiscal system that irregular extortions and forced
gifts were not permitted ; and Sa'ud, at the worst, was only suspected of
occasionally taking- steps to bring about the forfeiture by legal means of a
mare which he particularly coveted. The Wahhabi ruler had no currency
of his own and dollars were the principal medium of exchange in Najd,
but Turkish coin was rejected and treated as abominable.
Military Warfare was conducted by the Wahhabis on Bedouin principles.
WahhabL^ 6 f rom tlie Amir's mercenary bodyguard or Manjiyah of about
300 men, and from the retinues of his sons, there was no standing
force; but every man between the ages of 18 and 60 was a soldier and was
liable to render military service against those who had not accepted the
reformed faith, whenever he might be called upon to do so. At times only a
proportion, at times the whole, of the military strength of a particular
district was called out; and very heavy fines were levied on those who,
after being summoned, neglected to appear. This compulsory service in
the field was probably the most unpopular feature of Wahhabi rule, at
least with the settled population ; and it fell so severely upon the owners of
mares that many sold their animals, and the number of horses available
in Najd became by degrees considerably reduced. The matchlock men of
the towns and villages were a corps d*elite and took a leading part in the
sack of Karbala. Substitutes might be hired by those called out for
service except when the levy was universal. The Wahhabi soldier proceed
ing to the front was required to provide, in addition to his arms and a horse
or camel, his rations for the campaign; these were fixed at 100 lbs. of
flour, 50 or 60 lbs. of dates, 20 lbs. of butter, a sack of wheat of barley for
his animal, and a skin for water. The Wahhabi military system was a
good one for raids and incursions, but it supplied no men for the permanent
occupation of foreign conquests ; and, in fact, no regular Wahhabi garrison
was ever maintained abroad for any length of time except at Madinah.
The Wahhabis certainly excelled in those destructive raids on which they
relied for breaking the spirit of their adversaries, and these they carried out
with extraordinary secrecy and despatch, the leader generally assembling
his men at an unlikely rallying place and moving off at first in a false
direction. In a great invasion of the Syrian Hauran, in 1810, the Wahhabi
forces marched for 35 days before reaching their objective and looted a
large number of villages before the Pasha of Damascus, who had only two
days notice of their approach^ could make any defensive preparations. The
courage of the Wahhabi in war was stimulated by a belief that his soul,
ed fighting, went stiaight to Paradise; and he was chiefly terrible