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"If thou wilt," said the Bedouin, "take her up to Prince Sherkan, son of King Omar ben Ennuman, lord of Baghdad and of the land of Khorassan, and I will agree to whatever conditions thou mayst impose on me; for when he sees her, she will surely please him, and he will pay thee her price and a good profit to boot for thyself."
He said it was like Omar Khayyam in the Wilderness and Shelley's Epipsychidion, whatever that is; and he prattled on and on and read and read till my head began to split. Mother' her voice sank to a whisper 'I hit him! 'Elsa! 'I did! she went on, defiantly.
Then you will see," answered my friend mysteriously, and as he spoke the blood-red flash showed again and the great gun thundered forth its salute. While the dawn was spreading we ate our morning meal with eyes fixed upon the great high crag whence the gun belched forth with monotonous regularity; then Omar and I strolled away together further up the valley to occupy our time until the sun-rise.
The tumult was appeased by the weight and moderation of Abubeker. "Is it Mahomet," said he to Omar and the multitude, "or the God of Mahomet, whom you worship? The God of Mahomet liveth forever; but the apostle was a mortal like ourselves, and according to his own prediction, he has experienced the common fate of mortality."
Before them, Arab rule in Palestine was tolerant enough, and the Caliph Omar was scrupulously careful when he entered Jerusalem as a conqueror to respect Christian prejudices and the monuments of our creed.
It annoyed him that he had not waited for the storm to go down, instead of making the bargain with Mohammed, for he must now keep his word and pay the boy what he had earned. This day his rich catch of fish gave Omar no pleasure. His face grew darker and darker, while the men were opening the nets and counting the fish.
But I have heard it quite seriously suggested that if some future Attila or Jinghis were to wield as a unit the entire military strength of the four hundred millions of Chinese, possessed with some suddenly-conceived idea of conquering the world, even as Omar and Abderrahman wielded as a unit the newly-welded power of the Saracens in the seventh and eighth centuries, then perhaps a staggering blow might yet be dealt against European civilization.
The mighty Mosque of Omar, and the paved court around it, occupy a fourth part of Jerusalem. They are upon Mount Moriah, where King Solomon's Temple stood. This Mosque is the holiest place the Mohammedan knows, outside of Mecca. Up to within a year or two past, no Christian could gain admission to it or its court for love or money.
Within ten years of the Hegira, or commencement of the Mahomedan era, we find the followers of the Prophet already in Syria. The Byzantine army was overwhelmed at the battle of the Yarmuk, and the Arabs laid siege to Jerusalem. The city capitulated to Omar, who granted terms of comparative magnanimity.
Thereupon, quoth Mu'aykib, 'I returned to my own house, and while I was sitting there behold, a messenger came to me from Omar and I was afraid and went to him, and when I came into his presence, in his hand was the dirham I had given his son. He said to me, 'Woe to thee Mu'aykib!
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