On studying Esha further, Clara discovered that she was half Mahometan, and could speak Arabic. Her mixed notions she had got partly from her father, Amri, who belonged to one of those African tribes who cultivate a pure deism, tempered only by faith in the mission of Mahomet as an inspired prophet. Amri had been captured by a hostile tribe and sold into slavery. He lived long enough to teach his little Esha some things which she remembered. She could repeat several Arabic poems, and Clara first became familiar with the Arabian Nights through this old household drudge. One of these poems had a mystical charm for Clara. Through the illiterate garb which the slave’s English gave it, Clara detected a significance that led her to write out a paraphrase in the following words:— “The sick man lay on his bed of pain. ‘Allah!’ he moaned; and his heart grew tender, and his eyes moist, with prayer. “The next morning the tempter said to him: ‘No answer comes from Allah. Call louder, still no Allah will hear thee or ease thy pain.’ “The sick man shuddered. His heart grew cold with doubt and inquietude; when suddenly before him stood Elias. “‘Child!’ said Elias, ‘why art thou sad? Dost think thy prayers are unheard and unanswered; that thy devotion is all in vain?’ “And the sick man replied: ‘Ah! so often, and with such tears I have called on Allah! I call _Allah!_ but never do I hear his “Here am I!”’ “And Elias left the sick man; but God said to Elias: ‘Go to the tempted one; lift him up from his despair and unbelief. “‘Tell him that his very longing is its own fulfilment; that his very prayer, “Come, Allah!” is Allah’s answer, “Here am I!”’ “Yes, every good aspiration is an angel straight from God. Say from the heart, ‘O my Father!’ and that very utterance is the Father’s reply, ‘Here, my child!’” [23] Like many native Africans, Esha was fully assured of the existence of spirits, and of their power, in exceptional cases, to manifest themselves to mortals. And she related so many facts within her own experience, that Clara became a believer on human testimony,—the more readily because Esha’s faith in demonism was unmixed with superstition. “Tell me, Esha,” said Clara, at one of their secret midnight conferences, “were you ever whipped?” “Never badly, darlin’. It ain’t de whippins and de suf’rins dat make de wrong ob slavery. De mos kindest thing dey could do de slabe would be ter treat him so he wouldn’t stay a slabe no how. But dey know jes how fur to go, widout stirrin’ up de man inside ob him. An’ dat’s the cuss ob slabery.” “But, Esha, don’t they generally treat the women well on the plantations?”