After his final examination at Cambridge, he turned his whole attention to Arabic; why, he himself knew not, except that he loved the language; it was God’s plan in his life. To secure special advantages he went first to Leipzig in October, 1880, and afterward to Assiut, Egypt. The Semitic scholar was becoming an Arab and fell in love with the desert even then. He wrote from Assiut, after some months of study: “I am meditating a camel-ride in the desert. I mean to go from here to Luxor on a donkey, camping out every night, and from Luxor to Kossair, on the Red Sea, on a dromedary. ... I shall learn two things by doing this journey, Arabic and cooking.” An attack of fever prevented the journey, and Falconer returned to England. Even there his engrossing study was Arabic, in which he was now reading such difficult books as the Mo’allakat and Al Hariri; as he expressed it, “I expect to peg away at the Arabic dictionary till my last day.” In March, 1884, he married Miss Gwendolen Bevan; they took a journey to Italy, and then settled at Cambridge, where Keith Falconer lectured and studied. In the spring of 1885 he published his Kalilah and Dimnah, translated from the Syriac, with notes; a lasting monument to his Semitic scholarship and an example of his wide general learning.[145] Toward the end of the year 1884 his thoughts first began to be definitely drawn to the foreign mission field, but as yet without any special choice of field. A summary of the papers written on Arabia, by General Haig, for the _Church Missionary Intelligencer_ was published in _The Christian_, in February, 1885, and fell under the eyes of Keith Falconer. The idea of evangelizing Arabia took hold of him with Divine power. His whole soul answered, “Here am I, send me.” The immediate outcome was a request for an interview with General Haig, whom he accordingly met in London on February 21st, 1885, “to talk about Aden and Arabia.” He determined to go to Aden and see the field for himself. Only two questions did he stop to consider: First, as to the healthfulness of the place, and then whether he should go out as a free lance or should associate himself more or less closely with some existing society. Warmly attached to the Free Church of Scotland from his childhood, he met the Foreign Mission Committee of that church and his project was recognized by them. On October 7th he left, with his young wife, for Aden, and arrived there on October 28th. They remained until March 6th of the following spring. The first missionary report of this pioneer in South Arabia indicates what he thought of the field; and why he decided to make Sheikh Othman, and not Aden, the centre of future work; it also sets forth the methods which Keith Falconer proposed to adopt for the evangelization of Arabia. The following extracts are of especial interest: