“…I shall surely overwhelm you with cavalry and infantry!”
When he turned away, the Messenger of Allah ﷺ said,
“O Allah, suffice me against ʿĀmir ibn al-Ṭufayl.”
After they had left the Messenger of Allah ﷺ, ʿĀmir said to Arbad, “What became of the task I assigned you? By Allah, there was no man on earth whose threat to my life I feared more (1) than yours, but by the Living God I shall never fear you again!”
Arbad replied, “Woe to you—do not rush at me! By Allah, every time I resolved to do what you ordered (2) you stepped between me and the man until I could see nothing but you. Was I to strike you with the sword?”
They set off for their homeland, and when they were partway along the road Allah sent a plague upon ʿĀmir ibn al-Ṭufayl that lodged in his neck. He died in the house of a woman from Banū Salūl, crying out,
“O sons of ʿĀmir, a swelling like the swelling of a young camel—in the house of a woman of Banū Salūl (3)!”
Ibn Hishām says (4): It is also reported that he shouted, “A swelling like the swelling of camels, and death (5) in the house of a Salūlī woman.”
Al-Ḥāfiẓ al-Bayhaqī relates (6) through the chain of al-Zubayr ibn Bakkār: “Fāṭimah bint ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz ibn Mawlah (7) told me, from her father, from her grandfather Mawlah ibn Jamīl, that ʿĀmir ibn al-Ṭufayl came to the Messenger of Allah ﷺ. The Prophet said to him, ‘O ʿĀmir, embrace Islam.’
He replied, ‘I will embrace Islam on condition that the wabar is mine and the madr is yours.’
The Prophet said, ‘No.’ Then he said again, [O ʿĀmir] (8) ‘Embrace Islam.’
ʿĀmir repeated, ‘I will accept on the condition that the wabar is mine and the madr is yours.’
The Prophet answered, ‘No.’ So ʿĀmir turned away, saying, ‘By Allah, Muḥammad, I will flood it against you with sleek horses and clean-shaven warriors; I will tie a horse to every palm-tree!’
The Messenger of Allah ﷺ said, ‘O Allah, suffice me against ʿĀmir and guide his people.’
ʿĀmir departed, and when he reached the outskirts of Madinah he encountered a woman of his clan known as a Salūlī. He dismounted, slept in her house, and a glandular swelling seized his throat. He leapt onto his horse, seized his spear, and rode about shouting,
‘A swelling like the swelling of a young camel and death in the house of a Salūlī woman!’
He continued in that state until he fell from his horse dead.
Al-Ḥāfiẓ Abū ʿUmar ibn ʿAbd al-Barr records in al-Istīʿāb (9), in the section on the Companions, that this Mawlah was: ‘Mawlah ibn…’