from the Economist June 11 – 17th

” in old age, though, he was niether mad nor broke, as some boxers were. He was placid,serene and, in the face of his relentless illness, brave. That,too,became an image of centuries-long endurance of blacks and their spiritual patience. He spent much of his time in contemplation,rising at dawn and kneeling to face Mecca to pray so long as his body was up to it. Conquering the world, as he had done time after time with pure punching skill,did not now seem the source of true happiness. Nonetheless,he loved to watch film of his old bouts – “Sooooh fast! Sooooh pretty! – and think what they had done for the self esteem of his people. And his words,beong now so few rather than so many,carried all the more conviction. he hoped to be remembered “as a man who never looked down on those who looked up to him”