Damascus, as a thank-offering for his victories over the Crusaders.
This great institution completely overshadowed all the earlier Moslem
hospitals in size and in the completeness of its equipment. It was
furnished with facilities for teaching, and was conducted for several
centuries in a lavish manner, regardless of expense. But little over a
century after its foundation the fame of its methods of treatment led to
the establishment of a larger and still more luxurious institution--the
Mansuri hospital at Cairo. It seems that a certain sultan, having been
cured by medicines from the Damascene hospital, determined to build
one of his own at Cairo which should eclipse even the great Damascene
institution.

In a single year (1283-1284) this hospital was begun and completed. No
efforts were spared in hurrying on the good work, and no one was exempt
from performing labor on the building if he chanced to pass one of
the adjoining streets. It was the order of the sultan that any person
passing near could be impressed into the work, and this order was
carried out to the letter, noblemen and beggars alike being forced to
lend a hand. Very naturally, the adjacent thoroughfares became unpopular
and practically deserted, but still the holy work progressed rapidly and
was shortly completed.

This immense structure is said to have contained four courts, each
having a fountain in the centre; lecture-halls, wards for isolating
certain diseases, and a department that corresponded to the modern
hospital's "out-patient" department. The yearly endowment amounted to
something like the equivalent of one hundred and twenty-five thousand
dollars. A novel feature was a hall where musicians played day and
night, and another where story-tellers were employed, so that persons
troubled with insomnia were amused and melancholiacs cheered. Those of a
religious turn of mind could listen to readings of the Koran, conducted
continuously by a staff of some fifty chaplains. Each patient on leaving
the hospital received some gold pieces, that he need not be obliged to
attempt hard labor at once.

In considering the astonishing tales of these sumptuous Arabian
institutions, it should be borne in mind that our accounts of them are,
for the most part, from Mohammedan sources. Nevertheless, there can be
little question that they were enormous institutions, far surpassing any
similar institutions in western Europe. The so-called hospitals in the
West were,