One day Mrs.Lyons passed through the room where he was teaching Mr.L.and he turned his head away from her and spat towards her with a look of unutterable contempt.

It was the last time he did it, and he has now become so civilized that he can say good morning to the wife of a missionary, and even consent to teach the sacred, pure and undefiled Arabic to a woman! I believe that he has not yet given his assent to the fact that the earth revolves on its axis, but he has learned that there are women in the world who know more than Sheikh Owad.
In ancient times Moslem women were occasionally taught to read the Koran, and among the wealthier and more aristocratic classes, married women are now sometimes taught to read, but the mass of the Moslem men are bitterly opposed to the instruction of women.

When a man decides to have his wife taught to read, the usual plan is to hire a blind Mohammedan Sheikh, who knows the Koran by heart.

He sits at one side of the room, and she at the other, some elderly woman, either her mother or her mother-in-law, being present.

The blind Sheikhs have remarkable memories and sharp ears, and can detect the slightest error in pronunciation or rendering, so they are employed in the most of the Moslem-schools.