The very words of the opening of that chapter came to me:
'The omnipotence of love--its power of knitting together the entire
universe--is, of course, best understood by the Oriental mind. Just
after the loss of my dear wife I wrote the following poem called "The
Bedouin Child," dealing with the strange feeling among the Bedouins
about girl children, and I translated it into Arabic. Among these
Bedouins a father in enumerating his children never counts his
daughters, because a daughter is considered a disgrace.
'Ilyas the prophet, lingering 'neath the moon,
Heard from a tent a child's heart-withering wail,
Mixt with the message of the nightingale,
And, entering, found, sunk in mysterious swoon,
A little maiden dreaming there alone.
She babbled of her father sitting pale
'Neath wings of Death--'mid sights of sorrow and bale,
And pleaded for his life in piteous tone.
'"Poor child, plead on," the succouring prophet saith,
While she, with eager lips, like one who tries
To kiss a dream, stretches her arms and cries
To Heaven for help--"Plead on; such pure love-breath,
Beaching the Throne, might stay the wings of Death
That, in the Desert, fan thy father's eyes.
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