The Days of Mohammed

l all my wan

teps to Thee

me, I beseech you! Bow before that Great Sovereign of all wisdom and light, whom we worship through these vague symbols of fire and brightness; plead with him before whom I dare not come, in my behalf. Beseech of him, if he will condescend to notice his most humble priest, that he may lead him into light effulgent, into all truth, and that he may clear from his soul these vap

ut he still stood with upraised arms, gazing into the intense depths of the Persi

that swept downward to the ground. His black beard descended far over his breast, and from the e

s toward the same purple sky, as if pointing with long, red fingers, in mockery of the priest's devotion; and the ruddy glare, falling upon him as he stood so still there, enveloped him with a halo of light. It gleamed upon his head, upon his uplifted hands

; the mountain-tops shone with a rim of silver, the valleys far be

e, he was getting a faint, far-off gleam of the true nature of Nature's God. His glance fell to the changing landscape below; hi

rned low on

hey will mayhap follow him to slay him. And they will bow again to yon image, and defile thine altars again with infants' blood, not discerning the tru

essed a prayer direct to the Deity,

blackening altar. It flared up for an instant, then f

priest. "Yea, mockery of the

ly, rolled his white robes into a ball, and plunged farther into the cave. In the darkness the rush of falling water warned him that an abyss was near. Dropping on his knees, he crept carefully forward until his hand rested on the jagged edge of a ledge of rock. Beside him the water fell into a yawni