2.5 Mohamed In The Desert One day, when Mohamed was three years old, his foster brother went to Halirna crying, "Mother, mother, two men in white are holding my Qurayshi brother!" Halima relates, "I ran to him, and his foster father ran to him. We found him standing there looking pale. I asked him, 'What is the matter, my son?' And he said, "Two men in white came and laid me on my back. They took out something from my inside and left." Halima and her husband did not know what to think, but the incident passed, and the child was well and rapidly grew bigger and stronger. He remained in the desert, breathing the pure desert air, and learning the pure tongue of the desert Arabs until he was five years old. In later years, joking, he used to tell his friends, "I am the purest Arab among you. I am a Qurayshi and I was nursed by Banu Saad." When Mohamed was about five years old, Halima met some men from Abyssinia who seemed very much interested in the child and kept asking her questions about him. Then they said, "This child will be an individual of great importance; we will take him to our country with us. We have heard about him before." Halima could barely escape with Mohamed, then she returned him to his mother in Mecca, judging that he would be safer there. Halima and her people remained a happy memory to Mohamed. When he grew up, he used to shower her with gifts whenever she came to visit him. Once, after his marriage to Khadija, there was a year of scarcity in the mountains, so when Halima came to visit him she returned with camels carrying water and food, and forty head of sheep.