"Well,"  thought  Jean,  looking  after  him,  "when  it  conies
to  the  point,  he  does  their  Christianity  after  all ;  and  that
leaves  me  alone,  unless  I  turn  Mohammedan  !"


CHAPTER  XXXV

AFTERWARD

THE  night  of  the  funeral  it  began  to  rain ;  and  it  rained
steadily  for  three  days.  It  was,  besides,  the  beginning  of
Moharrem.  Religious  processions  could  be  heard  making
their  way  through  the  slimy  streets.  The  Mohammedans
were  celebrating  the  martydom  of  Hassan  and  Husain,
who  had  been  killed  in  battle  not  long  after  the  death  of
Mohammed.  Over  the  wrongs  of  these  two,  they  worked
themselves  into  a  frenzy ;  and  as  the  days  went  on,  men  were
often  seen  in  the  streets  slashing  their  breasts  with  knives
and  streaming  with  blood.  This  atmosphere  of  fanatical
excitement  added  its  share  to  the  discomfort  of  the  mission-
aries, besides  distracting  the  attention  of  the  civic  authori-
ties from  their  cause.
The  days  dragged  on  very  slowly  and  very  full  of  work
and  anxiety.  Hundreds  of  women  of  all  ranks  came  to  call
on  Margaret  Lawrence  to  "heal  her  head."  She  saw  them
all,  talked  with-  them  calmly  about  her  sorrow,  explained
to  them  the  hopes  that  encouraged  her  to  take  up  life  again
and  the  motives  that  made  it  impossible  to  curse  the  mur-
derer or  to  indulge  in  ostentatious  grief.  She  made  no  sign,
when,  with  unintentional  brutality,  they  turned  the  knife
in  her  wounds ;  and  she  sent  them  away  marvelling  at  the
religion  that  could  work  such  wonders  in  a  human  heart.
