"'My son,' said I, 'I will not restrain thee: thou art no longer a child.
Thou hast heard me discourse on the subject of persecution, and knowest
that poison was administered to me personally on account of my inability to
perceive the supernatural light emanating from the navel of Brother
Gregory. Thou art aware that thou wilt be beaten with rods and pricked with
goads, chained and starved in a dungeon, very probably blinded, very
possibly burned with fire?'

"'All these things I am prepared to undergo,' said Abdallah; and he
embraced me and bid me farewell.

"After certain moons he returned covered with weals and scars, and his
bones protruded through his skin.

"'Whence are these weals and scars?' asked I, 'and what signifies this
protrusion of thy bones?'

"'The weals and the scars,' answered he, 'proceed from the floggings
inflicted upon me by command of the Caliph; and my bones protrude by reason
of the omission of his officers to furnish me with either food or drink in
the dungeon wherein I was imprisoned by his orders.'

"'O my son,' exclaimed I, 'in the eyes of faith and right reason these
scars are lovelier than the moles of beauty, and the sight of thy bones is
like the beholding of hidden treasure!'

"And Abdallah strove to look as though he believed me; nor did he entirely
fail therein. And I took him, and fed him, and healed him, and sent him
forth a second time into the world.