THE MAN WHO CAME BACK

Dominion, Volume 23, Issue 51, 23 November 1929, Page 28

THE MAN WHO CAME BACK

♦* ' ♦ In the days of the great Caliph Omar, a camel driver was leading bis eamels past an orchard on the outskirts of Medina. One camel broke off the overhanging bough of a fruit tree with his teeth, and the angry fruitgrower snatched up a big stone and threw it at the animal. The stone struck the camel on the head, and the poor beast fell dead. Maddened by the loss of the camel, the driver picked up the stone and struck the fruitgrower on the temple and killed him. Before the man could escape he was seized by the sons of the dead fruitgrower and brought up for judgment to the court of the famous Caliph. Omar was a very stern man, and he ordered the man-slayer to be beheaded. The camel-driver asked as a great favour that he might be given three days more life, so that he could go to his distant home and arrange his affairs. He swore that he would return at the end of three days and endure the -penalty of the law. But to this the Caliph would not consent. He said that he must either die on the spot or find a surety to die in bis place if he broke his word. The poor camel-driver gazed in despair at the throng of enemies and strangers around him. Not a friendly face could he see, and no one offered to become surety for him. The hide of death was spread at the feet of the Caliph, and the headsman bound the camel-driver’s hands, and made him kneel upon the hide to receive the fatal stroke. But as the headsman stood with drawn sword,' the driver cried in a voice of wild despair: Has the race of generous souls perished from the earth?” None of the spectators answered. Again the condemned man cried out in fiercer anguish. Abu Dhur, one of the companions of the Prophet, and a man of great nobility of character, was deeply moved by the appeal. Stepping forward, he offered himself as surety for the criminal, and the freed camel-driver went off. Three days passed, and be did not return, so Caliph Omar commanded that Abu Dhur should pay the forfeit. Abu Dhur knelt upon the hide of death with bls bands tied behind him, and the headsman again drew his sword. But this time the spectators were woefully moved, and, with their faces streaming with tears, they interceded with the Caliph, begging for the life of the man who had been one of the companions of their* great Prophet. Then, Just as the headsman was preparing to deal the awful stroke, someone cried ont: “Stop! For the sake of Allah, stop! Here is the camel-driver coming back." “Ton stupid •• fellow!” said the MM fe awndbdriwv wie M

fallen exhausted on the place of the execution. “Why have you come back;? Your surety would have died in your place, and you would have been free. “I came back,” said the camel-driver proudly, “to prove that the race of the truthful has not perished from the earth anymore than the race of the generous.” • “Then why did you go away at all? said Omar. “I wanted to prove that the race of the faithful was still alive,” said the man. “What do you mean?” asked the Caliph. “Just before I started out,” said the camel-driver, “a widowed woman asked me to take charge of her money. I hid it under a great rock, in a place no one but myself could find. If my life had not been spared for a few days, the secret of the hiding place would have died with me, and the widow would have been ruined. But now that I have given the money back to her, I can die with a quiet mind." “Well,” said the Caliph, his stern face breaking into a smile, “now that it has been proved that the race of the generous, the race of the truthful and the race of the faithful have not perished from the earth, I must show that "the race of the merciful and the race of the charitable are also still alive. So I pardon you, and pay myself the money for the fruit-grower’s family.”