cause, therefore that cause will prevail
against all obstacles. Mahomet has become more familiar with the Jewish
Scriptures, and many of the suras are recapitulations of the lives of
Jewish heroes, especial preference being given to Abraham as mythical
founder of his race, and to Lot as the typical example of one righteous
man sent to warn the iniquitous. The style has certainly matured, and in
so doing has lost much of its primal fire. It is still stirring and
vibrant, but passages of almost bald narrative are interposed, shadows
upon the shining floor of his original zeal. He has become increasingly
reiterative, too,--a quality easily attained by those who have but
one message, in this case a message of warning and exhortation, and
are feverishly anxious to brand its urgency upon the hearts of their
fellow-men.

Confined within so limited an area, his energy recoiled upon itself, and
the despondency that so easily besets men of action when that necessity
is denied them, overcame his mind. Only at the yearly pilgrimage was he
able to gain a hearing from his Meccan brethren, and then, says the
chronicler bitterly, "none would believe." The Hashim could not trade or
intermarry with any outside their clan, and there seemed no chance of
circumstances removing their disabilities. Mahomet's hopes of embracing
all Mecca in his faith wavered and fled, until it seemed as if Allah no
longer protected his chosen.

But after two years of negation and impotence, an end to the persecution
of the Muslim was in sight, and in 619 the ban was removed. Legend has it
that when the chiefs of the Kaaba went to look upon the document they
found it devoured by ants, and took this as a sign of the displeasure of
their gods. The ban was thus removed by supernatural agency when its
prolongation would have meant final disaster for Mahomet. In the light of
later knowledge it is evident that the removal of the ban was the result
of the exertions of Abu Talib, and it was owing to his high reputation
among the Kureisch that they pardoned his turbulent and blasphemous
nephew. At the end of two years also, the Muslim were considerably
weakened, both in staying powers and reputation. They were now allowed to
go freely in the city, and the immediate prospect seemed certainly
brighter for Mahomet when there fell the greatest blow that could have
afflicted his sensitive spirit.

Khadijah, his companion and sustainer through so many troublous years,
d