Page 446 - Neglected Arabia Vol 2

Just Another Patient
Rev. G. J. Pknnings

O ETEN we look upon people in the .mass, In couseuucnce we too
often forget that the mass is com^sed of individuals all very
much like ourselves. Each was horn somewhere, each was the
object of some fond parent’s solicitude, each grew up in some
environment, and each now occupies some place in the social fabric; each
li.ts his hopes and fears, his successes and disappointments, his longings,
heartaches and tragedies, hor instance, a group with more varied life
experiences than that of the manumitted slaves in Mahrciu, it would lie
1,.,,-d to find anywhere.
1’or example, there is here] bin Mubarak, whom one might easily over­
look as just another patient in the Mason Memorial 1 fospital. With his
small eais, short krinkly_ hail, scpiat nose, almost toothless jaws and a color
so black that no bootblack could improve on it, he would be the last WO
would suspect of having passed through many experiences. Hut one day
when 1 asked him in a fiiendly way, to what he owed his exceptionally
Mack color, he told me that he was a Nubian by birth. Then bv a little
,|iie,spoiling, we managed to piece together a few of the main events in his
life, which, told in his own language, would read about as follows:
"J was horn in a country, very far away, called Nubia, in the Sudan.
Why, it is twice as big as all Arabia, and very much more fruitful. Mv
lather was a sheikh, a very powerful man, who often went hunting, j
I,member how once, when 1 was a little hoy, he got into a light about a
unman. He claimed the right to marry her,’but others disputed bis right.
The quarrel turned into a light. My father drew bis sword. All blows
...med at him missed, but bis went home, so that he killed four or live of
liuin. llicn he mairicd that woman. Often they tried to avenge them-
>r!vc\s on him, but he was too powerful and smart for them to accomplish
anything. But after a few years my father died Gods death (i.e., died a
ii.itural death). After that we lost our position o! prominence. The
j.,o|K*rty was divided and scattered, and my mother became poor. 1 used
t«i wander about, eating- here and sleeping there. One day a woman of our
juaintance asked me to accompany her to take care of her baby, while
u» «
die gathered wood in the desert. But it was all a ruse. Fur as soon as
nc had gone some distance from the town, she delivered me to some
Al»)Miinian soldiers. Her purpose in doing this was revenge, for my
Miller in his time had killed some of her relatives and had sold others in
djwry to the Abysinnians also. 1 was sold for blocks of salt; for salt, in
iIuim* regions is scarce and expensive, while as to gold and silver, that is
l..»rilly known.
“My stay in Abysinnia was short, for I was taken from place to place
nil we reached the Red Sea coast, where they sold me for a small sum to
*11 Arab slave dealer. lie took me, with others, across the sea to Yemen,
ulierc l came into the possession of a good master, with whom I remained
long time. When I had reached maturity, he gave me one of his
I.if a
iBvcgirls in marriage, a woman who could not In* sold. I luring the l\vo
i cars that I lived with her, a daughter was horn to us. Hut, alas, my
Mrr died, and trouble arose when it came to dividing the inheritance.