ABSTRACT
The importance of a knowledge of native languages, or at least of one, is fully realised in India and Egypt, in fact everywhere except in Tropical Africa, and nobody in those parts expects employment, far less promotion, in the political branch without possessing such knowledge. To an official whose life and energies are to be devoted to work among natives three qualifications are necessary; the first of these is a knowledge of native languages; the second a knowledge of native languages; the third something else which is quite different. The Arabian prophet Muhammad is said to have himself repudiated all claim to possessing the power of performing miracles, saying that the production of the Koran was sufficient proof of his divine inspiration. All Secretariat officers will be glad to hear that Abdullah nevertheless was subsequently re-admitted into the fold of the faithful, and was even made Governor of Egypt during the Kalifate of Omar.
