ecame a Christian.[61] He
was then twenty-seven years of age.

_The Brother's Dagger_

In the world of the East news travels like magic by Arab dhow (sailing
ship) and camel caravan. Very quickly the news was in Arabia that
Sabat had renounced Mohammed and become a Christian. At once Sabat's
brother rose, girded on his dagger, left the tents of his tribe,
mounted his camel and coursed across Arabia to a port. There he took
ship for Madras. Landing, he disguised himself as an Indian and went
up to Vizagapatam to the house where his brother Sabat was living.

Sabat saw this Indian, as he appeared to be, standing before him. He
suspected nothing. Suddenly the disguised brother put his hand within
his robe, seized his dagger, and leaping at Sabat made a fierce blow
at him. Sabat flung out his arm. He spoilt his brother's aim, but
he was too late to save himself. He was wounded, but not killed. The
brother threw off his disguise, and Sabat--remembering the forgiveness
of Abdallah--forgave his brother, gave him many presents, and sent
loving messages to his mother.

Sabat decided that he could no longer work as an expounder of Moslem
law: he wanted to do work that would help to spread the Christian
Faith. He went away north to Calcutta, and there he joined the
great men who were working at the task of translating the Bible into
different languages and printing them. This work pleased Sabat, for
was it not through reading an Arabic New Testament that all his own
life had been changed?

Because Sabat knew Persian as well as Arabic he was sent to help a
very clever young chaplain from England named Henry Martyn, who was
busily at work translating the New Testament into Persian and Arabic.
So Sabat went up the Ganges to Cawnpore with Henry Martyn.

Sabat's fiery temper nearly drove Martyn wild. His was a flaming Arab
spirit, hot-headed and impetuous; yet he would be ready to die for
the man he cared for; proud and often ignorant, yet simple--as Martyn
said, "an artless child of the desert."

Sabat's knowledge of Persian was not really so good as he himself
thought it was, and some of the Indian translators at Calcutta
criticised his translation. At this he got furiously angry, and, like
St. Peter, the fiery, impetuous apostle, he denied Jesus Christ and
spoke against Christianity.

With his heart burning with rage and his great voice thundering with
anger, Sabat left his friends, went aboard ship and sailed down the