with them.[424] O Lord, I have finished my course. And now to him that cometh after me I leave the kingdom and the Caliphate firmly stablished and at peace.’ Then he lay down quietly and rested for a time. [Sidenote: Omar desires to be interred beside the Prophet.] After a while he bade his son go forth, and see who it was that had wounded him. Being told that it was Abu Lulû, he exclaimed:--‘Praise be to the Lord that it was not one who had ever bowed down before Him, even once, in prayer! Now, Abdallah, my son, go in unto Ayesha, and ask her leave that I be buried in her chamber by the side of the Prophet, and by the side of Abu Bekr. If she refuse, then bury me by the other Moslems, in the graveyard of Backî.[425] And list thee, Abdallah, if they disagree’ (for he too was to have a voice in the election) ‘then be thou with the majority; or, if the votes be equal, then choose thou that side on which is Abd al Rahmân. Now let the people come in.’ Crowds had assembled at the door; and, permission having been given, they approached to make obeisance. As they passed in and out, Omar asked whether any leading man had joined in conspiring against him. ‘The Lord forbid!’ was the loud response of all, in horror at the very word. For this burying-ground, see _Life of Mahomet_, p. 208.] [Sidenote: Omar’s death.] Among the rest, Aly came forward to inquire; and as he sat by the bedside, the son of Abbâs came up. Omar, who dreaded the factious spirit of the latter, said: ‘O Ibn Abbâs, art thou with me in this matter?’ He signified assent, whereupon Omar added earnestly: ‘See that thou deceive me not, thou and thy fellows.[426] Now, Abdallah, my son, raise up my head from the pillow, and then lay it gently on the ground:[427] peradventure the Lord may in mercy take me thus, this night, for I fear the horrors of the rising sun.’ A physician gave him to drink of date-water; but it oozed through the wound unchanged; and so also with a draught of milk. Which when the physician saw, he said: ‘I perceive that the wound is mortal: make now thy testament, O Commander of the Faithful.’ ‘That,’ said Omar, ‘have I done already.’ As he lay, his head resting on the bosom of his son, he recited this couplet:-- It had gone hard with my soul, if I had not been a Moslem; But verily all the appointed prayers have I observed, and fasted. [Sidenote: Nov. 3, A.D. 644.] And so, in a low voice, he kept repeating the name of the Lord, and the short Moslem creed, until his spirit passed away. It was the 26th of Dzul Hijj, the 23rd year of the Hegira. He had reigned for the space of ten years and a half.[428] [Sidenote: Achievements of his Calphate.]