MAHOMET. 259 



banished from the town, under penalty of death if they 

 returned. 



But there rose up a man whose convictions were 

 too strong to be hushed by the love of family or to be 

 quelled by the fear of death. Partly owing to his age 

 and dignified position, and unblemished name, partly 

 owing to the chivalrous nature of his Patriarch or 

 Patron, he was protected against his enemies, his life 

 was saved. Had there been a government at Mecca, 

 he would unquestionably have been put to death, and 

 as it was, he narrowly escaped. 



Mahomet was a poor lad subject to a nervous disease 

 which made him at first unfit for anything except the 

 despised occupation of the shepherd. When he grew 

 up he became a commercial traveller, acted as agent 

 for a rich widow, twenty-five years older than himself, 

 and obtained her hand. They lived happily together 

 for many years ; they were both of them exceedingly 

 religious people, and in the Rhamadan, a mouth held 

 sacred by the ancient Arabs, they used to live in a 

 cave outside the town, passing the time in prayer and 

 meditation. 



The disease of his childhood returned upon him 

 in his middle age ; it affected his mind in a strange 

 manner, and produced illusions on his senses. He 

 thought that he was haunted, that his body was the 

 house of an evil spirit. " I see a light," he said to his 

 wife, "and I hear a sound. I fear that I am one of the 

 possessed." This idea was most distressing to a pious 

 man. He became pale and haggard, he wandered 

 about on the hill near Mecca, crying out to God for 

 help. More than once he drew near the edge of a 

 cliff, and was tempted to hurl himself down, and so 

 put an end to his misery at once. 



