He was persuaded by the tenets of his religion that by exercising the body in the pilgrimage to Mecca, the heart of man was enlightened in the knowledge and love of God.  He found by obeying the several duties of the religion he professed, and by enduring the consequent trials and privations of a pilgrimage without regard to any feelings of selfish gratification or indulgent ease, that, his nature being humbled, his love to God was more abundant.

His law commanded him to fast at stated periods, and although he was turned of seventy when I first saw him, yet he never failed, as the season of Rumzaun approached, to undergo the severity of that ordinance day by day during the full period of thirty days; and it was even a source of uneasiness to my venerated friend, when, two years prior to his decease, his medical friends, aided by the solicitude of his family, urged and prevailed on him to discontinue the duty, which by reason of his age was considered dangerous to health, and perhaps to life.  Prayer was his comfort; meditation and praise his chief delight.  I never saw him otherways than engaged in some profitable exercise, by which he was drawing near to his Creator, and preparing himself for the blessedness of eternity, on which his soul relied.

During our eleven years’ constant intercourse, I can answer for his early diligence; before the day had dawned his head was bowed in adoration to his Maker and Preserver.  At all seasons of the year, and under all circumstances, this duty was never omitted.  Even in sickness, if his strength failed him, his head was bowed on a tray of earth, to mark his dutiful recollection of the several hours appointed for prayer.  The Psalmist’s language has often been realized to my view, in him, ’Seven times a day do I praise thee, O Lord,’ and ’at midnight I will rise to give thanks unto Thee,’ when witnessing his undeviating observance of stated prayer duties; and when those duties were accomplished, even his amusements were gleaned from devotional works, visits of charity, and acts of benevolence.  I never saw him idle; every moment was occupied in prayer or in good works.  His memory was retentive, and every anecdote he related was a lesson calculated to lead the mind of his auditor to seek, trust, and obey God, or to love our neighbour as ourselves.

The many hours we have passed in profitable discourses or readings from our Holy Scripture and the lives of the Prophets have left on my memory lasting impressions.

I was, at first, surprised to find Meer Hadjee Shah so well acquainted with the prominent characters of our Scripture history, until the source from whence his knowledge had been enlarged was produced and read aloud by my husband every evening to our family party.  The ‘Hyaatool Kaaloob’ (a work before alluded to) occupied us for a very long period, each passage being verbally translated to me by my husband.

When that work was finished, our Holy Scripture was brought forward, which, as I read, each passage was again translated by my husband, either in Persian or Hindoostaunic, as best suited the understanding of our party at the time.  So interesting was the subject, that we have been five or six hours at, a time engaged without tiring or even remembering the flight of those moments which were devoted, I trust, so beneficially to us all.