A certain primitive simplicity in the Mohammedan character—not the least of its attractions—is pointedly illustrated by the following incidents drawn from Mohammed’s life, for which, as for so much else in these pages, I am indebted to my deceased friend Ahmed Midhat. In his early days Mohammed belonged to a humble sphere of life. At the age of twenty-four he married the widow of a rich merchant in whose employ he had been in a subordinate capacity. He remained devotedly attached to her, although she was sixteen years his senior. Only after her death did he marry again; but his thoughts would still revert to the one he had lost and to whom he owed his rise in the world. This excited the jealousy of his second wife, with whom otherwise he lived most happily. One day she pressed him to assure her that she was as dear to him as his first wife had been. “I love you dearly,” Mohammed replied, “but do not ask me to say that I love you as much as Chadidja, for she was the first human being to believe in me.” It was only after his first wife’s death that Mohammed, at the age of forty, really came forward and proclaimed himself a leader of men with a divine mission. It is related of Mohammed that when he felt his end approaching he summoned his followers around him, and, being still possessed of sufficient strength to address them, told them that he knew his days were numbered, and he wished to ask whether there was anyone present who could say that he had done him a wrong; if so, he was ready to crave his forgiveness. They replied with one voice that Mohammed had been their friend and benefactor and that he had wronged no man. Then someone got up and said he had a claim against him. On a certain occasion he had been present when a beggar had solicited alms of Mohammed, who, apparently having no money with him, had borrowed a drachma of the speaker to give to the beggar. This drachma Mohammed had omitted to return to him. Such, we are told, was the slight record of wrong and indebtedness of the founder of a religion which hundreds, aye thousands, of millions of human beings have professed in life and have adhered to until their last breath. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ CHAPTER XV CONCLUSION Truths can never be confirmed enough, Though doubts did ever sleep. SHAKESPEARE