rcial
expedition, as his father's representative on board a pilgrim ship
chartered by the wealthy Arab to convey a crowd of pious Malays to the
Holy Shrine. That was in the days when steam was not in those seas--or,
at least, not so much as now. The voyage was long, and the young man's
eyes were opened to the wonders of many lands. Allah had made it his
fate to become a pilgrim very early in life. This was a great favour
of Heaven, and it could not have been bestowed upon a man who prized it
more, or who made himself more worthy of it by the unswerving piety of
his heart and by the religious solemnity of his demeanour. Later on it
became clear that the book of his destiny contained the programme of a
wandering life. He visited Bombay and Calcutta, looked in at the Persian
Gulf, beheld in due course the high and barren coasts of the Gulf of
Suez, and this was the limit of his wanderings westward. He was then
twenty-seven, and the writing on his forehead decreed that the time had
come for him to return to the Straits and take from his dying father's
hands the many threads of a business that was spread over all the
Archipelago: from Sumatra to New Guinea, from Batavia to Palawan.

Very soon his ability, his will--strong to obstinacy--his wisdom beyond
his years, caused him to be recognized as the head of a family whose
members and connections were found in every part of those seas. An uncle
here--a brother there; a father-in-law in Batavia, another in Palembang;
husbands of numerous sisters; cousins innumerable scattered north,
south, east, and west--in every place where there was trade: the great
family lay like a network over the islands. They lent money to
princes, influenced the council-rooms, faced--if need be--with peaceful
intrepidity the white rulers who held the land and the sea under the
edge of sharp swords; and they all paid great deference to Abdulla,
listened to his advice, entered into his plans--because he was wise,
pious, and fortunate.

He bore himself with the humility becoming a Believer, who never
forgets, even for one moment of his waking life, that he is the servant
of the Most High. He was largely charitable because the charitable man
is the friend of Allah, and when he walked out of his house--built of
stone, just outside the town of Penang--on his way to his godowns in the
port, he had often to snatch his hand away sharply from under the lips
of men of his race and creed; and often he had to murm