Page:History of Mahomet, the great imposter.pdf/4

 as to be able after his death to carry it on, and also, to establish it through all Arabia by his own power.

After his father's death, he continued uuderunder [sic] the tuition of his mother till the eighth year of his age, when, she also dying, he was taken under the care of his grandfather, Abdol Motallah, who, at his death, which happened the next year after, committed him to the care of his uncle, Abu Taleb, to be educated by him out of charity ; who carrying on a trade of merchandise, took him into this employment, and bred him up in the same business. For Mecca being situated in a very barren soil, could not of itself subsist; and therefore the inhabitants were forced to betake themselves to merchandise for their support; and the best men among them had scarce any other estate but the flock wherewith they trafficked; and therefore they all betook themselves to this course of life, which they seem to have received down from the Ishmaelites, from whom they were descended, and in the same manner as they carried on a trade into Syria, Persia and Egypt, on camels' backs, furnishing those countries with such commodities as come to them from India, Ethiopia, and other southern parts, for which commerce they were very advantageously situated, as lying near the Red Sea, where they had the port Jodda, the most convenient for shipping in all those straits.

In this course of life Mahomet was brought up, under his uncle; and as soon as he was of fit age, he was sent with his camels into Syria. On his coming to Bostra, a city on the confines of that country, while he was attending his uncle's factors in the vending of his wares in the public marketplace, he was there seen, (say the Mahometans,)