I thought to myself that he might jest as well sed a “sister” while he wuz about it, but then I laid it to the excitement of the occasion—I wuz excited myself and felt bad. I hated to have him go, and when he wuz a-goin’ to let go of my hands I didn’t know. I wuz a-thinkin’ that if he offered to kiss me I didn’t know what I should do—it wuzn’t nothin’ I wanted, leavin’ Josiah out of the question, but I didn’t know what he would take it into his head to do. But he didn’t offer nothin’ of the kind, which I wuz glad enough on. But he gin my hands a long, hard clasp, and sez he:
“Farewell!” And then he let go. He looked bad, sorrerful as death. And I sez, onbeknown to me:
“Won’t you wait and bid good-bye to Alice?”
“No,” sez he; “I leave with you my farewell to her. May heaven bless her!” sez he.
“Amen!” sez I.
It wuz some as if we wuz to protracted meetin’, only more strange-like, and mebby not quite so protracted, but curouser.
Sez I, with a real good axent—“My heart will go with you, Al Faizi; I shall think of you when you’re fur away, some as I do of my own boy—knowin’ that you are doin’ your best for your own soul, and for everybody round you.”
“I go to my own people,” sez he sadly. “Forevermore will I work to help them to the right way—help them to understand the teachings of the Lord Christ. Nowhere else do I find such a pure religion as His. In my own home, far away beyond the dark waters”—and he made that gester of his towards the East—“I will work till I die to bring my people to know this great love, this mighty King. And there also I will pray that your people, too, may follow His teachings, and the people in the great countries I have visited with you, that these lands may renounce their false ways, and follow His gentle and lovely guidance, and be led into His truth. I will give my life for this,” sez he.
His tone wuz sweet and tender. It sounded to me sunthin’ like the autumn winds a-rustlin’ the leaves over the grave of the one you love.
I wuz almost a-cryin’, and sez I: