This reply of Lokman was so pleasing to Allah, that He gave him the gift of wisdom to such a degree of excellence, that he became capable of instructing all men; and this he did by means of a great multitude of maxims, sentences, and parables to the number of ten thousand, each of which is more valuable than the whole world.[273] When Lokman did not know any thing with which others were acquainted, he held his tongue, and did not ask questions and thus divulge his ignorance. As he lived to a great age, he was alive in the days King David. Now David made a coat of mail, and showed it to Lokman. The sage had seen nothing like it before, and did not know what purpose it was to serve, but he looked knowing and nodded his head. Presently David put the armor upon him, and marched, and said, “It is serviceable in war.” Then Lokman understood its object; so his mouth became unsealed and he talked about it. Lokman used to say, “Silence is wisdom, but few practise it.”[274] Thalebi relates, in his Commentary on the Koran, that Lokman was a slave, and that having been sent along with other slaves into the country to gather fruit, his fellow-slaves ate them, and charged Lokman with having done so. Lokman, to justify himself, said to his master, “Let every one of us slaves be given warm water to drink, and you will soon see who has been the thief.” The expedient succeeded; the slaves who had eaten the fruit vomited it, and Lokman threw up only warm water. The same story precisely is told of Æsop. Lokman is always spoken of as black, with thick lips. He is regarded by the Arabs much as is Bidpay by the Indians, and Æsop by the Europeans, as the Father of Fable. XXII. THE PROPHET SALEH. The prophet Saleh was the son of Ad, son of Aram, son of Shem, and is not to be confused with Saleh, son of Arphaxad. The Mussulmans say that he was sent to convert the Thamudites. The Thamudites were in size and strength like their brethren the Adites, but they inhabited the rocks, which they dug out into spacious mansions. They had in the midst of their land an unfailing supply of sweet and limpid water. They were idolaters. Saleh came armed with the command of Allah to these men, and he preached to them that they should turn from the worship of stocks and stones to that of the living God who made them. Now Saleh had been born among the Thamudites, but he had never been an idolater. When he was young, the natives of the land had laughed at him, and said, “He is young and inexperienced; when he is old, and has grown wiser, he will adore our gods.” When Saleh grew old, he forbade the Thamudites to worship idols, and he spoke to them of the true and only God. But they said, “What miracle can you work, to prove that your mission is from God?”[275] Then he said, “Oh, my people, a she-camel that shall come from God shall be to you for a sign. Let her go and eat on the earth, and do her no injury, that a terrible retribution fall not upon you.”[276]