There is one class of the Arab race, of which little or nothing has been
said in the preceding pages, for the simple reason that there is little
to be said of missionary work or progress among them. We refer to the
Bedawin Arabs. The true sons of Ishmael, boasting of their descent from
him, living a wild, free and independent life, rough, untutored and
warlike, plundering, robbing and murdering one another as a business;
roaming over the vast plains which extend from Aleppo to Baghdad, and
from Baghdad to Central Arabia, and bordering the outskirts of the more
settled parts of Syria and Palestine; ignorant of reading and writing,
and yet transacting extensive business in wool and live-stock with the
border towns and cities; nominally Mohammedans, and yet disobeying every
precept of Moslem faith and practice; subjects of the Ottoman Sultan,
and yet living in perpetual rebellion or coaxed by heavy bribes into
nominal submission; suffering untold hardships from their life of
constant exposure to winter storms and summer heats; without proper
food, clothing or shelter, and utterly destitute of medical aid and
relief, and yet despising the refinements of civilized life, and
regarding with contempt the man who will sleep under a roof; they
constitute a most ancient, attractive class of men, interesting to every
lover of his race, and especially to the Missionary of the Cross.
European missionaries can do little among them. To say nothing of the
rough, nomadic, unsettled and perilous life they lead, any European
would find himself so much an object of curiosity and suspicion among
them, and the peculiar Bedawin pronunciation of the Arabic so different
from the correct pronunciation, that he would be constantly embarrassed.
Native missionaries, on the other hand, can go among them freely, and if
provided with a supply of vaccine virus and simple medicines, can have
the most unrestrained access to them. During the last ten years, several
native colporteurs have been sent among the Bedawin, and lately the
Native Missionary Society in Beirut has sent out one of its teachers as
a missionary to the Arabs. There is little use in taking books among
them, as very few can make use of them. Mr. Arthington of Leeds,
England, has been making earnest efforts to induce the Bedawin to send
their children to schools in the towns, or allow schools to be opened
among their own camps. We have tried every means to induce their leading
Sheikhs to send their sons and daughters to Beirut for instruction, but
the Arabs all dread sending their children to any point within the
jurisdiction of the Turks, lest they be suddenly seized by the Turks as
hostages for the good behavior of their parents. The latter course,
_i.e._, sending teachers to live among them, to migrate with them and
teach their children as it were "on the wing," seems to be the one most
practicable, as soon as teachers can be trained. Until the Turkish
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