PREMONITION OF DEATH.


Since the day when Mohammed had first conceived a dark foreboding of
his mother's insidious disease, he had become more earnest and
gloomy in his disposition. The other boys avoided meeting and coming
into collision with him; they paid the well-earned tribute of fruits
from their parents' gardens, and assumed an almost humble demeanor
in his presence. He sometimes challenged them to race or wrestle
with him, but only the strongest and most active would enter into
such trials with him, and he always remained the victor. They were
in the habit of turning down a side street when they saw him
advancing toward them, and, when they observed him among the rocks
with his little gun on his shoulder, they would hide themselves
behind some rocky projection and remain concealed until he had
passed. But Mohammed saw them. His eye would glitter when he passed
their hiding-places, and a contemptuous smile play about his lips.
"The hawks fear the eagle," he would murmur to himself, "but the
eagle will some day pluck out their feathers and show them that he
is master."

Striving to earn money to procure little luxuries for his mother, he
would more rarely absent himself from home for longer periods than
formerly. When the storm raged, and, the boldest fishermen feared to
venture over to Imbro where their nets were laid, Mohammed would
offer to go for them, provided they gave him double wages; and the
fishermen, fearing that the wild waves might bear away their nets
filled with the rare fish that only came up from the deep during the
storm, would willingly accede to his demands. One day when the sea
was roaring and foaming wildly, one of the fishermen stood upon the